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Published: July 10th 2010
FRAM
Arctic ExplorerOur last Baltic stop, Oslo, Norway. We have been looking forward to Oslo. This is the land of Viking ships and explorers of the north and south poles , the Kon Tiki and international ski jumping. Today’s drive took us through the beautiful downtown of Oslo where we learned that Oslo is one of the three most expensive cities on the world. The other two being Moscow and Tokyo. In 1624 the Danish King, Christain IV, named the city after himself, calling it Christiania. Finally in 1925, the Parliament renamed the city, Oslo.
We saw the ship “FRAM”, that Roald Amundsen used to race for then south pole in 1911. He also used it to conquer the southwest passage. It is a huge wooden icebreaking ship and we were able to go aboard. Amundsen and his men had 98 dogs for the trip and planned to get to the pole by dog sled and skis. They used the dogs for pulling the sleds and also for food so that they would not have to carry so many provisions. After reaching the South Pole, they returned to the ship with all men accounted for and 16 dogs left.
We also headed
Viking Ship
Rowing around the world for the Viking Museum where we saw three original Viking ships. It took 32 men to row each ship. The ships had been buried over 1100 years ago and had been preserved in clay and sand. These vessels also served the royal owners on their final journey to the realm of the dead.
The third museum was that of the Kon Tiki. This was the raft that Thor Heyerdahl built to prove that people from South America could have built rafts and intermingled with Polynesian peoples who had come from Asia. They have a replica of the Kon Tiki and in the museum as the original Kon Tiki was burned. It as made of reeds and balsa wood. Also they have the original second raft of Heyerdahl’s, the Ra II which was made out of papyrus and is so sound it could be sailed today.
The day went by way too quickly! Each of these places was fascinating and we’d love to come back to Olso. Definitely one of our favorite ports!
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CLAUDIA
non-member comment
Utterly fascinating!!
I would love to have been with you on this day. Everything is so interesting!!!