Oslo

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15 June 2010

In excellent weather we had a delightful day visiting our third capital city of the trip, Oslo, which is situated on its own fiord.

After buying our seniors day transport tickets from the local newsagent we caught the train into the central station. From there we walked up the main street, Karl Johans Gate and saw the Domkirke (Cathedral), Stortinget (Parliament Building), the University, the National Gallery (it was closed due to a strike so we couldn’t see The Scream by Edvard Munch) and Det Kongelige Slott (Royal Palace).

We then walked down to the waterfront and had a look at the impressive murals in the main hall of the 1950s Radhus (City Hall). The local ferries were included on our ticket so we took one to the Bygdor peninsular and visited two impressive boat museums. The first included three Viking ships which were recovered from ancient burial mounds over a century ago and the second was a building constructed in the 1930s around the Fram, the boat used by Roald Amundsen when he beat Scott to the South Pole. After a walk through the castle grounds where the world cup was being shown on a large screen another ferry trip took us around some of the islands in the Oslofiord.

Our final sight of the day was we thought the most impressive and something everyone should try to see. Gustav Vigeland was a sculptor and between 1924 and his death in 1943 he created the Vigelandsparken, an avenue containing over 200 sculptures of men women and children in may attitudes and positions, a fountain and an obelisk. You walk right by these amazing imaginative works of art and can touch most of them. See this extraordinary spectacle in the evening sunshine is something we will always remember.

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