Today was a very special day for me. I finally got to visit the Molvika farm (see photo), where our friend Halton Molvik was born and raised. I wrote a book about his life on that farm in the 1920s and 30s and it was just as I had pictured it, only with details I couldn’t have imagined. It was almost like walking in the steps of my own ancestors as I got to relive several of the moments he had in his early years in each of the locations they happened.
Molvika is just like many of the farms in Northern Norway – only accessible by boat(or on foot.) It sits just a few hundred feet south of the Arctic Circle and it’s a long way from anywhere. We had to walk over a mountain to get there and it was pouring down rain the entire forty minutes we walked. I thought it was a far better representation of his life on that farm, having the rain as part of the experience. When we arrived, there was no porch in which to seek shelter, so we found the cellar door open and we huddled under the house to escape the downpour (see other photo of the view looking out toward the grayed out sea.) I brought along a copy of the book and read excerpts to Kory and Kaleb about life on that farm while we waited out the squall. It was almost surreal.
No one lives at the farm today – it’s only used as a summer place by Halton’s nephew and his family. The house and all the outbuildings are still frozen in time. The fields and rocks surrounding the house were just as Halton described them. The feeling of absolute calm and isolation were every bit as real today as they were for him growing up there – only the children were missing – all 17 that his mother gave birth to. I found a few of their graves at the cemetery along the path back into town.
Halton had many memories of the walk he made over the mountain to get to town. We stopped at the only store and met the owner – a cousin to Halton. We left a few copies of the book with him to sit on the tables of the little café he has added to the back of his store. We also left a copy for the local school library and we went to the old folk’s home nearby and left a copy there as well. (Several of the residents we met there were related to Halton, including his sister-in-law.) I also spoke on the phone with the “mayor” of that area as he helped me write parts of the book and he was quite distressed he couldn’t meet me in person, but the ferry schedules didn’t work out as he lives on an outer island and was unable to get to the mainland.
It was such a blessing for me to visit Molvika and to connect personally with its history. We all picked up rocks from the water’s edge as mementos of our journey north, as the title to the book I wrote is, “Built on Solid Rock.” It had a double meaning – that the farm where Halton was from was built on the solid rock of the Norwegian coastline, but also, the life he built for himself was built on the Solid Rock of Jesus Christ. It’s good to have reminders of that (especially when you live on sinking sand!) The visit today was the main reason we took this road trip north, to see the farm up close and personal and it was every bit as exciting as I hoped it to be. We can go home now.
We had a two hour drive to get to the nearest hotel and we got into Sandnessjoen just after sunset. We managed to see two moose nibbling grass on the side of the road as we were entering town. That was another thrill for the day as grazing moose are not the norm in our world. The life on this north coast is so different from anything I can relate to. I keep wondering what it is that keeps people here and why they don’t all move to a place more convenient. I got my answer today in talking with Halton’s cousin -- he said, “We have everything we need here,” and he’s quite content with his life. He either doesn’t know any better, or it doesn’t get any better, I’m not sure which.
Molvika is just like many of the farms in Northern Norway – only accessible by boat(or on foot.) It sits just a few hundred feet south of the Arctic Circle and it’s a long way from anywhere. We had to walk over a mountain to get there and it was pouring down rain the entire forty minutes we walked. I thought it was a far better representation of his life on that farm, having the rain as part of the experience. When we arrived, there was no porch in which to seek shelter, so we found the cellar door open and we huddled under the house to escape the downpour (see other photo of the view looking out toward the grayed out sea.) I brought along a copy of the book and read excerpts to Kory and Kaleb about life on that farm while we waited out the squall. It was almost surreal.
No one lives at the farm today – it’s only used as a summer place by Halton’s nephew and his family. The house and all the outbuildings are still frozen in time. The fields and rocks surrounding the house were just as Halton described them. The feeling of absolute calm and isolation were every bit as real today as they were for him growing up there – only the children were missing – all 17 that his mother gave birth to. I found a few of their graves at the cemetery along the path back into town.
Halton had many memories of the walk he made over the mountain to get to town. We stopped at the only store and met the owner – a cousin to Halton. We left a few copies of the book with him to sit on the tables of the little café he has added to the back of his store. We also left a copy for the local school library and we went to the old folk’s home nearby and left a copy there as well. (Several of the residents we met there were related to Halton, including his sister-in-law.) I also spoke on the phone with the “mayor” of that area as he helped me write parts of the book and he was quite distressed he couldn’t meet me in person, but the ferry schedules didn’t work out as he lives on an outer island and was unable to get to the mainland.
It was such a blessing for me to visit Molvika and to connect personally with its history. We all picked up rocks from the water’s edge as mementos of our journey north, as the title to the book I wrote is, “Built on Solid Rock.” It had a double meaning – that the farm where Halton was from was built on the solid rock of the Norwegian coastline, but also, the life he built for himself was built on the Solid Rock of Jesus Christ. It’s good to have reminders of that (especially when you live on sinking sand!) The visit today was the main reason we took this road trip north, to see the farm up close and personal and it was every bit as exciting as I hoped it to be. We can go home now.
We had a two hour drive to get to the nearest hotel and we got into Sandnessjoen just after sunset. We managed to see two moose nibbling grass on the side of the road as we were entering town. That was another thrill for the day as grazing moose are not the norm in our world. The life on this north coast is so different from anything I can relate to. I keep wondering what it is that keeps people here and why they don’t all move to a place more convenient. I got my answer today in talking with Halton’s cousin -- he said, “We have everything we need here,” and he’s quite content with his life. He either doesn’t know any better, or it doesn’t get any better, I’m not sure which.
