We went five good, strong days of walking on our new wheels through Brandbu, Lena, Hoff and Kapp, to Gjøvik. Jens, a Pilgrim Hostel volunteer and custodian of Hoff Kirk was perfectly happy to open the hostel solely for us and, with his granddaughter, gave us a tour of the church the following morning. Jens told us of the trolls in these parts - one in particular who had so disliked the sound of the church bells that he threw two great stones in the direction of the church. Both missed their target but these huge stones can be seen in the local area, where they landed. This story is partly illustrated in the 800 year old stone carvings built into the original church. Here you see the body and head of the troll emerging from the ashlar and also a detail of the hand poised to throw a boulder. Hoff Church also contains this carving of a bear from the same period, for protection against wild beasts.
Happily camped along from Kapp, on the West shore of Lake Mjøsa, I took the Orkney Boat back to water for the first time in weeks.
However, Marianne continues to be let down by her wheels which, despite being superbly welded by our friends at Granavollen, were sheering little by little from their rims with every step. We noticed the grating noise as we tried to depart Gjøvik and one curb was all it took to do for the right wheel. For the second time, we had to seek out a mechanic; on this occasion, the answer came from the acquaintance of someone who had written to me many months ago, after seeing some television coverage about the project. Although in Oslo, Mike gave me a Gjøvik name and address and I went with my story to a sports shop in town to request a mechanic. Said contact was fantastic also, collecting the trailer from us that evening, advising us where to camp and returning her the following morning with reinforced weld around her wheel rims.
During our anxious wait for the trailer, I was able to write replies to the postcards that the children of Hope Community School in Orkney made at our workshop back in May. The drawing on the front of each is of a place or landscape particularly and personally special to its artist. As well as drawing our most empowering landscapes, many of the children chose to stand in the stone and speak for refugees, the environment and their hopes for greater personal courage! I have carried the postcards in my map case until now, written a little about our journey and adventure, and posted them back to the school.
Friends and supporters of The Orkney Boat, we WILL get the stone to Trondheim, and we will return it home to Orkney. However, we will have to deviate, sometimes majorly, from our initial route and there will undoubtedly be further trailer trouble, perhaps requiring us to use public transport when stranded or not able to continue on foot. For me, this is a disappointment and it will be for some of you too, I know. But the terrain, the weight and the distance all make it so. And the more often we have to look to other people for help to move the stone through Norway, the more often we encounter enormous kindness, gather stories and make connections through conversation and through the standings in the stone, of course.
Who knows how this Journey and Return will develop and change, but it must resolve itself somehow because I have been invited to talk about the project at the Orkney Science Festival on 9th September in Kirkwall! I am also thrilled to be able to say that the exhibition will run from 4th-25th November in the Orkney Museum Gallery, Kirkwall. The stone will be installed there for the three week exhibition period and, as ever, ALL are invited to make a stand in The Orkney Boat.
So, back to this journey, and, unable to know how far we will get when we start out from Lillehammar, we have first brought the stone to Hamar, on the East side of Mjøsa. Yesterday, the Orkney Boat was amongst other stones at the medieval Cathedral ruins.
We have been recipient of the high spirits, hospitality and engagement of Pilgrimssenter staff and six fellow walkers on the evening of Midsummer! Positioned on the track up to the hostel, the stone received its first “singing standing” of which I hope to publish a more detailed account in the near future, with Wanja’s permission.
Juergen is walking to Trondheim also, with two friends. They will be some way ahead of us by now but our encounter will stay in my mind for a long time as we journey on. Juergen, a business consultant from Germany, was most interested in the stone giving the opportunity for and gift of expression, since his work and his thoughts often turn to improving communications between people. During his travels in the northernmost climes of Finland, he met a shaman who performed a ritual, especially for him, with a piece of driftwood. Into this piece of wood, the shaman poured three gifts. When holding the wood he would: 1. be able to speak truth, 2. be able to find the words to speak truth and 3. he would find that he had the time to speak truth. Juergen uses this piece of shamanic wood in his workshops now; he tells its story and the practice of using the piece of wood accompanies the entire day. We spoke about the parallels with standing in stones such as the Orkney Boat, to be made courageous to speak. And at 6am, the following morning, while I was asleep and unaware, Juergen stood in the stone, entirely without witnesses. He later told me that he had begun to laugh, almost immediately, and then the laugh died down to a smile. He felt he rose up to look over a map of the world and from that vantage point he watched the connections form between places. He went from Nidaros to Iceland to Shetland to the North Cape and to the Black Sea and, when he had finished looking, five minutes had gone by.
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