Oslo — What a beautiful, clean & progressive city!

Hello All,

We got off the ship and headed straight to our hotel, The Thief, where we dropped off our bags and headed out.   We had to drive through an underwater parking garage to get to our hotel.  This boot was in the roundabout.  Another stunning day — how lucky are we?

It took us a long walk along the beautiful waterfront to find the closest Hop-On — Hop-Off bus, but we eventually found it. As it was such a beautiful day, the other three went to the top of the bus while my bike and I stayed down.

Our first stop was Vigeland Park, a beautiful landscaped park with 200+ sculptures donated to the City of Oslo by the artist Vigeland with lakes and a rose garden.  This artist devoted his whole life to the study of the human form, mothers, fathers and children, gay and straight.  At the top of the park was a phallic monolith at the top.  One of the more bizarre artist expressions we have seen.

 

From Wikipedia:  Gustav Vigeland (11 April 1869 – 12 March 1943), born as Adolf Gustav Thorsen, was a Norwegian sculptor. Gustav Vigeland occupies a special position among Norwegian sculptors, both in the power of his creative imagination and in his productivity. He is most associated with the Vigeland installation (Vigelandsanlegget) in Frogner Park, Oslo.^[1][2] He was also the designer of the Nobel Peace Prize medal.

Our next stop was the Viking Ship Museum where we learned a whole lot about the early ships of Norway. They were really works of art. When a Viking leader died, he was buried with his belongings in his ship.  The ship was then covered with a mound of dirt. Because the dirt was moist, the ship and many of the belongings were well preserved. The museum contained three ships from different eras and a multitude of belongings.

 

We took the bus back toward the center of the city and landed at the Oslo Opera House.  It is spectacular-a true work of art!  What a pleasure it was to walk around and then inside of the fabulous building.

We went across a side street to Dognville for burgers; I mistakenly ordered the one with chilis – it was a scorcher.  By the way, all along the way you will see pictures of the wonderful buildings of Oslo.

Yes, those are all chilis — hot, hot, hot!

Our hotel was located on an island in a series of islands of reclaimed land.  I think that the land was created about 2010 so it is all relatively new construction with a very trendy boardwalk along the water.

What a view!

 

Likewise, our hotel was a boutique, modern hotel – very hip but not very functional.  We loved our room, loved our view, loved our very fast internet; however, the wiring  in our room must have been messed up because we blew out our Eurosurge adapter when we plugged it in.  Then we lost power to the room completely – twice.  The current wasn’t strong enough to charge the battery of my scooter; we had to charge it downstairs in the office – worked fine there!  And one night the TV wouldn’t turn completely off; a very bright light bar came on saying no signal in Norweigian.  Our room was a little too bright that night.  They offered me admission to the spa to compensate…..but I didn’t spend three days in Oslo to sit in a spa!

We walked a few “blocks” to find a dinner spot — Olivia’s, taking in the views as we walked.

The Thief from the bridge:

On our second morning we headed toward the Akershus Fortress by walking down the boardwalk then up to the fortress.  Once there, I made it only partway up the property and then realized the scooter was not going to be able to do the huge hills over cobblestones.  I dropped out and played Solitaire on my phone while they went on.

In the middle of the outdoor seating at the TGIFriday’s:

Nice view of City Hall:

My endpoint going up:

This is a good place to explain the roof top additions all over Norway on both homes and commercial buildings.  The grids at the base of the roof are to prevent the melting snow from falling and, literally, killing someone underneath.

Nice view from the top back toward our island; the sloping roof goes right up to our hotel.

We then took a taxi to the Royal Palace for our 12 noon tour.  I was not allowed to use the scooter, so John got to push me in a wheelchair.  No photos were allowed so I am going to upload a few from online.  The rooms were gorgeous…..and I could photograph the building as we walked away.

 

     

It was now time for more food and John had read about a food court – Mathallen.  We had Chinese and Tomi & Bryan had Italian; then we all had Sniker (a Norwegian gelato that tasted like a Snickers candy bar) at Paradis. We had had it the night before and it was delicious!!!!

Our next stop was the Munch Museum.  The National Gallery had been our first choice to view paintings by Munch, but it is closed for renovations.  The Munch Museum has a new building underway but it won’t open until next year; meanwhile we visited their older place…..but we enjoyed the art – lots!  The name of the exhibition was EXIT! — a reference to the end of an era for the museum.  By the way, you can still see the tear marks from when The Scream and The Madonna were stolen from the museum in 2004.

Our last day in Oslo was going to be rainy – we were certainly due.  We headed to an area that housed three different museums and got there before the rain started.  Our first stop was the Kon-Tiki Museum.  It recounted the raft trip of Thor Heyerdahl, one before him and another after.  I thought it was very interesting!

Next we went to the Fram Museum – also interesting.  We took some silly pictures there, looked at some very funny (and germaine) comic strips, and John played an endurance game/test as if pulling a sled full of supplies (he did very well)!

This one made me laugh — at ourselves — we don’t miss a museum shop….

Timely:

The last museum there was the Maritime Museum.  Lots of ships and history of ships, but I had mostly lost interest by that time.  The movie at the beginning was great and I did take a few pictures.  Meanwhile the rain continued to pour down – even after we had gone to all three.  It was like finding a taxi in Manhattan in the rain after the shows on Broadway.  It did take awhile.

Once we were back in “our hood”, we went to a final museum, the Astrup Fearnley – contemporary art. Some great things and some very, very out there stuff. Think Whitney Museum in New York.

Jasper Johns:

The strangest were the works of British artist, Damian Hirst.

The one below is an animal floating in something; next is all butterflies; and the red one I’m going to attach the card.  Also, not pictured is one of all flies!!!!

Back to other artists….

Nan Golden:

I did take a picture from the room of John coming back from the museum.  The elevator to the second floor didn’t work, so I left a little early.  John is the little figure in the red hat waving in the rain then walking around taking pictures!

We celebrated with one last dinner – back at Olivia – where we had gone our first night in Oslo. And, miracle of miracles, just as we were getting ready to walk the two blocks to the restaurant……out came the sun!!!!

We both thought Norway was very interesting and that Oslo was a fabulous city. The Norwegian people are nice and the country seems to have good, forward thinking policies.  My weird husband took some pictures at the airport — why?  I don’t know!!!

Thanks for reading,

Beth