Norway

Bergen, Norway..........

The photo on the top is from Bergen, Norway a town on the western coast of Norway known for it's harbor and fish market and rich sea-trading heritage.  These buildings face the harbor and had some great weathered character to them and were anything but straight.  They all seemed to have a bit of a lean to them.  I liked the simplicity of the shapes and how they became a color study with the blue sky and the mountain of green trees in the background.  And the funny thing about the photo in the bottom is that it's from Epcot at Disney World.  They have a World Showcase area that highlights 10 different countries and Norway is one of them.  As soon as I saw these buildings I realized they were mimicking Bergen.  So to have some fun, I photographed the architecture from some of the countries in the showcase and I posted the images on Facebook.  I didn't say where I was but most people thought I was in Europe.  The architecture in the World Showcase is very believable.  I had German beer in "Germany" and ate French food in "France" and pretended, at least for the day, to be in Europe.

Undredal, Aurlandsfjord, Norway

Undredal, Aurlandsfjord, Norway   My dad is really into geneology and he has traced the Bragg name back several hundred years to Norway.  Knowing for some time that I wanted to go to visit the land of my forefathers, I decided it would be interesting to visit it right around the time of summer solstice since Scandinavia is known as the "land of the midnight sun."  So I went during that time but never actually got to see midnight sun because we weren't far enough north.  But, the sun did set around 11:00 pm and would rise again about 3:00 am.  Because of this, the sky never got pitch black at night but just looked like dusk.  The town of Undredal was very briefly seen while riding in a boat through the Aurlandsfjord.  Norway is known for their fjords and for good reason.  They make for a strikingly beautiful backdrop with deep waters and lush mountains.