Scandinavian Traveller: Likki the Trimmed Beaver - Chapter Nine

Well, today is our last Sunday in Bodø; I've realized that as I was showering.  And, I had not shown Likki our little town yet.  On weekends, we tend to go for fikka either next door at the Bodø Bakeri or at Café City Nord.  The Bakeri has good sandwiches, good pastries and coffee. The Café is more like a cafeteria, but they serve some local food and they're not opened on Sunday.  So, we walked over to the Bakeri, and introducing Likki to it all.

After that, we finally made our way to The Nordland Museum.  We've been walking by often (it's next to the Post office), and until June it was always closed on weekends.  Since, once again, it's cloudy again, we thought it would be our last chance to actually see it, given their schedule and Hubby's don't match.

That museum was founded in 1888 and the building was raised in 1903 and was not destroyed in the 1940 bombing of Bodø.  It shows the Lofoten Fisheries, the Sami exhibit, the bird mountain, where I realized that Puffins are little birds.  I thought they were penguins size, was I wrong!  The seagulls are actually bigger than them, at least in Bodø.

Likki in front of the Bird Mountain

The section which interested us most was Bodø through time and how the city evolved.  It went from being a tiny huddle of houses in 1816  to a city which also went through a lot from being bombed by the Germans in 1940 and almost completely destroyed.  I thought it was strange not to say funny that the town was actually taken over by German soldiers on bicycles!  They've always had public activity, a hospital and health service and of course fisheries, canning industries and a brewery.

Bodø, now...

The NATO invested lots in Bodø, due to its location and being this far North, it would have a role as the airport in a possible reprisal attack on the Soviets (or others).  The military presence is significant in Bodø, 10% of people here are related to the aviation industry, either military or civilian.

Likki playing Godzilla over the Bodø model

It was an interesting little museum, nothing like museums I've seen before.  Everything was in Norwegian, only a few items on display had English translation.  The little leaflet we got when we came in was somewhat helpful, but most of the valuable information we've got (other than what we've decrypted ourselves along the way) was during the little movie showing the history of Bodø, in Norwegian with English subtitles.  A nice way to close our little adventure in Nordland was to find out more about this little town where we could live, if only it was sunnier!!