A mountain goat I am not

I’ve been ready for quicksand since before I even knew where I could find it. I’m pretty sure every little kid who has watched cartoons, or The Princess Bride, is. Because, really, who knows where it could pop up?!

Apparently in Bergen, Norway. On Mt. Floyen. Next to a bunch of goats.

Never fear though – when I marched right into what I thought was a shallow mud puddle, that promptly tried to eat my shoes, I had a quicksand plan already prepared. But before I enacted step one in the plan, I risked a lunge for the cement path just in front of me. I made it, but just barely (!), shoes and all. What I didn’t realize while I was savoring my couch-honed reflexes, was that there was a small red-headed Norwegian child watching me fight with 3 inches of mud from the Tubakuba only a couple yards away.

The Tubakuba is a 14 square meter room on the edge of a cliff on Mt. Floyen, designed and built by students from the Bergen School of Architecture. The intention of the design is actually to entice more kids to come explore the woods (we learned nothing from the Grimm Brothers), which is reflected in the tininess of the entryway, which is shaped a bit like a tuba. It’s also rented out to campers for free, and comes equipped with a stove and walls. This was the thing I was perhaps most excited to see while in Bergen, I just hadn’t thought I’d stumble onto it quite so literally.

After a prolonged staring contest between myself and the Tubakuba child, I attempted to leave the quick-mud area in search of more goats. Because Mt. Floyen is a generous mountain, and the Norwegian people thoughtful towards scattered travelers such as myself, there’s a funicular that can be taken up the side of the mountain. I had heard about the funicular (every travel blog ever recommends the funicular for the view), and I had heard about the Tubakuba, but no one had told me about the goats. So this is me, doing you a favor and telling you about the goats on Mt. Floyen[1]. (Also, there’s trolls. Just as a heads up).

P.S. I will also state the obvious and say that you should bring a raincoat to Bergen. While western Norway as a whole is known for its rainy weather, Bergen just has to be competitive and earned itself the title of “the rainiest city in Europe” – it averages about 240 days of rain a year. Naturally, I didn’t bring a raincoat. I realized my mistake when I was running to catch a boat tour of the fjords[2] in the pouring rain.

P.P.S. – I did get a raincoat and the fjords were beautiful.

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[1] I found out later that these goats are cashmere goats that were raised to clear vegetation in Storoyen, where they lived until they were brought onto Mt. Floyen in 2016 to clear out the vegetation. They are now called the Floyen Boys and I want all of their boy band merch. (They also vacation on Askoy in the winter??)

[2] A long, narrow inlet created by glacial erosion – I spent a couple of days convinced that fjords were just cliffs.