I spent the weekend with an old campaign friend Kjell Knudsen at his family home thirty minutes outside Oslo. The house is down a long road framed by evergreen trees. It lies right beside a long lake that has completely frozen over. At least a foot of snow was lying on top of the ice and we spent Sunday cross-country skiing down the lake. It was my first experience at this type of skiing and I was glad to have such a competent teacher! We also took the family dog Hero along with us. The dog, a Dalmatian that looked pretty cool in the snow, has a leash that can be tied on to a harness around your waist so that he pulls you along. The set-up proved very useful when I got tired!

That afternoon it started snowing and hadn’t stopped by the time we were ready to leave Monday morning. After digging a path through snow two feet deep, Kjell manouvered the four-wheel drive down the access road. Everything was covered in snow. We came across a woman, a foreigner of course, whose car had become lodged in a snow bank. Kjell was late for his class at university, but nonetheless stopped to tow her out. I’ve seen a lot of strangers pitching in to push cars out of snow banks.

This week Kjell and his roommate Mette, another old campaign friend are going to show me how to toboggan down the Korketrekkeren (the Cork Screw), a 2 km bob sleigh run from the 1952 Oslo Winter Olympics. I can’t wait…