MacDonalds avoid the litter introduce a money back system!

I must admit it has been a while since I have eaten at MacDonalds, but should the urge take me there is one here in Bergen! It is located in a pretty old building just off the Fish Market on the way up to the Floien funicular train station. They seem to do a good business there as there are always people in buying burgers, fries and drinks.

MacDonalds in the States is having a problem with their staff calling for better wages. It hasn't happened here yet, probably because Norwegian workers have better employment rights than their US counterparts, but MacDonalds is facing another big problem here too. So far 3 landlords in Oslo have cancelled premise leases to the chain because of complaints about litter and smell! The MacDonalds affected were right in the centre of the capital and did good business so they can't be happy with the decision.

Here in Bergen there have been complaints too about the littering that takes place around the fishmarket, and you often see MD packaging dropped on the ground. It has always been a problem with take away restaurants, and understandably it is impossible for the restaurant owner to do much about it. What though if he takes a leaf out of the beer and soft drinks companies books here in Scandinavia? The beer and soft drinks producers pay 1 kr for every empty can returned  to a collection point, which can be found in every supermarket. The 1 kroner is added on to the can at the supermarket check out, so it is not included in the beer or drink price. it is then up to you to claim the kroner back by returning the can or bottle. Anyone can claim the 1 kroner just by taking the empties to a collection point. That's why you often see people looking through the bins in the tourist areas here, as the tourists don't know the system and just throw their empty drinks cans away

I'm sure that would have an effective impact on fast food littering. If the person who ate the stuff doesn't want to return it, there are plenty of other people who would!

Norway and the electric car

Considering the distances between small villages out in the countryside, the mountainous topography and the quality of some of the roads, it is odd to read that the electric car is extremely popular here and sales are on the increase. I have yet to see a public recharging station (our neighbour just used a very long electric lead draped across his garden and into the road here in Bergen) although I'm sure they exist. Maybe there's a phone app that shows where they are?

It is fair to say that the majority are driven in the larger towns, such as Oslo and Bergen and not out in the countryside, where you risk running out of battery in the middle of nowhere! Of course, they are very 'green', and the government has introduced several incentives to help you make the correct decision to buy one. For instance, you do not have to pay toll road fees (there are hundreds of toll roads and bridges here), you can park for free in public car parks, recharge for free in public spaces, travel free on the ferries (well the driver has to pay the passenger charge) and of course there are a load of tax incentives too, particularly if the car is a company car! Apparently, electric cars are also cheaper to service as there are fewer moving parts.

So far so good then, but, another advantage of driving an electric car is that you can drive in the bus lane, and that is starting to give the poor bus drivers a bit of a headache! There are so many of them now that they are starting to get in the way of the busses, delaying them on their routes, pulling sharply in front and generally acting lie irritating school children! Also, most of the cars only have one person in them, in effect, creating a higher number of vehicles on the road!

Statens vegvesen (the state traffic ministry) refuse to see it as a problem, although they actually do not have accurate figures as to how many cars are now using the bus lanes. All electric cars have a number plate starting EL so the toll reader automatically ignores them. Unofficial figures show that numbers of vehicles using the bus lane have doubled in the past year! Oops! The incentives are set to run for the next four years but I'm guessing they will have to trim back some of them before the four years are up! Wonder if that will affect sales at all?

Salmon fishing!



The Gloppen Hotel

Well we have just been lucky enough to be invited on a salmon fishing trip. From Sunday to Wednesday we were in the village of Sandane, staying at the Gloppen Hotel, a lovely wooden building built in 1866. The good salmon fishing in the Gloppen river has been an open secret since the 1860's when the well-heeled lords and rich entrepreneurs of the Victorian era travelled here from all over Europe to fish.

So we joined an impressive line of salmon fishers to try our hand at it, and despite the complete lack of technique and knowledge, guess what both Trevor and I caught one! So now we have 8kgs of wild salmon safely ensconced in the hotel freezer waiting to be smoked for Christmas!

I must admit, it is extremely restful standing beside a fast flowing river casting a line. We tried fly fishing (caught a lot of grass and bushes behind me until I finally managed to get the knack!) and fishing with a spinner. A spinner is a flashy fish shaped hook which wriggles through the water as you reel in the line, like some kind of monstrous shiny cockroach – apparently appealing (or not) to fish. The river was high and fast flowing, so I wasn’t so comfortable standing up to my hips in water casting a line, so most of the time I stayed on the bank, which felt much safer!

There was a down side though - no-one else in our party caught one, and the hotel owners and those who own the fishing rights along the river are worried as stocks have dwindled noticeably over the past three years. The salmon are just not making it up the rivers to spawn, and sports fishing went down from 50 fish on the Gloppen river in 2011 to 35 in 2012 and 16 so far this year.

As a result, there is a lot of monitoring going on. Every fish caught has to be weighed, measured, checked for lice and a scale sample sent for analysis. Assessments are being made, together with local fishermen as to how many fish there might be in the river, and whether fishing should continue or not. This year, the Government has got even more involved and decreed that the wild salmon fishing season must finish two weeks early, i.e. by 15th August.

Exactly why numbers have dropped is not entirely understood, although a sharp decline in the numbers of medium and large sized wild salmon coming to the Norwegian coast has been recorded since the 1980's. The Russians, Finns and other Baltic states have also noticed a decline in stocks.

The consensus is that the wild salmon are dying when out at sea for some reason. The Russians also complained bitterly in 2007/8 that Norwegian sea fishermen were fishing far too many wild sea salmon before the salmon had had a chance to gut to their home rivers (salmon always return to the river they were spawned in to spawn themselves). There have also been issues with salmon and trout fish farms which pollute the water in the fjords with excess nutrients and sewage from the tanks. Lice infestation is common amongst the fish on the fish farms and antibiotics are used to treat them. The lice though get into the water and infect the wild fish too. If a fish gets infested with too many lice it will die, and this is particularly a problem for the young fish or smolts.

So, now I know all this, I feel a little guilty that as a family we caught two beautiful fish, yet as my husband says, 'you've got to eat!' How long though can this state of affairs continue? Maybe there will have to be a stop on all river fishing for wild salmon at some point for a few years, in order to see if the situation can improve. There are plenty of brown trout out there to catch - they don't seem to have been affected by changes in the ecologic system at all.

Fjord Steam 2013

An eerie noise wafted across the harbour yesterday evening - well in fact several eerie noises as the fluty, breathy, deep and high sounds of various steam whistles floated on the summer air as several old steam ferries arrived in Bergen for the beginning of Fjord Steam weekend.

The tones were all different. Some were melancholy and definitely in a minor ke
y, and others were like deep bass notes from a tuba or euphonium! A couple appear to have twin air horns!

Last night was Bergen time on the TV as well, as the Summer Open programme broadcast straight from the decks of one of the ships. There were interviews with local celebrities and local music played! The evening was cool but at least it didn't rain before midnight.

Today (Friday) though was a whole different question. We woke to torrential rain, and then from 9 through to 11.30 we had a massive thunderstorm rolling back and forward across Bergen. The rain was so heavy, and the air so humid you could have been excused for thinking you were somewhere in Asia during monsoon! As usual though, weather here is fairly unpredictable, so by midday the sun was out and everyone was overheating in rain jackets, jeans and wellington boots!

I went down town to take a few pictures. Tomorrow we plan to go and see more of the boats and Trevor will be able to take much better pictures with his camera than I can with my phone. Until then, here are a few: