What is it all about?
Two brave Frostpunk fans - Lars Andreas Melsæter and John William Baier Hofoss - set off on an expedition through the frozen nooks of Norway. This is a story of their journey.
The previous posts about the venture can be read here: https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1601580/view/3122690263509401625
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1601580/view/3217271087478821042
---- Telegraph from New London ------------
Imperial Exploration Company is pleased to share the news about the ongoing expedition to Norway providing further opportunities to get to know the customs of the local people.
As our, for now, sole Scout progresses, we leave Vardø behind and aim to cross the Tana River. And following a large river like Tana makes pathfinding brutally straightforward. In addition, the river is used by snowmobiles and dogsleds, leaving paths for explorers to follow. On the other hand, the ice could be unsafe, or – more likely - reascent heavy snowfall will not be blown away or compacted by wind and leave the expedition wading in deep, loose snow. This passage may take six or eighteen days, depending on these factors.
Administration of New London bows to the achievements of our Scouts.
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“A nomadic livelihood of traditional, indigenous people of northern Scandinavia - The Sámi, served the expansion of a tent-based culture. People who dove into coastal fishing, fur trapping, and sheep herding, also developed more permanent settlements - described by the umbrella term “gamme” - like hunting and fishing huts, spread out in the wilderness. And searching for them proved to closely resemble the refreshing activity of exploring the frozen outskirts of New London.
Often built with locally available materials in carefully picked locations - fruitful hunting or fishing grounds, and summer or winter grazing lands. Among the most common kinds of huts, was the small or semi-small "buegamme" curve/arch-gamme. This style relies on naturally curved birch cut down and stripped of its bark before it is leaned upon other curved logs. The shape is important so finding the right trees was almost an art form. Wooden bolts were also in use. Onto this main wooden skeleton, a new layer of thinner logs and poles was laid to act as the inner walls. And support more layers to come.
The gamme would now look somewhat similar to an igloo, though often more egg-shaped than hemispherical. To waterproof the structure, large cylinders of birch bark were cut off the trees, stretched, and dried before it too was laid onto the structure without fastening. Birchwood is in its dry state efficient firewood, but its bark is also entirely waterproof, making dry birch hard to come by. By overlapping the patchwork of so-called "never" (Norwegian for birch bark), downpour would flow along with it and end in the surrounding soil. This process would start along the ground, and as one worked upwards the final layer would also be placed down to hold it all in place. Slabs of topsoil with low dense vegetation (called “torv” in Norwegian, and incredibly common up north as well as south) would be cut out and laid down leaning in towards the slightly tilted wall. These slabs might be something like 30-40 cm wide, 30-60 cm long, and 5-15 cm tall.
Once the entire structure was clad in this manner, a door would be installed. Originally not hinged. The floor was made from young birch branches, and there would be an open fireplace with a hole in the roof. That’s it for the tradition. As modern times arrived so did hinges, windows, wood-burning ovens, wooden floors, insulation, and plastic moisture protection. Today most gammes forego the traditional construction in favor of standard "plank and nail" constructions, but the law still mandates the exterior "torv" cladding.
Quite some years ago it was decided that these huts, that usually were owned and used by families or reindeer herding family groups, were to be open to all. This was partly a measure to improve the safety in the mountains, and partly to direct the culture. In Norway, there are so-called laws about "every man's rights". They’re to ensure nature is not privatised and locked away but remains available to all. This meant that those who wanted to keep their gamme, also had to keep it unlocked and assure its maintenance to safety standards. Some families, or individuals, opted to accept this, others never applied for this new permit and registration and let the old structures decay.
Today the gammes are marked by a "point of interest" sign on the map. A small black triangle which you can never be sure what you’ll find there. Some huts can be of the oldest, some are modern and comfy, some are about to collapse, and some simply no longer exist. To be honest - I felt a bit like a proper Frostpunk scout running around the map looking for "points of interest" not knowing what to expect. It ended up that I explored five marks that turned out to be too decayed or entirely gone thus far on the expedition. The cabins in the first phase of the expedition, whilst crossing Varangerhalvøya, have a sadly relevant history tied to the fights between Norwegian partisans and the Nazis during a past war.
Whilst staying at Bjørnskardhytta I had the worst mental day I have had during the entire expedition. My mind played awful games with me and I felt the urge to give up, yet I could not find any practical reason for my deep discomfort. Later I learned that the Parthians were snitched on and the Gestapo caught and executed at least one man in the very same cabin. Approximately a further eight men had also attempted to parachute to the cabin but been blown off course and landed on the hillside. They broke their legs and hips and never made it down from the mountain I was sitting looking at.”
