Aurland

A big day today. Up early for breakfast (the huge hotel buffet - almost as much choice as on the ship)...and then sad farewell to Carole and John who had come down early for coffee to say goodbye. Then we walked the very short distance to the train station. The train left as scheduled at exactly 7.57, and arrived at Oslo at exactly 14.45. It was a beautiful rail journey as reputed to be. Thinking about it, I think it would be better to do it in the opposite direction as you would leave the big city, go trough the usual industrial boring bit round a city, then get into the pretty flatter, then undulating countryside and farming land that gradually turns into mountains and ending in spectacular scenery as you get to Bergen! Of course, I don’t wish we had done that because it wouldn’t have worked for us, but after 2 weeks of such amazing and spectacular scenery, it did get a bit less as we approached Oslo. And 7 hours is quite a long ride. I am still feeling the shuddering movement of the train whenever I am still...very off putting! But I don’t think I’ve done justice to the train ride. It was amazing - we climbed (though you didn’t realise it as we went) up high into the mountains beautiful panoramas, then it was very snowy and quite whited out for a while, then that gradually lessened as we descended and came into obviously more moderate terrain where there were fields, ploughed and soggy looking, and grazing animals. Very different from the totally rocky crags and water of the last 2 weeks.

So here we are in the big city. And we have had our first - almost - Scandinavian rain. We found our hotel, very near the central station, and went walking round getting our bearings. Walked along the main pedestrian road that leads to the royal palace, surrounded by beautiful gardens, and it did start to sprinkle a little...so eventually we went back to get umbrellas and coats, but it never became heavy, just very light drops, but you’d get damp if you didn’t have some protection. We did then go to inspect the opera house that is nearby. And it is magnificent! Very modern and angular..sloping and you can walk up the slope on the roof...very hard to describe and neither of us had our phones to take photos, and anyway the sky was all grey and it wouldn’t have been a good photo...will take some tomorrow.

We have great plans for tomorrow - the Viking museum, the resistance museum, the Nobel museum and the sculpture gardens. Hope it is not too grey a day. We are again facing the extremely high prices here - had been insulated rather on the boat not having to buy meals etc...but we drew the line when to go to the loo at the station cost 6 kroner - that is equivalent to $3.50 - just for a pee! So we decided it was time to have a glass of wine, and use the loo there.

We had dinner at an Italian restaurant - Olivia - the same chain where we had our first meal in Bergen! We loved the Norwegian food on the boat, but suddenly couldn’t face more fish and felt like pasta. I had ravioli with fungi and truffles, yum, and a delicious salad.

Will put a couple of photos from the train, but not good through a window when moving...and there were many tunnels during the most spectacular times, and I took several photos of tunnel interiors, missing the moment of view! Hope I feel more normal after a night’s sleep.Read more