Europe

We had a good night’s sleep last night, and were up early in preparation for an 8:00 am disembarkation.

The Thief Hotel’s car picked us up for the drive to hotel, which is only a short distance from the cruise port.

We left the hotel around 9:30 am and headed off on foot to meet Peter and Joy, who were staying in a different hotel. Since we had not yet had breakfast, we met in a local cafe for a quick breakfast.

Over breakfast, we decided that it might be worth trying the Oslo hop-on, hop-off bus, to give us an overview of the interesting sites. We boarded the bus at Universitetplassen (University Square) in time for the 11:00 am departure.

Our bus driver was, to put it mildly, somewhat of a lunatic! The ride was far from the sedate sightseeing experience we had anticipated! We lasted about a third of the bus circuit, before getting off near the Akershus Fortress. We walked around the shoreline, and made our way to the Astrup Fearnley Museum Of Modern Art, a privately-owned contemporary art gallery in Tjuvholmen (just next to our hotel).

The museum houses a very eclectic selection of modern art. There are plenty of conversation-starters on display, but it was probably a little too way out for our taste.

We left the museum a little after 1:00 pm, and walked back along the boardwalk. By this time, rain was falling, so we were keen to not be outside for too long.

Our next stop was the Nobel Peace Centre, a museum dedicated to telling the story of Alfred Nobel and the Nobel Peace Prize, as well as honouring the recipients of the award. Just as we arrived at the Nobel Peace Centre, the rain started to get a lot heavier, so we were pleased to get inside. The Nobel Peace Centre was very interesting, and we spent around an hour viewing the exhibitions.

We exited the Nobel Peace Centre, to find that the rain had not abated. But, with more to see, we pushed on to our next destination, The Royal Palace.

After 15 minutes of walking in the rain, we arrived at the very impressive Royal Palace.

We admired the palace and grounds for a little while before assessing our options for the rest of the afternoon. By this time, it was about 3:00 pm, and it seemed like the rain had set in for the rest of the day. So, we said goodbye to Peter and Joy, and we headed back to our respective hotels.

We walked back along the pretty, and very lively, boardwalk area.

The boardwalk on the shoreline is in the Aker Brygge area. This area, like much of Oslo, is dotted with sculptures.

As we got close to the hotel, we decided that we’d get an ice-cream, which meant that we had to retrace our steps back along the water to one of the ice-creameries in the area. As we passed one called “Pascal”, we were offered a sample of their pistachio ice-cream, which was amazing. We ended up trying quite a few flavours, all of which were delicious.

The Pascal ice-cream brand was started by Pascal Dupuy, a Frenchman who rose to become one of the most respected pastry chefs in Norway, before specialising in ice-cream and macarons. There are now seven Pascal shops in Norway, and Pascal employs over 100 people. It just so happened that Pascal Dupuy was at this store today, so we met him, and learned about his rags-to-riches story, which was fascinating.

Ice-creams (and macarons!) in hand, we headed back to the hotel to warm up after a prolonged period in the rain. We decided that if this is what summer looks like in Oslo, we’d definitely want to avoid the winter!

By the time we got back to the hotel, it was nearly 5:00 pm. We decided to order room service for an early dinner.

Tomorrow, we’re meeting Peter and Joy in the morning, for another day of exploring in Oslo.