The Americans have never seen anything like it before, only they have… it’s a tale of Leif, Erling and Transatlantic Norse power.
Because, in truth, Leif Eriksson and the Vikings were the first settlers of North America.
Nearly 500 years before Christopher Columbus.
When the longboats made terra firma at L’Anse aux Meadowes in Newfoundland.
And made their way over the years, four million of them, to the Upper Midwest and the Pacific Northwest.
Mostly to Minnesota, the Dakotas, Wisconsin, Washington State and California.
The Norse Home Country
Well, they’ve been joined, as we’ve all seen in the last month, by crewmen and women from the Old Country.
With the Norwegians giving the Scots a run for their money as the party people of this World Cup.
With their Viking-rooing, or Viking rowing crowd surge.
Even taking over escalators in Boston.
And those very same Scots taking to Norway as their adopted team.
Well, the nearest train station for Shetlanders is Bergen.
Row, row, row your boat
And while none got wet in its production apart from spilled lager.
Modern Norsemen did put their backs into it to row all the way across the Atlantic.
With 338 Norwegian supporters crossing the Atlantic on Norse Atlantic Airways’ longship to New York.
Of course, most of us don’t have that amount of time (and that’s our excuse) so we avail instead of their flights.
The stuff of legend
Norse have been putting on extra seats for Miami for their quarter-final match with England.
And we dare say that Norse flights will be in high demand for the final on Sunday, July 19 in New Jersey.
But here they are, should you be free for next Sunday, from £1,082 return Saturday to Monday.