We have been driving ourselves around southern Norway for a few weeks now and I have some thoughts to share.

First. There are no stop signs here. Almost no traffic lights either. Norway runs on roundabouts. They are everywhere. In town. On the highways. Connecting everything. And every single person uses their blinker in them. Every time. Without fail.

Coming from America that feels almost radical.

The roads are two lanes. On the highways you occasionally get a passing lane for a stretch and then it disappears again. Everyone drives in the right lane except to pass and nobody speeds. There are cameras everywhere and fines can run into the hundreds of dollars. The math on speeding just does not work here.

Speed limits are 80 kph on rural roads which is about 50 mph. In town it drops to 50 kph. Speed bumps are everywhere in town and the signs for them look like a little figure mid stride. Avilene took one look and said they look like Michael Jackson moonwalking. She is not wrong and I cannot unsee it.

The yield signs are a yellow triangle with a circle. There is also a red and blue striped triangle that means proceed with caution. Like a stop sign probably should be there but is not. You figure it out fast.

Pedestrians always have the right of way at crossings. Always. Norwegians take this seriously. So do we now.

You must have your headlights on at all times. Day. Night. Always.

The tunnels are something else entirely. They are frequent on the highways and within town. Some parking garages are literally carved into the mountains. You drive into what looks like a tunnel and find yourself in an underground parking structure built inside solid rock. Completely normal here. Still slightly surreal every time.

My personal nightmare would be getting stuck in one of those tunnels in traffic. I have not had to face that yet and I am not ready.

I am driving a 6 gear manual stick shift. I had never driven 6 gears before. I am getting more comfortable but backing up still makes me nervous. No backup camera. Just mirrors and a lot of deep breathing…and Adam standing behind the car guiding me.

EasyPark is genuinely one of the best apps I have used. Parking is almost entirely app based. Pull up. Enter the zone number. Set your time. Done. Pricey but seamless.

Tolls exist too. Oslo to Arendal cost us about $30. Factor that into any road trip planning.

And the electric cars. I knew Norway had a lot of them. I was not prepared. A LOT of people drive electric here. The infrastructure is everywhere. The incentives are real. After a few weeks of paying for gas in a 6 gear manual stick shift I completely understand.

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Recycling in Norway

Sit with this for a second.

We have four bins. They are tall and skinny. One for paper. One for plastic. One for metal. One for general waste.

Each bin is picked up every six weeks.

Six. Weeks.

To all our old neighbors and friends back home — can you imagine a garbage can about a third the size of yours being picked up six times a year?

Everything is sorted. Plastics like yogurt containers and hummus tubs have to be rinsed before they go in. Food waste is the exception. That gets picked up weekly.

If your bin fills up before pickup you take the excess to a recycling center yourself. Unless it is cardboard or paper. Those can go next to your bin and the collectors will take them.

Then there is the bottle deposit system. Every plastic bottle and can has a small deposit built into the price. When you are done you take it to a machine at the grocery store. Feed it in. It counts. You get a receipt for the deposit amount. Use it at the store or donate it.

The kids are obsessed with the machine. Honestly so am I. I know Oregon and a few other places have this as well.

The whole system makes you think about what you consume. When your general waste bin is only emptied eight times a year you get very aware very quickly of what you are actually throwing away.

Norway is serious about this. The infrastructure is serious. The culture around it is serious.

And after a few weeks of living it it does not feel hard at all. It just feels like the right way to do it.

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The bigger picture

Everything here carries between a 15% and 25% VAT. That sounds like a lot until you see where it goes.

Healthcare. Free. School. Free. Retirement. There is a system that works and people trust it. Everyone retires here. Not at 75 scrambling to make ends meet. Actually retires.

Coming from America where taxes are a loaded conversation it is interesting to live somewhere where the social contract feels real and visible.

We are still figuring all of this out. But so far Norway keeps surprising us.

We are worldschooling our family of five in Arendal Norway right now. Follow along at adventuresweseek.com.

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