Life in the Norwegian arctic is always a bit unpredictable but today really proved that when our friend asked if we wanted to go for a boat trip to an island….to collect some of his sheep!! So apparently he puts them there for summer grazing but now the grass has lost most of its nutrients and snow will cover the ground for the next 5 or so months he needs to bring them back to his barn on the mainland.

We boarded a little white boat and towed a aluminium boat which was where the sheep would be put. The journey to the island took one hour, travelling through the fjord, across a wavy section of open sea and eventually to rugged and remote island. We put the anchor down and climbed into the metal sheep boat which had a small motor on the back and we headed to the pebbly beach where some gigantic jellyfish had washed ashore.

There were 5 of us helping so our friend gave some instructions as we were all amateurs at herding sheep, believe it or not. Saying that we did herd the sheep, goats and alpacas from one field to another twice a day when we helped at an animal sanctuary in Australia so I guess we weren’t totally clueless.

It turned out to be absolute chaos, the sheep were all in the field ahead of us but they got spooked before everyone was on their positions and they just bolted out the field and ran riot across the island which measured 1.5km wide as the crow flies, so they were free to pretty much go wherever they wanted. I was left in the original field holding a bucket of candy (sheep food) with one large female sheep harassing me for some free tasters the entire time. After about 30 minutes of awkwardly trying to keep this one sheep away from my bucket of food I heard jingling bells and the herd started running my way. It was my time to shine, which meant I had to shake my bucket to make noise. They weren’t really interested in it though, their main goal seemed to be avoiding all humans but regardless, I stood there for a good 10 minutes shaking the bucket like I was playing maracas in some sort Andean healing ritual.

Eventually our friend took over and with some persuasive talking he managed get the sheep to follow him down the hill and into the pen we’d created near the boat. That was the first challenge, now we needed to use some metal fencing to create a sort of walkway leading to the back of the boat where we’d placed a wooden ramp.

Then it was time to open the gate and corral them up the ramp, which was easier said than done as they clearly didn’t like the look of the tin boat. Things were going well and we had about 8 sheep onboard when suddenly 3 sheep appeared to our left side, they clearly missed the memo to stick with the group and had been separated. While we were busy trying to add them to the pen the sheep onboard began jumping off! The sea was shallow so they were able to run off at great speed and quickly hide from us in the forest.

It took a good hour to find the sheep again and round them up but eventually we had them all together and began the walk of shame back up the boat ramp. I think the sheep were getting a bit pissed off with us all interfering with their idyllic island life and they were really resisting getting on board now. Two people were standing by the edge of the boat and after the last failed attempt they now had to watch the sheep non-stop because as soon as one jumps they all follow. Well, good news is we managed to get half of them onboard at last and now we needed to join the sheep on the boat. The engine was at the back so we had to squeeze through the poopy-bummed animals to the back and motor our way out to the white boat.

We attached the tow line to the sheep boat and off we went, heading for the open sea with a dozen or so nervous looking sheep bobbing about in the tinny. The sea became pretty choppy and I was constantly looking out at the window behind us as waves hit the boat and spray up. It was at this moment that our friend searched the boat for a knife, when he found it he explained it was incase the tin boat began sinking and we couldn’t untie the rope in time, we would be able to at least cut the rope. I liked that he was making a plan for worst case scenarios but it terrified me to think that it was a possibility that the tin boat could either flip and sink or take on too much water and sink. Either way if it sunk it would take us down too as we were connected so the knife was needed incase of an emergency. Luckily we made it across the rough sea and entered the calmer fjord where I could relax again.

Our final challenge was getting the sheep back onto land so first Craig had to jump off the boat and onto a rock surrounded by fairly deep water. He kept the boat close to shore by pulling on the rope and then we put the ramp in place. I was left holding the rudder of the boat which was vibrating violently and spluttering water as the weight moved to the front and the engine came out the water. The final stage of herding them into the barn where they’ll be spending the winter months was fairly easy. While we were there he asked if we wanted to weight the sheep so we also gave that a go, when in Rome ay.

It involved me entering a pen where they all scurried away from me while I selected the easiest target. To get hold of them we were told to put our arm around their neck and with the other hand we grabbed their lower back area. Some of them were easy to manoeuvre into the caged weighing scales while others acted like they were possessed by the devil, I don’t blame them though. We also had to lift up their tail and check if it was a boy or a girl, I wasn’t sure if it would be obvious but it turns out sheep, even the lambs have rather dangly balls. It was an interesting experience to say the least!