Kick-off 2013 - Røros

Røros - the destination of this year's company kick-off!

Every year, sometime in the first quarter of the new year, our entire comany goes on a little trip. That is with the colleagues of both offices (Oslo and Stockholm) and all our sales representatives and other staff abroad.
Every year the organisation of this trip lies in the hand of another team/department, e.g. the MICE department or the group department or all "external" staff... For this year's 2013 trip, it was the FIT departments (= departments for foreign individual travellers) being responsible for the organisation, i.e. the department I'm working in as well. So this year it was up to me and my colleagues Elisa, Jana, Wiebke, Séverine and Trude to come up with something great. And I think we did :-)

When having been to Røros in June 2012 together with Jana, Stéphanie and Michelle [click here to read more on my blog about this visit] we loved this place so much and knew that this is the place to show also to all the other colleagues.

So this is the result of our planning - a FIT & FUN kick-off to Røros:

FIT & FUN kick off 2013 – RØROS – our workout schedule:

Friday, 11 January

10:10 - Arrival Stockholm office at Oslo airport Gardermoen.

10:15 - Oslo office met at the train platform for the train to Hamar.

10:34 - Train left from Oslo Central Station.

10:44 - Veronika boarded the train in Lillestrøm.

10:59 - Stockholm office joined us on the train at airport Gardermoen. As this was a local train, we didn't have reserved seats, but all found place together in the front of the train.

11:53 - Train arrival Hamar.

Hamar is also known for its indoor long track speed skating and bandy arena, the below pictured Olympia Hall, better known as "the Viking ship" for its shape. It was built to host the speed skating competitions of the 1994 Winter Olympics that were held in nearby Lillehammer.

In Hamar we changed onto the train with direction Trondheim and Franck, who had visited a friend in the area, joined us.

12:10 - Train left Hamar in direction Røros and Trondheim. On this stretch I had reserved seats so that we were all sitting together.

This morning we, the "FIT & FUN" organisation team, had gathered in the office already at 9 a.m. to prepare sandwiches for everyone's lunch package. Every lunch package contained (next to a bottle of water) and the sandwich also an apple, a cookie made by Jana, a piece of "galettes des rois" (typical French almond cake) which Stéphanie had baked... and also a little welcome note:

As this was going to be a FIT & FUN kick-off, each lunch package included also a sweat band for the various workouts planned during this weekend :-)

And now that we had left Hamar it was lunch time - time to hand out those lunch packages and enjoy the landscape we were taken through.

The train ride to Røros took 3.5 hours. To kill time on that train we had organised a game. So after lunch it was time for our first FIT & FUN workout: Train your brain 1 - so the moment to get out the sweat bands. The game we had set up was a "secrets bingo". Before the kick-off, every colleague was asked to tell us a secret about him-/herself. During the train ride it was now up to find out who is hiding behind each secret. This way people had to swap places in the train and got to chat to each other - an interactive way of getting to know each other better :-)

Among the secrets there were quite some funny ones which had caused quite some laughter when we had handed out the paper with the secrets. It was great to see the enthusiasm with which our colleagues tried to discover the others' secrets and I think it took them some 90 minutes or even more to find the solutions. So it seemed everyone had fun.

15:30 - Arrival in Røros at -25°C! FIT & FUN workout 2: Let’s go! and start the kick-off by driving up to Røros Hotel.

16:00 - In one of the many meeting facilities of the hotel we held our annual company internal meeting. That way the formal part of the kick-off was done and we could fully concentrate on FIT & FUN :-)

17:30 - Surprise, surprise – let’s start the FUN evening! light FIT & FUN workout 3: Biceps power! = a beer tasting in the micro brewery of the Vertshuset Røros hotel.

 

 

18:15 - Check-in to our rooms (I was sharing one with Jana) at Vertshuset Røros and time to relax a bit and dress up for dinner.

19:15 - Meeting in the lobby for transfer to dinner. The transfer was planned by horse-drawn sleighs. Unfortunately it was far too cold for the horses. They would take out the horses only until -15°C maximum. This would have certainly be a fantastic and unforgettable activity on the programme. But of course, it was damn cold and we had full comprehension for the poor horses!

 19:30 - Dinner (buffet) at Røros Hotel aka FIT & FUN workout 4: Tummy stretch advanced.

We had a great dinner full of good local food. Once exercise number 4 was completed it was time to reveal our colleague's deepest secrets. Oh my god have we been laughing when everyone told the more detailed story around his/her secret!!!

After dinner - FIT & FUN workout 5: Fat burner. There was music/dance in the night club of the hotel. A piano artist was entertaining the people with songs. I didn't take long, though, until Gerlinde (our "professional" singer) took over the singingpart, from time to time supported by other colleagues.

 

While Gerlinde and Co. were assuring good quality singing, all others (with few exceptions) were dancing.

After a long night at the piano bar, step by step everyone was leaving the stage to go to bed. From that hotel to our hotel it would have been a 10 minutes walk by foot only, but at -25°C only a few resisted a taxi.

Saturday, 12 January

07:00-10:00 - Breakfast at the hotel.

10:00 - FIT & FUN workout 6: Train your brain 2 - during a guided tour of beautiful Røros.

The mining town of Røros is sometimes called "Bergstaden" which means "the mining town" due to its historical notoriety for copper mining. It is one of two towns in Norway that were historically designated "mining towns", along with the "silver-town" of Kongsberg. The modern-day inhabitants of Røros (some 3,600 people) still work and live in the characteristic 17th and 18th century buildings which have led to its designation as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1980.

We started at our hotel in Kjerkegata:

Main street of Røros: Bergmannsgata

Just one picture to show how cold it was: some -28°C - cold enough to get your eyelashes freeze!

Røros Church - with about 1,600 seats Norway's fifth largest church.

Røros Copper Works paid for the building of the stone church, and the symbol of the Copper Works was put on all sides of the tower wall.

 Though we highlyappreciated the warmth in the church it was nice to step out again into the wonderful sun to continue our visit.

May I present you a kick-sled - in very common use in Scandinavia, especially where roads are not salted or sanded.

We proceed to the mining museum.

As mentioned, known for its copper mines, Røros is one of Norway's two nationally significant mining towns with activity starting in the 17th century (the other one being the "silver-town" Kongsberg). In 1644, the general manager of the mine at Kongsberg gave permission to exploit one lode of copper in the mountains near Rauhaammaaren. Storvola and Gamle Storwartz became some of the company’s most important mines, together with Nordgruva.

From 1740 and onwards it was agreat period for the Røros Copper Works with several mines yielding extremely well, because high prices for both copper and zinc gave good results. But then the prices dropped and led to bankruptcy. Thus, after 333 years, mining activity in Røros stopped in 1977.

Further on to the old part of the town - in which also some of Astrid Lindgren's Pippi Longstocking classics were filmed as well.

 

 

 

What a great tour - thanks also to the fantastic local guide Lars... and the wonderful sunny weather!

12:00 - Lunch at Kaffestuggu, Røros' oldest café - aka FIT & FUN workout 7: Tummy stretch light

13:00 - FIT & FUN workout 8: Speed up! Meet in hotel lobby for afternoon FUN outdoor activities – with and without horse power! Well, this was the original plan. Unfortunately, "horses" were involved again (horse power), so it was once more too cold for thisactivity. A 2.5 hours snowmobile tour through the mountains was planned, but it was simply too cold. Not only for the snowmobiles, but even more for us. Already in the valley we had some -28/-30°C, so it wouldn't have been warmer up in themountains. Plus considering the airstream...we would definitely have been freezing our asses (and probably more) off!

Alternatively we had some activities at the base camp of the supplier, at Kverneng Gård.

  

Axe throwing:

 

   

Group skiing:

Some warming up in between - or at least the ATTEMPT to warm up with coffee and tea.

 And last but not least some strange "team building" activity - blind - which resulted more in
 a "team (feet) freezing".

 

 

16:00 - Return to the hotel and time to have FUN on your own or just relax.

 

Most of us though used the time to warm up with a hot chocolate and another piece of

Stéphanie's french almond cake ("galette des rois"). 

19:00 - FIT & FUN workout 9: Tummy stretch advanced = Dinner at Vertshuset Røros – with one of
the highlights: the announcement of the employee of the year 2012!

The three "employee of the year" nominees: Orijana, Aurélie & Jana.

 Happy birthday, Ann-Louise!

After dinner, we went to test the pubs in Røros and ended up at one bar which had - before we came
- 2-3 guests. Well, that left us at least enough space for dancing :-)

Sunday, 13 January

07:00-09:30 - Breakfast at the hotel.

We started the day even colder than the day before: -34°C! And it certainly didn't become warmer during the day!

09:30 - We left by bus to Hummefjell Skisenter, the alpine area of Røros.      

10:00 - FIT & FUN workout 10: Pull the trigger! Our host Nina arranged some FUN outdoor activities for us - at -34°C!!! :-) On the programm not only team building activities, but also some speed sledging and airboarding. What a fun!

 

 Frozen girls! When you feel the inside of your nose and your eyelashes freezing than you realise it's cold!

Rubber-boot-throwing competition: throw the boot through your legs, over your butt and over your bent back forwards... Not that easy - and looks terribly ridiculous!

Air boarding competition - between me and Franck :-)

 

12:30 - Return to the hotel to pick up out luggage and further on to the airport - which is as big as it might be someone's living room.

14:13 - Flight departure from Røros.

15:05 - Flight arrival at Oslo airport Gardermoen. FIT & FUN workout 11: Wave Goodbye! The colleagues from the Stockholm office and others continued with other flights home. We from the Oslo office took the bus or train back to Oslo downtown and back home.

That was truely a "cool" kick-off! I really liked it and I think and hope our colleagues did so as well :-)