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Week 269 – Stavanger – 17th of May

The 17th of May celebrates Norwegian Constitution Day or Syttende Mai. Starts as wholesome day with children in parades and everyone dressed formally but the day ends like Preakness midfield. Women of all ages wore the traditional wear and Sharon spoke with a lady who spent $6,000 on her dress while another wore a family heirloom. Most older men wore traditional dress and younger men wore dark blue suits. It was very respectful – at least before 3pm. Apparently some of the moderation is that 17th of May eve is a big drinking night. 

Stavanger is an oil town and very nice. Everything was closed except restaurants but it was a great place to be for 17th of May. The old part of the city has two pedestrian areas – one on the east side of the harbor which was commercial while the one of the west side is more historic and goes back to the 1600’s. 

So if you ever go to Norway – make sure to go on 17th of May. Separate videos to follow that show the festivities.

Also for full disclosure – in person, the parades were awesome and very wholesome. However, in looking at the pictures with the red flags with the blue stripes held at a diagonal and 99% Northern European participation, it does look like a Klan Rally. To be clear it was NOT a Klan Rally.

In front of “Breiavatnet” — in Stavanger, Norway.
East side of harbor – you can see how people are dressed up or formal 
Stavanger domkirke – oldest cathedral in Norway – dates to 1100 and viking days. — in Stavanger, Norway.
West side – more residential and hasn’t changed since 1600s — in Stavanger, Norway.
East of harbor — in Stavanger, Norway.
After the parades – many of the restaurants looked like this with singing of the national anthem — in Stavanger, Norway.
Everyone dresses for the occasion
We had one that fit in….
Right after we parked, ran right into the morning parade – mostly elementary schools
Flags were easy to come by
Bird on statue
Parade finishes at harbor
Separate end of day parade – after a lot of day drinking
I hear this a lot – at least the part about the hair
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