I’m getting a great jump on this blog entry here in Oslo. While most of southern Europe is baking, it is 55 F (13 C) here at noon and it’s raining. A lot. A large storm is moving across Scandinavia causing flooding in Sweden and Norway. As a result, we spent most of our time hanging in our apartment and visiting museums. Thank goodness Oslo has plenty of great museums!
Stockholm to Oslo by Train
To get to Oslo we took a 7 hour train ride from Stockholm. Curious to see the rural areas of both countries, as we gazed out the window of the train. Rain, clouds, rolling hills covered with trees (pine, aspen oak and others), streams, lakes. White farmhouses or red with white trim set on green fields. We managed to take a few reasonable pictures, which is hard to do through the window of a moving train.
Our Nordic Home
We are staying in a studio apartment in Oslo. It seems like an average middle class apartment building. The building is old, and has a wash room in the basement with sinks for scrubbing and an interesting rack system for drying. They have added one large communal washing machine for maybe 30 apartments, though some apartments may have their own machines. There is a calendar book in the wash room to sign up for washing times and the wooden drying racks are still in use. Four tall drawers that roll out along the overhead pipe with wooden slat to hang the clean laundry, and then roll back into the wooden box, which has a fan that draws air through it. Don’t hang anything that might fall inside though!
On Sunday, we attended church and took advantage of the break in rain to explore the port area. They have a modern opera house that has a walking ramp for a roof, providing a nice view. The Munch Art Museum is nearby, as well as the cruise ship port.
The Fram Museum
This museum chronicles the expeditions of the many polar explorers (both North and South), especially the Norwegian expeditions. The museums are built around two wooden ships that played prominent rolls in that exploration: The Fram, a ship that was designed to be frozen into polar ice and drift along with the ice in the North East passage near the north pole in winter. The Gjøa, the first ship to actually cross the North West passage in the Arctic sea above Canada to Nome, Alaska (a multi-year endeavor).
Kon-Tiki Museum
Thor Heyerdahl was a Norwegian explorer famous for building a balsawood raft (the Kon-Tiki) and sailing it from Peru to the Pacific islands to prove that it could have been done anciently. Later, he made raft from papyrus and sailed it from Africa to the Caribbean (Ra II) This was to prove that it could be done using ancient ship building techniques. The museum also documents other explorations and archaeological expeditions he did. The original Kon-Tiki is there along with Ra II, the papyrus ship. Really interesting to learn how harrowing the trips were, see artifacts and the original ships.
The Norwegian Museum of Cultural History
This is a collection of old building from throughout Norway that have been moved to this outdoor museum. There are also many artifacts on display in dedicated museum buildings. Four hours was not enough time to see everything, but it was a really interesting experience. Like other similar museums we have visited throughout Europe, it is clear that life was hard well into the 19th century.
A highlight of the outdoor museum is a 13th century wooden church, which has been restored a few times.
So much for Scandinavia for now. A bit more than normal. We hope to return to check out the fiords on the west coast. Next up, 3 weeks in Ireland, home of green landscapes and probably more rain!
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