About

Hi, this is Anna! Former travel guide based in Geiranger, Norway. Currently raising my little cub and getting her ready to explore our great amazing world!

The job of a tour guide is ever changing: from entertaining the crowd to organizing mere technical aspects (think of those long-awaited restroom stops!); from showing what the inexpert eye could miss to sometimes hiding what is better left in shadows; from conveying the must-know informations to adapting the speech to the needs of a particular group. You might think it’s all about the input you give, but it’s rarely so: a tour guide works on the feedback that he/she is given, builds stories around that and accordingly creates a certain mood, trying to give the best possible experience.

During the nine seasons I spent working as a tour guide in Geiranger, the people I met taught me a lot about my job. Some asked about things I didn’t know and had to go and research myself; some gave me informations I could later share with other crowds; some simply pointed out amazing things that I had always taken for granted. One of the most valuable feedback I received though was the one that generated the idea for my book A Walk Through Geiranger.

After the first summer I spent in Geiranger, I printed a photo album about the village and the surrounding area just as a travel keepsake. I had taken the habit of showing certain pictures to people just to enrich my speech: I would show them pictures of the glaciers nearby, of the summer farms hidden to the view, of harbour porpoises swimming in the fjord. People started asking me where they could buy the photo album, but of course it was nowhere to be found, if not on my home bookshelf. At the same time though, people started asking for something else: where can I buy a book with all the information you just gave us? That’s when the lightbulb turned on in my head! Since then, there has been a great deal of trial and changing, but I finally published my book A Walk Through Geiranger thanks to the support of some of the local shops (which I will never be able to thank enough!).

The pandemic hit me in a moment when I would not have been able to travel anyway, while giving my first attempts at motherhood and rethinking space through the eyes of a toddler. All the same though (or maybe because of the combination?), wanderlust hit me strong and the desire to go back to Geiranger has been running under my skin for some time now. Scrolling through old photos surely made me remember what this part of the world means to me, but has not been a satisfiying solution. That’s why I thought of building this virtual space, hoping to inspire people to visit this wonderful corner in the world, while waiting the moment when we’ll all be able to physically travel again.