Now that we are at home and the laundry is done, I can catch up on the last few days of the cruise, the Scandinavian ports of Oslo, Gothenburg and Aalborg.
We sailed in to the Oslo Fjord at around 8:00 Wednesday morning and had 2 hours of beautiful scenery before we docked at our berth at the city centre at 10:00. This is one of the most beautiful sail-ins in the world as we pass by islands and peninsulas that remind us of Georgian Bay and the islands of the St. Lawrence River, dotted heavily with cottage homes.
It was a beautiful sunny day with an expected temperature of 24C, so we were already in our shorts and t-shirts for the first time on the cruise.
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| The Opera House; the Norwegians sure love to make use of every square centimetre of space! |
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| The tour boat on the right was very interesting - no steps from deck to deck, so completely accessible! |
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| Our ship was berthed at the inner harbour, not far from the Opera House |
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| These are little floating saunas (bathing suits required) - when you're done and want to cool off, just jump into the water! |
It was as we left the park and wanted to 'hop-on' the bus that we realized we had made a huge mistake...There are two Hop-On Hop-Off bus companies in Oslo, and we had picked the wrong one! The original company, that has more buses and stops more often at each location, has 'Hop-On Hop-Off Sightseeing Norway' written large on the sides of the buses, and the other is 'Hop-On Hop-Off City Sightseeing' run by Hop-On Hop-Off AS. We had unfortunately chosen #2 because it was the first kiosk we came across. When our bus finally arrived, about 50 people were all scrambling to get on, as we had been waiting for almost the full half-hour (some people had been there longer as there was no room in the previous bus) so it was something of a mob scene. We ended up standing for a couple of stops, until people got off at the open air and naval museums. It would have been nice to do that as well, but we were afraid we wouldn't be able to get back on when we were done, so we stayed on board until the bus stopped near our ship, and decided to spend the rest of the afternoon on board at the pool.
We had dinner at Earth and Ocean on Wednesday - as described in our previous post - and made our plans for Thursday. No more buses; we were walking around the city ourselves.
Thursday morning was just as bright and sunny and warm as Wednesday had been, so we set off after breakfast to visit the Akershus, the original fortress of Oslo, which was not far from the ship. We had been through the grounds on that visit 30 years before, but this time discovered that the interior was now open for tours.
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| The complex also houses the Military History Museum and some adminstrative offices for the military |
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| The castle courtyard. The tour basically took us all the way around it. |
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| This room has a very interesting feature - the crown shape of bricks above the wooden armoire was put there spontaneously by the bricklayers working on renovations in 1937 when now King Harald V was born, the first monarch born on Norwegian soil in 604 years! |
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| These rooms are all beautifully maintained and still used for diplomatic functions |
The audio-guided tour was very interesting. This castle/fortress was originally built in the 1300s when Norway was a part of Denmark, to be the seat of the king's representative. The castle has seen many additions and remodels since then, and is still used for royal receptions and important government occasions to this day. The last major royal event was the wedding of Crown Prince Haakon in the early 2000s, but the Nobel Peace Prize is awarded here every year, while all the other Nobel prizes are awarded in Sweden.
After we were done at Akershus, we decided to visit the Cathedral in the heart of the city, again, not that far a walk.
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| The interior of the cathedral. The walls are quite plain but the ceiling makes up for it! |
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| The main altar. Norway's main religion is a Protestant one. |
And then we continued along the main pedestrian shopping street, Karl Johan Gate, toward the Royal Palace.
By then we were getting hungry, and had passed a restaurant we wanted to try out, just because of its name: Egon. That was my father's second name, so we felt we had to see what kind of food they had. Apparently this is a chain with many locations in Norway and a few in Sweden.
The patio area was quite full, but there were lots of tables inside, so we checked out the menu, found a table, and Larry went off to place our order. The system they use is similar to that in an English Pub - you place your order at the bar, pay when you order, and then, when you're done you can just leave. Tipping is not usual as waiters and barkeeps are paid a working wage, so there's none of the extra time and effort that we have at the end of the meal dealing with the bill.
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| The interior of the restaurant was quite beautiful. |
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| I had cod from northern Norway with potatoes and vegetables |
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| Larry just had a sandwich -- a hungry-man's Club Sandwich, and fries. |
Not long after we left the restaurant and were walking back along Carl Johan Gate, we noticed a small parade coming toward us, complete with horses and a marching band. As they came closer, we realized it was the parade of the Changing of the Guard going from Akershus toward the Palace.
We strolled back to the harbour and the ship after that, and relaxed a little before getting ready for the evening. We were sailing out at 6:00, but we had a 6:15 dinner reservation at The Grill by Thomas Keller, so we would be missing at least part of the lovely scenery. It wasn't getting dark until very late, so we'd have to see where we were after dinner and the early show.
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| The lighthouse at the very end of the Oslo Fjord |
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| Sunset was after 11:00, and it would be rising again before 4:00 |
We enjoyed our time in Oslo, and were especially happy for the fantastic weather we had. Our overnight sail to Gothenburg, Sweden, was fairly short and the sun was up again long before we arrived.
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