Day 11 / 12 : Oslo

Day 11: was mainly a train ride from Copenhagen to Oslo.  The terrain was a lot of farm fields and individual houses.  There were some mini mountains in the area which is a change from what we had been seeing.  When we arrived in Oslo we checked into our hotel which was near the airport.  The funny thing about this hotel is everything is digital.  You walk up to a kiosk and enter your reservation number.  It takes your payment and spits out your cards.  There is a tablet for the concierge.  I poked around it a bit and under FAQ one question was "I need a HUMAN".  Thought that was funny.

Day 12 : This is a pretty ugly City Hall.  It almost looks like a prison.  Supposedly its nice inside but we didn't get a chance to go in it.

On this day we hit a lot of different museums around Oslo.  We started at the Fram museum which was all about the race to the poles.  They had very well documented treks and planning and had the original ship.  Although one of the two expeditions racing to get there didn't make it back.  It was also stated that most of the dogs didn't make it back either.  Little sad but an interesting read.

The South Pole boat wasn't very big at all but that is because they didn't really use it too much.  The North Pole boat was much bigger.  But one thing both boats did have in common was everybody must have been short cause you had to watch your head.

Next stop was the Maritime museum.  The Norsemen really like their boats. 

The most interesting boat they had in this place was some old canoes but the coolest one was basically a Pine tree that had been carved out.  It was said to be over 2000 years old.  It was found on a river bed that was at its lowest ever.  Funny because when they escalated it they had to do it from under water.

Next museum we went into was the Kon-Tiki.  This was an expedition off South America to prove that old style rafts could be used to sail on the ocean.  The expedition was a research activity to prove that native people from South America could reach the Polynesian Islands.

After the success of that expedition there was another one that I can't recall to where but the boat was made out of reeds.  They built the ship in the shadows of the Giza pyramids for publicity but had to get the reeds else where because they were no longer available on the banks of the nile.

Next museum was the Viking Museum.  I really like this one because of the variety of items on display.  The objects in the Museum are from 3 main graves.  Apparently important people were buried in ships with a lot of belongings they would need for their journey to heaven.

One of the graves even had horses to pull the carts that were buried with him.

This particular boat wasn't in the best shape but it showed a different style as well.

After the Viking museum we went to a Folk museum.  This was a bunch of houses and buildings from all over Norway that were moved to the facility.  We have seen this before in a number of different countries and it is always neat to see how times change.

This next building reminded me of the Swiss structures we saw.  Looks like the living quarters were upstairs.

This is a picture of an old church.  It was made out of wood but yet very ornate.  It had all kinds of roof sections and peaks.

Inside the church was a beautifully painted alter.

The snow gave the building a little more realism.

Some of the houses were open with period decorations or utilities to show how they may have looked back in the day.

The doors and their hinges were very decorated.  But you better be only about 5 foot tall to get though any of the doors.

Most of the buildings had dirt roofs with grass growing on them.

This place was especially neat.  Instead of wall paper they had a painted decoration on all the walls.

They had an old bank building.  These buildings were from newer era's than the previous ones.

The most modern area had a gas station and an apartment building.  The apartment building was not actually relocated.  When the building was to be torn down they went in and took measurements and pictures.  They also took everything that was not attached to the building like doors and windows.  They then used the measurement to rebuild the building and placed all the objects back into their original positions.

Last stop of the day was the National Gallery.  This is all about the art work.  There was a variety of art but I only took pictures of the ones I liked.  The first one I really like how the colored buildings just pop on this snowy street.

Not that I know where most artists come from but didn't realize the Scream artist was Norwegian.

They had a Monet.  I don't like all his pieces some are a little too abstract for me but this one was pretty nice.

Not sure who this was buy but the way the light was done was amazing.  This is a picture of the full painting.

this is the same painting just focused on what the light was focused on.

We ended our tour walking back to the Hotel but we took a small detour to see the Palace.  It was a treacherous walk up all that shiny ice leading to the Palace.