06-24 Norway in a Nutshell Part 1

Today is one of those days that you look forward to on your vacation - kind of like the Pulpit Rock hike. You read and read about it and you decide that that would really be a cool thing to do. The Norway in a Nutshell Tour will take us from Oslo to Bergen on day 1 and then back the next day.

The route consists of a 4 ½ hour train ride to Myrdal, a 1 hour train ride to Flam, a 2 hour boat ride to Gudvangen, a 75 minute bus ride to Voss, and finally a 75 minute train ride to Bergen.

Up early this morning and we pack one backpack with stuff for overnight for the both of us, bringing both of our pillows. We check out of our room and put our luggage in the locked storage room at the Thon Hotel Astoria and then head to the hotel's breakfast. Same stuff here. Why do they eat beans and wieners for breakfast??

On to the train station. We find an open grocery store and after checking out the first one, the second one has some sandwiches for us. After getting two sandwiches and two cokes, we check to see which track we are on - track four. OK, 5 minutes and our train will be here.

We have reserved seats and there are a lot of people boarding this train. Most of the trains we travel on have 6 cars: Engine, 2 passenger cars, a café car, and then 2 more passenger cars. The Oslo to Bergen run has 1 more passenger car at each end for a total of 8 cars. We did not upgrade to Komfort class this time, but we were assigned a seat number which is wonderful, considering how many people are standing on the platform to board.

Here is something amazing to think about. The train enters the station about 10 minutes before it is scheduled to depart and hundreds of people are able to store their luggage and find their seat before the train departs ON TIME. Tickets are checked by the conductor AFTER the train is underway. This whole scenario happens 10’s of times per hour in these busy train stations. Why can’t we do that on airplanes?

We are traveling through lots of trees and farms. There are so many trees and so much water that it feels like we are in Western Washington.

Eventually we hit 4,000’ and there are no trees and still snow on the ground.

It is 46 degrees out when we reach Myrdal at 2,840’ elevation at 1pm. The train arrives from Flam and it’s a scramble to get a seat with your loved ones even though there are plenty of seats when everyone is settled.

The ride down to Flam at sea level is wonderful. The stop at the Kjosfossen waterfall was thrilling. The train stops for 5 minutes and everyone scampers out of the train to take a picture and then the whistle blows and back into their holes the mice scurry.

The train continues to descend through the Flåmsdalen valley.

We passed another Flam train going up the hill to Myrdal.

There are waterfalls falling off the mountains and waterfalls falling over rocks in the river. It’s as lovely as we wanted/imagined it to be.

We arrived in Flam. Then got onto a boat to cruise a couple of fjords to Gudvangen. It’s a beautiful sunny day and a rain storm struck us and then THIS happened! A rainbow on the water.

Buses were waiting for us in Gudvangen to take us up over the mountain to Voss. Along the way there were spectacular waterfalls that were posing for us.

From Voss we got back on a train going into Bergen. The neon sign inside the Bergen train station was pretty nice looking.

It’s 9pm and it has been a long day. Fortunately, the Thon Hotel Bristol is only a half mile walk and since we only have the one backpack it’s easy – so was getting to sleep.

06-23 Back to Oslo and Ski Jumping

Yesterday we cruised the Telemark Canal. Today we have to head back to Oslo. After breakfast it's time for our one mile walk to the train station from our hotel, with a quick stop at a grocery store for lunch. Only found a blueberry muffin, not a very good one, and two Cokes.

On to the station with fifteen minutes to spare. We are taking the bus from here and the seat is very uncomfortable on Karen's back. After 45 minutes we arrived at the Larvik train station.

Our train is in the station waiting for us. We have Komfort Class tickets that give us an assigned seats. I'm really glad.  After I go to the bathroom, I see that it's wall to wall people out in the regular seats. They are sitting on the floor, suitcases and backpacks everywhere. We are on this train for two hours.

Karen listen to a Mousetalgia podcast and Pat has his computer and works on the blog. We arrive in Oslo just before 1:30 and check into our hotel, Thon Astoria, which is only two blocks from the station.

The first thing we do is turn on the fan in the room. We leave a card in the electricity to keep the fan on when we leave.  Set up Karen's clock so we will know the temperature of the room when we get back there. We get our day backpack ready with raincoats, unfortunately, and snacks and head back out.

As soon as we step out the door the raincoats come out of the backpack. Back to the train station and we get tickets for the tram out to the ski jump. Why is it always raining when we want to get city view pictures????

Our best view of the day of the landing area and runout of the ski jump.

And our view UP the ski jump.

We bought tickets for the ski museum which includes an elevator ride to the top of the ski jump. The museum has skis and bindings through the ages. Recreational skiing began in the 1850's. Up until then, skiing was for commercial or work usage.

There was also an exhibit on snowboarding and the crazy tricks people do with skis and snowboards.

Brian had a blue one of these in our house in the 90's.

We did go up in the ski jump elevator - straight up into a cloud. This would be the ski jumper's view heading downhill toward the jump. If there was snow. If he could see his landing.

Of the jumpers today (standing on the platform), Pat was #1.

There was a ski jump simulator on the same level as the museum. It was ok, just one of those in-the-mall portable models. The picture quality is greatly improved, but the motion is still jerky and at times gratuitous.

It was still raining and totally fogged in when we got done. We walked back down to the train and took it into Oslo central station. Stopped at Burger King for dinner on the way to our hotel.

06-22 Telemark Canal Cruise

Today is our Telemark Canal Cruise. Completed in 1892, we are cruising 65 miles, through 18 lock chambers, raising us 236 feet.

We started our cruise at 8:10 this morning in Skien (pronounced "she-en"), Norway with about 20 passengers.

As we make our way to our first set of locks, there are many beautiful homes on the hillside.

At Loveid, we went through our first locks. The locks here come in sets. Most are two locks together, but there is also a set of three and a set of five (just like the Bingley Five we did in England on the Leeds to Liverpool Canal). Sometimes their locks are carved right out of the rocks.

Here in Norway our two lock keepers follow us from 8:30 to 2:00 pm, operating all of our manual locks (all but the first set). When we leave a lock they jump in a van and drive to the next lock. There they are patiently waiting our arrival again.

A grandmother and grandson only went as far as the second lock set at Ulefloss before departing. We took on a few more passengers to offset the loss.

We had the opportunity to get off and walk at Eidsfoss. We walked to the next set of locks at Vrangfoss about a mile away.

At Vrangfoss is where we had our five locks together, so we were able to film our boat, the Victoria, going through four of the five locks. We always like to see things from both sides.

Those of us that walked got back on board the boat and "we proceeded on..." After our exhausting 1 mile walk and wonderful picture taking opportunity, we decided to have some lunch downstairs in the salon. It was a hamburger on top of a piece of regular bread covered with some special Norwegian cheese, garnished with onions, tomatoes, and lingonberries.

At Lunde everybody got off. Everybody but US and the crew of 4. What? Pat and I are now the only guests on board and we have four more hours and two more sets of locks. Yes, it's the Pat and Karen Charter Canal and Lock Cruise. So peaceful.

Immediately after leaving this lock and all of our passengers behind, we passed the Henrik Ibsen boat coming from Dalen, going to Skien. This is a beautiful boat that Karen originally want to take, but fortunately the boat we were on had much more space up front for viewing.

During the next 3 hours the river way gets narrow and then opens up to a large lake. We pass under a father and son on a bridge who stopped their bike ride to watch us go by. There are just a few kayaks out on the lakes. The towns are sparse in this region and we only see a few people out of their houses who wave at us. There is no wind and the lake is like glass. Up on the hill is a classic, black Stave church.

We go down a short inlet through a swing bridge to the city of Kviteseid, where we picked up a new chef. She's been on the boat for one week now. In an hour or so she will cook us dinner.

We split a chicken focaccia and a hot dog. It's a very relaxing, totally beautiful boat ride.

The houses and hillsides, trees and rock cliffs reflected in the water are just beautiful. Norway, all parts of it, are amazingly beautiful.

We arrive at Dalen right on time and our bus, mini bus, is right there waiting for us and only us. The road out of Dalen is very windy, like the road we drove the Twizzy cars on. Lots of hairpin turns.  

06-21 Train Ride to Skien, Norway

Leave the Oslo apartment for the last time at 9:20 for a bus to the train station. We have our train tickets and we are going early to find some food here to take on board. They only have vending machines and no Coke on the train.

The luggage fits great in the locker with plenty of room left over. We could have gotten both the backpacks in also, with plenty of room to spare.

We scope out a place to get a sandwich and some Coke to take onboard with us, then sit down and wait.

Picking up our sandwiches and drinks, we head out to track #5. We have reserved seats 207 & 208 in car #5. We reserved seats and someone's in them. What's the point? We grab two other seats and the conductor doesn't seem to care. She checks our tickets then gives us one token each. For the bathroom, for drinks? We think bathroom. We are wrong; they are blanks for the coffee machine.

At the city of Drammen, the business men in our seats conducting a meeting finally get off and now the train is quiet. We don't move.

At 12:35 we arrive in Larvik and get off and get on the bus. It's across the track and around the building and waiting for us. Awesome.

Arriving in Skien, we grab our backpacks and walk over to the hotel (Clarion Collection Hotel Bryggeparken) and check in. Our room is ready. Great.

Check in done, bags dropped, we go for a walk around this new town of Skien.

Pedestrian only shopping area downtown.

Our hotel is on one bay and the bay next to it is where we will catch our boat tomorrow, the Victoria. But for now we walk through town and up the hill behind our hotel to the Brekke Park and through the Telemark Museum area. This area is like the open air museums we have been to with buildings from all over the Telemark area brought to this location. Most of these buildings were from the 1600's and 1700's. None of them were open, but we saw the others and there's a plaque describing the interior that we read in each house - in English.

We’re having an ice cream and some Lefsa. Karen remembers her Mom having Lefsa in the house. It’s kind of a flat bread with cinnamon, sugar and butter on it.

After this we walk down the stairs near the entrance and back through town, walking through their mall and out to the other bay.

We head down to the dock where our boat will arrive at 5:30pm tonight. We pick up a brochure in a rack outside (there's no gift shop, just kind of an office).

We keep walking around the bay by apartments and through a park, then back to the boat dock and back to the hotel.

After a break in the room, we went downstairs for dinner. Breakfast and dinner are included in our room rate and so is the water view looking out into the bay. Dinner was rosemary chicken (it was so so), sweet potato sticks (not bad), grapes, watermelon slices, strawberry chiffon, and some cold salads.