Alt for Norge Daily Journal: Day 13 - May 5, 2012 (Episode 2)

Today is, in essence, a day off. However, we are filming breakfast in the cabin, interviews and then dinner in the cabins. Basically, we’ll be hanging out in these cabins all day!

Johnathan and Amy after a good night's sleep!

The Blue Cabin woke up around 8:30 today after a nice, full night’s sleep! (We figured out the trick and started hanging any extra blankets, towels, clothes, plates, trays or whatever we could get our hands on, over all of the windows to block out the sun, which likes to come up around 3:30 A.M.! Then, we had to wait around until 11:00 to film “breakfast”, which we kept pretty simple. Just some sliced meats, vegetables, bread, jam, and of course, the crowd favorite, brunost (brown cheese). A quick filming followed by some additional time to actually eat breakfast and the day was off. (By the way, it was this morning that I discovered the mouth-watering flavor of Nugatti! A chocolate-hazelnut spread that goes great on bread! Or, as some people tried, on bread with brunost and jam!)

Sitting on top of a mountain, following a brief hike! Check out my
Facebook Fan Page to see video and beautiful, mountainous terrain of Norway!

After breakfast, they were filming interviews which we knew were going to take a long time. Because of that, Mama Brita allowed me to take a hike. She gave me one hour, so I went as far and high as I could in 35 minutes, got some great pictures and video, then ran back. The sights were absolutely amazing! I’ve never been somewhere like that, all by myself, without another sign of life anywhere near, snow-covered mountains surrounding me on all sides! Absolutely breath-taking! The only worry that I had were the fresh wolf tracks that were all over the mountainside, but I pressed on. The return was fun too. Running downhill, with lots of snow, and being able to take some leaps off of some higher elevations to land in some soft snow! Good times! (Although, I didn’t push it too much, because I didn’t want to injure myself, possibly costing me the ability to move forward in the show.)

The Red Team doing some "reality" in preperation
for tomorrow's elimination challenge.

After getting back, I quickly realized the interviews were going way over their expected times. Due to this, I was able to get two more shorter hikes in, in different directions, lunch, then a nap, all before I finally had my interview. Because I was on the winning team, they weren’t as concerned about me, so my interview was pretty short. On the other hand, the other team was not only doing incredibly long interviews, but they were also acting out “reality” scenes. Nothing too crazy, but the director would basically set up a scene and let them take it from there. (Example: Have two members come outside on camera and talk about what it’s like knowing that you may have to go home. After some talking, a third member would be cued to come out and continue the conversation. Almost all of our filmed segments, that weren’t a competition, were a “reality” scene.)

There's nothing more manly than a Nordic Man reading Donald Duck!
(Although, Alf did have a great point, that reading children's books is
a great way to pick up the language.)

Finally, they filmed us making dinner and sitting down to eat. It was pretty good stuff. Johnathan made a reindeer stew, without a recipe to follow! He did a really good job and the reindeer was pretty good meat. A little chewy, but pretty flavorful! At that point, we were all in a good mood after some good food. That was until we had our next “information” session.

After dinner, Mama Christine (she and Mama Ane worked for Mama Brita, rotating roles while taking care of the cast) informed us that the loser of tomorrow’s competition would get a small window afterwards to say goodbye to everyone, but would quickly jump into a car and head straight back to the Oslo airport! Immediately, the mood completely changed! Stephanie, who was on the losing team, was in tears and most of her teammates all got very quiet. A very strange feeling, but made me so relieved to be on the winning team!

We hung out for a little while, playing more cards and learning a Norwegian game called “Americaner”. (It was a pretty fun game, but could use some changes!) Soon after, we were reminded that some people were trying to sleep and we should probably quiet down, so we took that cue to go to bed. The Blue Team talked for a little bit before going to bed, trying to guess what the competition would be and who might be going home. However, everyone’s minds were pretty heavy, knowing soon, one of our 12 would be heading home. Tomorrow, everything changes!

DAY 13 OVER!