Oslo In Six Daylight Hours

Well, Rebecca knows what she likes (ever since she was born).  She knew she as soon as we got out on the street that she likes Oslo.  And as we moved through the city, we kept finding more evidence that this is a much cooler place than Copenhagen. I am sure that the weather gave it an unfair advantage -- it was sunny and beautiful today, if only in the 20s.

However, the system for purchasing bus tickets was a bit primitive. I didn't witness it because I sat on a bench and watched people while the other two went down into the train station to wrestle with the ticket machine.  They were gone long enough for me to watch a delivery person unload a full straight truck of cargo, one pallet at a time, and roll it down the bumpy pedestrian walkway to the store.  He wasn't a big burly man but he knew how to operate a pallet jack and he took the whole operation to its very edge. When the lift gate hit the pavement, the wheels of the pallet jack started to roll and the whole tippy stack began to leave the truck.  The man deftly slowed it down, adjusted the load and maintained control of a pile of boxes that was much taller and heavier than he was. I see this dance of the pallet jack every year when Carroll S. unloads the pumpkins, but it was fun to watch it in an urban setting, on ice.

We walked to our bus stop with our 24-hour bus tickets and expertly got on the bus (Jon and I never try to ride buses in foreign countries, but Becca has a Google Pixel and supreme confidence.  It is amazing how much data Google can provide on any topic, any time.  Bus schedules, endless fun facts, closing times for the cathedral that definitely appears to be closed. I understand that everyone else in the world already knows this, but this is not how I operate. It's not my age, it's my lack of technological curiosity/aptitude.).

The first bus ride took 25 minutes, through the center of town and on out to the west where there are lots of museums in a relatively undeveloped area.  Oslo is apparently 2/3 open space, with lots of parks and trees and water.  Our first destination was the Viking Ship Museum.  It was great.  One story line, some incredible artifacts, three real Viking ships that were discovered buried in ship graves and one handful of nails that represent a fourth ship. They don't have much information on how the Vikings lived, compared to other co-existent cultures, but those buried ships have left them many dots to connect.  The whole story is pretty amazing. If you ever get a chance to go to a Viking Ship Museum, you should do it.

The wood is the actual wood from 1000 years ago, preserved in the mud, which was
painstakingly labeled, disassembled and put back together as the fully assembled ship.

We headed back toward the city center and got off to walk up a big hill (did I mention that it snowed here recently and there is an icy coat on all the sidewalks? Some people are wearing crampons, some people are just slipping and falling, some of us are walking with small steps to avoid disaster.)

Certainly no salt is used in this crunchy country.

to Vigeland Park, a huge park with dozens of sculptures all by one artist. I had read about it some last night so we knew there were a few statues that were especially notable. We found some of them. Without intending to, we went to the most-visited spot in all of Norway -- a big column carved out of one piece of granite, of lots of bodies climbing and crawling up the column. They say 1 - 2 million people a year go to see it (as R. says, that's a big range). We will have to read more about it if we want to understand those sculptures. Some of them were pretty weird.

Angry baby, some say this is an allegory about Norway.

It was time for something to eat, so we uncharacteristically went into a tiny cafe right in the park. We had the best beet soup ever, and a sandwich with very substantial and good bread. But the biggest surprise was the hot chocolate that was made with coconut milk.  Becca said it was like drinking a macaroon. It was the most satisfying meal in a restaurant in a very long time. The dishes were beautiful, which I appreciate a lot.

Back on the bus downtown, got off to walk around the waterfront and admire all the boats. We saw but did not visit the building that holds all the archives for the Nobel Peace Prize.  We found a random statue of FDR, erected in appreciation for all that he/we did for Norway during and after WW2.

Becca (and Hana) in silhouette.

Wandered through the downtown shopping district, stopping to do some research about sweaters ($$$), and eventually actually buying a sweater in a mall, after a great deal of pondering.  Rebecca knows way too much about consumer psychology now, and neither of them is keen to spend money on themselves, so the proper compromise was to buy a sweater for Alissa that Rebecca will break in for a few months first.

The Norwegian Palace at the end of a busy street.

And then I was the one who was finished with walking in increasingly uncomfortable boots and I started to whine.  They took pity on me and we went home by 5:30. After our daily rest, R. and Jon went back out to buy some more groceries.  We had a salad that tasted like home because Jon finally got to assemble all the right ingredients. The store-bought soup was not like home, but we fluffed it up some with leftover rice.

As usual, we didn't make it to all the places that we had marked on R's phone, but we did see a remarkable number of iconic Oslo spots.  It was an excellent day of touring. I think we feel more at home in a city that is so full of immigrants -- Wikipedia tells us that a few years ago 40% of the kids in grade school did not have Norwegian as their first language.  For some reason, people are just pouring into Oslo and the population is growing fast. It must be a good place to live.

The famous Oslo Cathedral which closes at 4:00, with, oh yes, some chickens in front.