Shepherding in the Arctic

So, how many of you have herded pesky sheep in the Arctic Circle in Norway? Raise your hands. Like two other people? That sounds about right.

I don’t think I ever thought I’d find myself as a sheep herder in Norway, but it did happen, and I have the sheep photos and videos to prove it.

Ever heard of WWOOF (World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms)? 

I definitely hadn’t.

On one of my many researching nights of travel on Pinterest, I came across this ‘budget-friendly ways to travel’ pin. So, obviously living off of less than minimum wages, I clicked on it and scoured the different ways – one of which was WWOOF.

WWOOF is basically a way to volunteer on a farm and then you get free lodging and for the most part, free food. I had the very best host family ever so I never had to pay or buy food. Yes, they were absolutely excellent and the sweetest people on this planet.

So, I ended up in the Arctic Circle in Norway surrounded by basically no people for miles and miles and yet in one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. 

Obviously, being in the Arctic, there was snow up to my waist, which meant I couldn’t help feeling like Elsa from Frozen whenever I went cross-country skiing or climbing one of the mountains I had seen reindeer on earlier. 

However, I most definitely was not a princess since a large portion of my time was dedicated to mucking out the pens of sheep and their very recently born lambs – very recently, as in a lot of them were born while I was there. They were the cutest things in the world... after they were cleaned off.

While I don’t think this is exactly a task for a ‘valley girl’ as people called them in the 2000s or whatever, I don’t think cleaning up after the sheep was the worst part.

No, the most frustrating part was waking up to the bright sunshine (and I do mean scorching bright) at 5 am, sometimes 4:30 am, and trying to coax the sheep from one pen to another. The really fun part (this is sarcasm – read between the lines) was when they were so stubborn that they would stare me down, seem to smirk, and then bolt from me – each and every one of them bounding around outside the barn while I chased them ridiculously and slipped in the snow every other step. I think I probably looked like one of the fooled robbers in Home Alone.

A lot of times, I would have to wrestle some of the sheep into the next pen over, then go after the next ones, only to come back to realize the first few sheep had escaped and were running crazy again!

As my cousin calls her nephews, they were little nuggets.

In the moment, I wanted to scream – and sometimes did. But I look back now and simply burst out laughing at the fluffy creatures who liked to cause trouble. 

Sometimes – well, more often than not – there have been extremely frustrating moments in travel. But the thing is, whenever I look back weeks, months, and years down the road I’m able to laugh and say, ‘I did that.’ And in this case, I'm able to say, 'I chased sheep around a barn in the Arctic Circle.'