Alt for Norge Daily Journal: Day 6 - April 28, 2012 (Episode 1)

Today was our first day of Norway! It involved a trip on one of Norway’s greatest boats, our first steps on Norwegian soil, a visit to an old military fortress, our first challenge and the eventual staying of a night at said fortress! Crazy!

The cast ready to get on Eileen II, an incredible 92' yacht!

First step to get to Norway was a cruise for two-plus hours on a 92’ all-wood yacht! It had a cabin with sleeping quarters, kitchen, and dining area, complete with wood-burning stove (which made me a little nervous on this all-wood boat)! Basically, our whole time was spent hanging out on the main deck, enjoying views of Sweden on one side and Norway on the other! Then, we were told to hang out on the deck as the film crew went and hid underneath. Next thing we know, there’s a helicopter charging in from overhead! It spent 20 minutes making several circles around the boat and finally took off. Good start! Next step was to complete our sailing of the fjord to a town called Halden.

A view of Halden and Fort Fredriksten as we sailed in! What a sight!

In Halden, we took our first steps on Norwegian soil (although, we had to take two takes)! Halden was a great town, but the coolest part was the fort sitting on top of a giant hill, which just happened to be our next leg of the journey.

We ended up taking a rather long walk to get to the fort, mostly due to several camera stops. We were greeted with a few shots from a cannon overhead! Very loud and very surprising! We also got to stop and enjoy a special religious presentation by Alf. He performed a very unique presentation to his “Gods”, which included his giving of blood (pricked his finger and rubbed in the dirt)! I wasn't familiar with this practice, but it's always a treat to get the opportunity to experience new things, especially when those things are so personal and important to someone else!

Henriette and the crew getting ready for the introduction to our first challenge!

After reaching the fort (Fort Fredriksten), we received our first challenge from Henriette. The task was to gather as much information from locals regarding Norwegian history as possible. Basically, we would have an hour to learn thousands of years of history. No problem! We were divided into two teams with myself, Austin, Tara, Amy, Johnathan and Mary Caryl on one team. Fortunately, this task was suited perfectly for Johnathan, seeing that he studies Norwegian History at school! We were given an hour to split in two groups. The first group would have 30 minutes to visit with locals and gather as much info as possible. Then, the second group would have another 30 minutes.

During our 30 minutes, I had a brilliant plan of grabbing more and more locals that were walking by and forming a large group of people, so that we could interview them all at the same time, eliminating the possiblity of wasting time by receiving the same information over and over from different individuals at different times. Basically, be as efficient as possible. Well, that would work in real life, but this is "reality" and doesn't make good TV. After spending several minutes with a group of 8 people or so, the director asked us to move on to other locals, but to make sure they stayed “smaller groups”.

Eventually, we finished our time. After the second group was finished with their time, we hung out in a little dining area for an hour or so, as the camera crews got set up for the quiz portion of the competition. It was funny to see the anxiety on everyone's faces. It had already been a long day and people were tired and wornout, but very nervous about the impending first challenge!

It was time for our quiz! During it, they had us stand in our two groups and would fire different questions at us. Each team would write their answer on a blackboard and then reveal their answers when Henriette asked for them. The whole sequence would be very strange and would give us a glimpse of how these TV shows are actually filmed. We would have to reshoot (or do “pickups”) of several of the same questions and would have to reenact how we acted when we found out we were right or wrong. In fact, the first question was the best! I don’t remember what it was, but we were given three possible answers. Each team wrote down their answer. We went first, revealing a poorly written name, but close enough, so we were correct. Then, the other team went, revealing an equally poorly written name, but turns out that their spelling actually ended up translating to “hairy horse-*&%# (slang word for a lady part that rhymes with bunt)”. None of the Americans obviously knew that, but all of the Norwegians were cracking up! Due to that issue, the directors made a decision to just have us put A, B, or C! Ha! (Although, Henriette put up a pretty good fight to keep us writing the answers, as she thought it made for pretty good TV. It was only after her, the director and the executive producer had a "discussion" that they opted for the A, B, C method.)

Apparently, this answer is equivalent to Harold Horse-*&#%!

We were asked a total of eight questions (I think) and our team only got one wrong! Some of that was due to Johnathan, some was plain luck, some was intuitive guessing by the whole team. Either way, we ended up winning by two! This ensured us a head start in our next competition, which will send one team to an elimination challenge!

After our competition, we did some interviews. (By the way, all of the interviews consist of you sitting/standing with the camera guy staring at you through the camera lens, a sound guy holding a boom mic as close to you as possible and a director standing right next to the camera, firing questions at you and over-exaggerating their emotions to your answers, to make you feel better about your answers. It’s very strange and uncomfortable at first, but as time went on, it became natural.) After the interviews, they filmed us finding our accommodations for the night. They were 10 by 10, small, A-frame cabins, with two beds and just enough room for your bags. I ended up getting Dana as a roomie. At first, I was a little concerned about how we’d click, but it ended up working pretty well. He’s a pretty funny guy and we got along great. He even shared his handle of Crown Royal with me and some of the other guys.

Before the night was over, we went back and had dinner (at about 9:30!). A really good chicken dinner with a special family recipe of rhubarb and strawberry concoction for dessert. All this was done in this old bunker-like room, with the owner of the fortress. Very surreal!

That was about it. An extremely long day with sleep finally coming at 12:30 or so. We got the first victory, enjoyed some good history and got to know Dana a little better. Seems like a good guy and is pretty easy to talk with!

Day 6 Over! We’re in Norway!