Gateway to the Fjords...

So long ago we can't remember, we booked seats on a train from Oslo S to Bergen. WE'd heard that the scenery was special. After 4 nights acclimatising to endless daylight in Oslo, we boarded the express, run by Vy and sat back for a comfortable and truly spectacular 500km heading westwards over the mountains to Norway's second largest, and once capital (13thC) city. The train itself was most interesting: it featured regular first and second class seating, a sleeper carriage for overnighters, a "family" coach especially for children (complete with playrooms), large spaces dedicated to ski and bicycle storage, and a cafe. At the cafe, the most popular items were hot dogs, made fresh. The prepackaged sandwiches and rolls were very ordinary, as you'd expect on a train. The seating was comfortable, with large tables, but there were no power or USB outlets, and no onboard WiFi. The train was pretty crowded, but luggage space was ample.

The train was an express, but it at stopped many, many places (19 before Bergen), cute little towns, in the 7 hour journey. Stops were very short - you had to be ready to get off or get on. The scenery grew in spectacle as we crossed the mountains. As the altitude increased we passed the tree line and forests gave way to snowy plateaus. Grey skies gave the patchy snow cover a grim monochromatic look like the Australian high plains. Higher still and rain gave way to snow. The snowbound towns looked very nice. The highest stop was at Finse (1222m) where a blizzard was blowing and, being ahead of schedule, we were allowed off for 6 minutes. It was bitter out there!

Glacial lake and snow capped mountains as seen through the windows of our 7 hour Vy train journey from Oslo to Bergen. [05-27]

Summer approaches but still plenty of snow in the higher hills on the scenic rail crossing from Oslo. [05-27]

The snowbound town of Finse was having a blizzard during our brief stop there. [3257]

Vy trains arriving under the grand arches of Bergen railway station. [5401]

Soggy weather at Bergen's fine railway station. [5397]

On the way down, we stopped at Myrdal where there is a connecting train to Flam. This was our one regret about this trip - not allowing time for this side-track, for the steep run on the spur line down to fjord level Flam, apparently one of the world's most scenic train segments, but the weather was foul and we probably did not miss much. In Bergen, we discovered ferries to Flam, so it's possible to do a round trip.

Our arrival in Bergen was greeted by a grand railway station and freezing cold rain, but a taxi easily got us to our hotel on the famous Bryggen, Bergen's iconic wooden warehouse strip. And the rain came in frequent squalls for every one of our five days here! Traffic management is even more obvious (and welcome) here than it was in Oslo. The main downtown areas are virtually car free which makes the cobbled streets and lanes a delight to stroll around. The steep slopes at the back of Bryggen are especially interesting, where narrow windy lanes barely separate closely packed, very old, houses and shops and make for fascinating walking territory. Possibly by regulation, only local vehicles can ply these streets.

Not sure of the details, but this significant monument clearly pays tribute to many professions who are behind the Bergen of today. [5288]

An entertaining cooking demonstration attracted potential customers at the Bergen fish market. Plenty of whale meat on display, and being consumed in the restaurant, but we declined to sample it! [5292]

Now a fast food outlet, the wooden building on the left was probably built for a wealthy merchant. [5416]

Jammed into the tight spaces of downtown Bergen is the Domkirken cathedral. [5418]

Athletic statue jammed between buildings on the south side of Vagen. [5168]

Artistic graffiti seems to be an acceptable art form in Bergen, and this style is popular, maybe one dominant practitioner. [5178]

Quaint wooden buildings jostle for space in Bergen. [5192]

Many establishments in Bergen feature wooden statues like this one, usually representing the trade of the current or historical occupant. [5365]

Signage says the Rozencrantz Tower is the "most prominent renaissance building in Norway'. Parts of this tower date back to 1270AD. [5369]

So emblematic of Bergen are the wooden warehouses that they form the bulk of this souvenir shop's offereings. [5393]

Apparently owned by the Commune of Bergen, this prominent wooden building was being used for very loud drum practice. [5406]

In WW2, the Germans built many bunkers into the side of Bergen's Mt Floyen. This may be one, but now it has more peaceful purposes. [5414]

We were told that some of the warehouses in Skuteviken are older than the famous ones on the Bryggen. [5434]

Even the footpath sewer covers feature Bergen's iconic attractions. [5469]

Bergen's most famous "attraction" is the strip of waterfront warehouses (now shops and cafes) along the Bryggen (docks) on the north side of Vågen, an inner bay of an impossibly complex maze of fjords cutting into the Norwegian mainland from the North Sea. This part of Bergen dates back to 1070AD, and around 1350AD the Hanseatic League, a "medieval commercial and defensive confederation of merchant guilds", established a base here and constructed the warehouses to store their produce. The oldest warehouses are lopsided and unstable, being built on landfill made from rubbish, and are subject to restoration projects. Developers wanted to replace them with more modern brick structures, but community opposition fortunately prevailed and the strip is now Bergen's premier attraction. As fascinating as this strip is, its current photogenia is seriously compromised by many properties undergoing (probably necessary) renovation and are covered in scaffolding and hoarding.

Rare blue skies over Bergen's Bryggen showing the old wooden warehouses (left) and their replacment stone buildings (right). [5439]

The narrow alleyways between the warehouse buildings of Bryggen host shops attractive to tourists. [5293]

Warehouses such as these replaced the dislapidated and fire-prone wooden ones. [5382]

Visitors hamming it up for their selfie! [5470]

Another Bergen tourist attractions is the funicular railway up Mount Fløyen. The railway climbs 300m along 800m track length, so it's mighty steep, and it was opened in 1918, having been first envisaged in 1895 but delayed by WW1. Amazingly, the bottom entrance and takeoff point for the Fløibanen is underground, underneath the many houses that cling together on the steep slopes of the mountain. At Fløyen, there are numerous walking trails, but it was raining and miserable up there for our visit, and we didn't hang around for long. The view from Fløyen is truly stunning (in between showers and fog) as it commands spectacular views of much of Bergen and its harbours.

Before the crowds flock here, early morning Vertlidsalim leads up to the underground buttom station of the Floyen funicular railway. [5415]

We didn't see much sunshine in Bergen, but here it is lighting up the slopes of Mt Floyen. [5468]

View of Vågen Bay in Bergen from the top of the Floyen funiicular railway. The fish markets are the red and blue buildings near the bottom left corner. [5215]

A waltz fence at the top of Floyen. [5252]

It was pure coincidence but our visit to Bergen coincided with at least two significant events. One was the Bergen International Festival which, along with paid events, featured free live performances in city streets. And the other was the opening of the Tour of Norway, a bicycle event like the Tour de France but only four days. It was on a Friday, attracted a good crowd of enthusiastic supporters, the Bergen stage being a cruelly steep hill-climb up Floyen. This hill is challenging enough to walk up, so to ride bikes up its cobbled pathways?

A popular and lively band puts on a free performance on a street stage as part of the Bergen International Festival. [5438]

Rider in the Tour of Norway 2023 starts his time trial along the Bryggen, chased by his support car. [5360]

Norway's Beautiful Capital...

Oslo, the capital of Norway, is two hours flight in a north-westerly direction, from London, and into a different time zone. At 60^oN, Oslo is literally two thirds of the way to the north pole (compared to Australia's southernmost city, Hobart, which is only 43^oS), and we expected cooler weather, but in our four days here, it was mostly sunny and balmy, much to the delight of the locals who were visibly lapping up the warm 20^oC+ conditions. However, early in the mornings it was very cool (brrr!) and on occasions a strong wind from the north blew, which brought us back to earth, weather-wise.

City sprawl into the hills as seen from The Top high-level bar. Oslo's iconic Olympic ski jump is barely visible in the distance. [4991]

Alice in Wonderland is on at the grand National Theatre in Oslo. [4924]

You know it's coming, the long daylight hours, but it still takes you by surprise, and you find it weird for a long time. Sunrise is at 04 in the morning, and sunset is not until 10 at night! What with twilight etc full darkness hardly occurs at all. It is just daylight all the time, and it takes some getting used to. No wonder hotel reviewers on the web talk about blackout curtains as well as the perennial favourite, the quality of breakfast!

Oslo is replete with statues, fountains and outdoor cafes, this one in the colonnade surrounding the city Cathedral. [4901]

The airport is a long way out of town, so we saved big money on a taxi by catching the FlyToGet highspeed train which runs from inside the arrivals hall into the city in 19 minutes every 10 minutes. That is a great service, in a fast clean train which actually had room for all our luggage. Our hotel was within walking distance (and not a single step!) of the large modern station which is Oslo S, and very kind railway staff helped us with directions.

The Akerselva river runs from the hills of Oslo, past our hotel, and into the waters of the fjord. [5120]

The very top of our hotel contained the gym. It was a workout just to get there, requiring a five storey climb! [4863]

We totally forgot that Norway is not a member of the European Union (having voted "no" in two referenda) and our EUR currency was useless there. But so far we have found that plastic is universally accepted and did not had any need for Norwegian krones (except for one merchant whose terminal had broken). However you look at it, with the exchange rate, everything is very expensive for us (Australians) here, maybe about twice or more the prices we would pay at home.

The European love of al fresco dining is alive and well in Oslo. Here, along sunny Karl Johans gate on a warm evening. [4866]

Oslo is officially a global city despite it's modest size, with an urban population of about 1.5M. We found it to be a fascinating blend of the old and the new, the old reflected in magnificent historical buildings, including military forts parts of which date back 500 years, and wonderful civic buildings several centuries younger, and the new with a magnificent public transport system (we managed to use trains, trams and buses to get around) and ultra-modern building projects in and around a part of town whose name Bjorvikameans "city bay". Here there be intensive apartment developments, but also the splendid Norwegian National Opera and Ballet as well as the (Edvard) Munch Museum / Art Gallery, home of The Scream.

The Mother by Tracey Emin (2022) in the grounds of Oslo's Munch gallery. [5088]

Construction aplenty is evident in the modern quarter of Oslo known as Bjorvika. [4959]

New high-density apartment construction in Bjorvika, Oslo makes good use of the fjord water over which they are built. [5116]

Magnificent form of Norway's parliament building in downtown Oslo. [4869]

Impressive statue and fountain near Oslo's central railway station. [4873]

To us as visitors, it seems like Oslo is a cool, calm and collected city. Everyone seems to be relaxed, and moves around in a sense of relaxation and happiness. Part of this overall feeling must be the traffic, or lack of it. Somehow, Oslo has found a way to keep traffic out of the inner city. There must be restrictions, a congestion toll or something. There are taxis and delivery trucks, trams and buses, but very few private cars. What a delight that makes it for pedestrians!

Just offshore near the city CBD, a glass sculpture island, and the DFDS ferry from Denmark. [4877]

Visitors to Oslo's startling Opera and Ballet house can walk on the roof. [4880]

Oslo lies at the northern end of the 50km long Oslofjord, one of 1700 named fjords in the country, and indeed the name fjord is derived from ancient Norwegian. So deep into a fjord offers extraordinary protection, so it is little wonder that fjords make good ports, and, in Oslo, we saw nothing but calm waters and numerous facilities designed for locals to take advantage of them, like artificial beaches, kayaking ramps, marked lap swimming zones, sauna cool-offs. The water is 10-11C in May and so we were not tempted to dive in. That said, the locals take it in their stride, and we saw many people jumping in, having jogged or ridden to the edge, or freshly heated up in one of the numerous public waterside saunas.

A large aquatic recreation area in Bjorvika, Oslo was popular with casual swimmers but only a few ducks were taking advantage of the marked lap lanes. [5019]

Young men enjoying the saunas by the harbour in Oslo, braving the 11C water temperature. [5089]

We were entertained by an orchestra's free concert in this gazebo in a park near the National Theatre, while we imbibed in an adjacent open-air cafe. [4921]

Others at the same cafe. [4923]

A bold statue of King Christian IV (1577-1648) overlooks the square in front of the grand Glasmagasinet department store. He was a popular reformer who ruled Denmark and Norway. [5063]

Norway is a consitutional monarchy with King Harald V having reigned since 1991. The grounds of the Royal Palace lie at the opposite end of Karl Johans Gate to the Oslo S railway station, and they are effectively a public park, and a popular one at that, with many people walking and relaxing there in the sunshine during our visit. During the world wars, Norway was a neutral country but this served them no good when it was forcibly occupied by Nazi Germany for 5 years. The efforts and bravery of the resultant resistance movement is memorialised in a museum in the huge grounds of the medieval Akershus Fortress quite near downtown. Construction here started in 1290AD. Wikipedia says that it "has successfully survived all sieges, primarily by Swedish forces, including those by forces led by Charles XII in 1716" although it did surrender to the Nazis in 1940.

The view from the Royal Palace looking east on Karl Johans gate in Oslo. [4918]

Unlike at least one other monarchy, the approach to the Royal Palace is in a public park and free of any restrictions until you get really close. [4911]

A guard on duty at the Royal Palace setting off to raise the bollards preventing vehicular but not pedestrian access to the grounds. [4909]

Sun-lovers enjoying beer and warmth in the grounds of the Royal Palace. [4912]

Seemingly aimed at the Aida, a cruise ship visiting Oslo, a canon guards the boundary of Akershus Fortress. [4891]

The National Monument for the Victims of (the second World) War, in the grounds of Akershus Fortress. [4884]

Detail of the old buildings in Oslo's ancient fortress. [4888]

Overlooking the city is a sculpture garden in a large park called Ekebergparken. We caught the tram up to the park and walked back into town afterwards. The garden has 45 impressive artworks scattered over a large area of forest of great diversity. We notice the curators (both here and in town) have a particular interest in the nude form as well as very modern approaches to artistic creation. One in particular was quite ephemeral, being a water misting system which operated intermittently to create a dense fog which rolled around the forested slope and valley nearby. Our visit here was most enjoyable, although we were put off by the price charged for a simple map, and to use the toilet.

Chloe (2019) by Jaume Plensa in Ekebergparken sculpture garden is like an optical illusion from any angle. [4961]

This is artwork in the Ekebergparken, Pathfinder Oslo (2016) by Fujiko Nakaya, is a misty fog lasting 15 minutes several times a day. [4971]

Adoration (by Gustav Vigeland, 1908), one of 45 artworks in the Ekeberg Park. [4944]

One day we visited the botanic garden near the suburb of Toyen. This unheralded place was very popular with locals, elderly people (us included) and families. One of the temperate houses was named after Queen Victoria, and one contained a rather sad and dusty specimen of the Australian Wollemi Pine. Maybe it was just too dry in that environment to be happy?
.

Tulips in Oslo's botanic garden. [5071]

Sculpted almond willows (by Tom Hare, 2014) were a highlight of the Oslo botanic garden. [5075]

Inside the glasshouse at Oslo botanic garden. [5078]

Water lilies in the Victoria House in Oslo's botanic garden. [5080]