Back to the big city

May 1/07

Wow, I can hardly believe that there's only 15 days left. We headed back to Oslo, repeating the spectacular train rides from Flam to Myrdal, then to Oslo. This time, we were not in first class, and not even in the same coach. For some reason we were booked seats in different coaches...which was really odd because we both had empty seats beside us. Part way, Bridgette came to sit with me, so that was better. It gets boring alone.

In Olso, we were exhausted, so after we found our hostel, we pretty much called it a night, after going to the only open restaurant around and buying pizza. Hmm, I'm starting to notice we ate a lot of pizza.

May 2/07

In a much better state of mind, and more awake, we went to the Vigeland park, where a local artist, Gustav Viges (I think) was given a contract to build a bunch of statues for a park. It turned into an enormous project, with more than 200 statues, larger than life-size. The statues represent human emotion in every form. It was incredible. They showed relationships between men and women, old and young, grandparents and children. What was amazing was that, for me, it only took one glance and I KNEW the story of the people in the statues. I could feel who they were to each other, and what was behind the moment captured in stone. I don't know if that makes sense, but they were very moving statues.

After visiting the park, we had some time to wander around the old parts of Oslo, and then went to a fortress to see the changing of the guard. I'm always surprised how many guys it takes to help one guy leave his post and another to replace him. The funniest part was that during all the marching and saluting and waving of bayonettes, there was also a lot of shuffling. They'd get all lined up and then shuffle to one side, and back like little boys at a dance. It was really odd, and not what I'd expect from a military group. It looked really funny, and kind of like they didn't know where they were supposed to stand.

Next, we jumped on a ferry to go to Bygdoy, a penninsula across from the main harbour, which was a short walk to the Viking Ship Museum. This museum had...Viking Ships in it. It was specifically built to hold the remains of 3 large ships found in burial mounds, and the grave artifacts found with them. The ships date back to 800AD. It was very impressive how well preserved they are, and, well, Vikings are really cool.

Back in the main part of Oslo, we did a bit of shopping then returned to our hotel for "the BIG Pack". We had booked a flight out to Glasgow for tomorrow morning. This was an incredible example of the cheap airlines here in Europe. The flight cost 1NOK, that's equivalent to 0.18$. With taxes and baggage charge, the ENTIRE flight was booked for a mere 55$ CND for TWO people. Yup, that's it. Unfortunately, we had baggage limits. The maximum weight of checked luggage was 15Kg, and carry-on was 10Kg. Hmmm, what to do? And we had bought alcohol, so it needed to be checked (liquid and all) and the glass stuff we bought in Venice needed to be carried on...what to do? We planned to check our packs, and carry on our wheely-bags, since they were small enough to fit. We packed accordingly. I figured we were a bit over weight, but hoped they wouldn't notice. Right, dream on.