English: It has been announced that this year’s big permaculture event in the Nordic countries, the Nordic Permaculture Festival will be arranged in and around the fantastic village of Jondal at the Hardanger Academy for Peace, Development and Environment (see http://www.hardangerakademiet.no). Jondal is situated on the Hardanger Fjord just a half hour’s drive from the Folgefonna Glacier!
Norsk: Det er annonsert at årets store begivenhet innenfor Permakultur i Norden, den Nordiske Permakultur Festivalen blir arrangert i og omkring fantastiske Jondal ved Hardangerakademiet (Nordisk senter for fred, utvikling og miljø) http://www.hardangerakademiet.no Jondal ligger ved Hardangerfjorden bare en kort halvtimers kjøretur fra isbreen Folgefonna!
On the second day of Perennialen III, in early August 2017, we were joined by Rebecca Smith of Norway’s second LAND centre on Byrknesøy on the coast north of Bergen! Since I last met Rebecca here during Perennialen I, Eirik Lillebøe Wiken’s food forest which basically surrounds the house, both above and below all the way down to the fjord on steep ground, has grown well and is becoming more established. The diversity has also increased. These pictures are from our food forest tour together including a stop on the shoreline where we could only imagine the wild food forest also in the fjord, this is truly a food forest with many layers :)
For day 2 of Perennialen III, we were joined by Rebecca Smith!
Views from Alvastien showing the mozaic of ecological niches, the complicated geology not allowing the modern world to destroy the environment!
Fyksesund bridge and old Hardanger terraces
Rock gardening #1
Part of the food forest is located below the house on the steep slope from the road to the fjord!
American blueberries
Looking up from the food forest to the road.
Cirsium oleraceum (Cabbage thistle / kåltistel)
Mallow / kattost
Alcea rosea (Hollyhock / Stokkrose)
Alcea rosea (Hollyhock / Stokkrose)
Rumex spp.
Looking up from the food forest to the road.
The house from the food forest
Below the food forest is an underwater food forest, providing much food through the year
An album of pictures from my short Perennialen II visit with Eirik Lillebøe Wiken and Hege Iren Svendsen at and around Alvastien Telste in Hardanger. Impressive nature, good beer and fruit, good company and just relaxing this time! It poured with rain on the morning that we’d planned to look properly around the Forest Garden, so that will have to wait for next year! Watch this space for the announcement of the next Perennialen event at this wonderful place, now a Permaculture LAND centre, next summer!! Hope to see you there!
Returning to nature
This climber had broken into the house, but it looks like someone has pruned the outside growth away from the window!
Hops
Steinstø “Fruit and cake shop” :) had a good selection of varieties of locally grown fruit!
Ramsons puree!
The road to Hege and Eirik’s LAND centre
The road to Hege and Eirik’s LAND centre
Eirik in the local beer drinking costume ;)
Bedroom view :)
Record rainfall recently and the waterfalls are full…there’s a minihydro scheme up there!
Old walls/terassing are protected
Stunning engineering, pylons way up on the mountainside…
Aralia elata (Devil’s walking stick / fandens spaserstokk) flowering in a local garden, one of the 80 in my book!
Aralia elata (Devil’s walking stick / fandens spaserstokk) flowering in a local garden, one of the 80 in my book!
Alvastien Telste
The forest garden…sadly, it was pouring with rain the next morning, so I didn’t get a proper chance to look around the garden!
The forest garden…sadly, it was pouring with rain the next morning, so I didn’t get a proper chance to look around the garden!
Juniper growing out of a rock!
Alvastien Telste from the other side of the fjord. Eirik and Hege own a wide strip of land up to and to the right of the waterfall near the top…must do the walk up to the mountain cabin next time!
Alvastien Telste
House on the rock!!
On the way to my next stop at Stussvik, where I’d been invited to spend the night with local organic guru Vidar-Rune Synnevåg and his wife, we stopped at Skarsvatnet Goldfish Lake!
Skarsvatnet is home to a number of introduced species including Golden Orfe, Crucian Carp, Eel and Three-spined stickleback…
Mallard with carp
Flowering Japanese knotweed, one of the 80 in my book!
Perennial vegetables, Edimentals (plants that are edible and ornamental) and other goings on in The Edible Garden
