Welcome to Ethiopia! I am sitting in the terminal waiting to get on the plane from Addis Ababa to the Kilimanjaro Airport and this terminal is something else. The walls are made of a mud-like plaster and are a desert sand color. People are openly smoking in the halls throughout the terminal and the bathrooms have signs saying “Passengers Only”. The array of people in the boarding area is quite impressive. I think south America is the only continent that doesn’t have a representative.

A large Kenyan man is sitting in my assigned aisle seat as I am boarding the flight to Kilimanjaro; he insists that I take the middle seat. It’s only a 2 hour 20 minute flight so I oblige. 20 minutes before we land we fly right by Mt Kilimanjaro and there is a rare, clear view of the mountain and the summit. Since I am in …

In May of 2011, we took a family trip to Norway to learn about the land of our ancestors. The name Fostvedt is Norwegian and my Dad’s grandparents spoke Norwegian at home. So I, and my siblings, are not too far removed from our Norwegian roots. During the course of our trip we visited Oslo, Bergen, Trondheim, Bodø, Å (Lofoten Islands), Oopdal, Lillehammer, Kristiansand, and Fosstveit. It was the trip of a lifetime and some photos are below.
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