Hamre Church

Hamre Church has, by all accounts been one of the four main churches in Horda County in the Middle Ages. Hamre was a main church for the whole of Hordaland. Timber remains in the present church show that there was a stave church here in medieval times.

Hosanger church

On Christmas Day 1795, at 5 a.m., the lightning struck the church in Hosanger. After three hours, the timbered church from the 1600s, which had replaced the stave church from the Middle Ages, was in ashes. Already on New Years Day in 1796, a sermon was held for the Hosanger population in the main church at Hamre, to which the congregation belonged earlier,

Valestrandsfossen- tanning industry

Valestrand became a centre for the tanning industry in Osterøy; one of the old crafts that has developed into a local industry with many places of work. From the 1870s ever more ventures were started. Many of the large sea houses we see today around the bay have been places for tanning and leather enterprises.

Ferstad

Ferstad is well worth a visit. The farm lies on a little hillock south of Lekven: a beautiful official residence from the 1700s.

Gåssand

The 28th November 1914 was a day to remember for the Os inhabitants. This was the day they could turn the switch on the wall and have electric light in their houses. It was like opening the door on the future when the power station at Gåssand was put into operation.

Grødalshaug

At the bottom of Vargavågen on Halhjem lies Grødalshaug, a 30 metres high rocky outcrop between the bay and a moist valley cleft. On the south side of the rock is a steep rock cliff facing the valley, the bog and the stream. On this rock face we find rock carvings from the Bronze Age.

Lyse chapel

The small white-painted chapel with the red brick tiled roof just south of the monastery ruins at Lyse was built in 1663 as a local chapel for the monastery estate, following the takeover of the property by the District Recorder (Stiftskriver) Niels Hanssøn Schmidt two years previously. The chapel, with its harmonic proportions, lies in the cultural landscape beside the grand monastery estate, witness to a time gone by. But even today, there is a tradition of high mass on the 2nd day of Ascension in Lyse Chapel.

Lyse Monastery

Osøyro

The coastal settlement of Os begins to take form in the middle of the 1800s. This is when craftsmen and traders begin to settle at the river delta.

Lysøen

Lysøen, this fairytale castle with its Russian-inspired onion dome on the corner turret, stands as a reminder of the diversity of the period called Historicism and a monument to a versatile artist; a key figure in the Norwegian National Romanticism.