initially we were only going to go to bergen, norway's second city, as we like the quieter life; after looking at flights and recommended things to do in norway, we decided to spend the first couple of days in oslo.
day one:
after freshening up, we decided to have a bit of a wander around the area close to the hotel and found a beautiful little courtyard near a museum and a quaint little restaurant. we sat near the fountain for a while sipping some fresh orange juice and snacking on pastry from a tiny cafe nearby before we decided to go and find the sea.
we flew (on the tiniest plane i have ever seen) mid-morning to copenhagen then (reassuringly on a slightly bigger plane) on to oslo. we arrived mid-afternoon in a very sunny, very warm oslo.
i had very low expectations of oslo - i don't know why, i just felt like bergen was where i'd wanted to go and this was a cost-effective way of getting there - but it exceeded all expectations. we stayed in a hotel called grims grenka which was down a quiet street in the city centre. the hotel itself was lovely, had a rooftop bar and the most amazing waterfall shower.
johnny loves the sea; any water to be honest, but the sea is his happy place. we weren't expecting to see the sea much from oslo but it turns out that there are some of the most wonderful views across the fjord that you can get as low down as we were. we walked past the fortress and found the ocean, we even found time to get a glass of wine at a harbour-side restaurant to make the most of the later afternoon sun.
travelling is exhausting so we soon made our way back to the hotel. we'd already decided to eat there that evening - word on the street was that they had a barbecue up on the rooftop bar - best decision ever! we rounded off a very uneventful day sipping some of the tastiest cocktails (including a super tasty tiki cocktail in a really cool cup), eating burgers and watching the smörgåsbord of patrons flit in and out of the bar.
day two:
we woke up early on the sunday and hurried down to the restaurant in the hotel for breakfast (also, the most awesome hotel breakfast ever - loose leaf tea, smoothie shots, pastries, bacon, eggs). we ate whilst listening to the floor to ceiling water feature and made typical scatty plans for the day. much like the majority of europe, i'd read that most things were closed in oslo on a sunday but we hoped that meant it wouldn't be as busy.
our first stop was the opera house, which is an understated beauty of a building that appears to be floating on the water. we walked up to the top of it and looked out across the sprawling fjord; it was an absolutely stunning day so we could see for miles and miles. also floating out there on the water is an impressive sculpture by monica bonvicini called 'she lies'. i'm a lover of art and could have sat and looked at this for hours - the weather definitely enhanced it though, i can't imagine it is as impressive on cloudy days unless the water is rough.
we love shoreditch in london and had heard that grünerløkka - an area in the north of oslo - had a similar vibe so took a leisurely stroll through the city. oslo was super sleepy on this Sunday morning but by midday there was definitely a buzz in the air. we nipped into a little sandwich place for lunch and then took a stroll back to the opera house. it was super busy and hot down by the water so we decided to go back to the little courtyard near our hotel and relax for a while. during the evening, we walked over to the aker brygge area of oslo - this was definitely my favourite part of the city that we saw; it's full of nice bars, shops and restaurants. we stopped for a beer at underbar which had so many different taps and bottles that it was difficult to choose... we then wandered round the corner to a tapas place i had heard excellent things about called delicatessen. it did not disappoint. i had possibly the best tapas of my life, and i have had a lot of tapas!
after polishing off a lot of food we went back to the hotel rooftop bar to watch the sun go down and enjoy some more cocktails. it was a very expensive evening, but so worth it; watching the sun set and the stars come out was one of the best nights of the summer.
the following morning we had a train to catch but this post is already too long... i'll talk about it later.
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