Friday 9 February 2024
Our economy City Box Hotel is actually OK. Comfortable, warm and clean and I like the bed.
Today we went for a guided tour of the Opera House, built in 2018 for 500 million
Euro. It is next door to the City Library. Both buildings were spectacular and
right on the seafront. If you are a designer or architect, you will love this
precinct. If you are married to one, you might still like it. Really good
photos are on the Penguin blog.
An interesting Nordic fact for those waiting. We were told we should have a sowna. Eventually, I figured they meant sawner. Speaking of which, we noticed a number of floating (just) houseboats in the harbour. Then we saw a number of semi-naked men and women emerge and immerse themselves in the icy Baltic, some actually moving sheets of ice to get wet. Ah so, they were public saunas.
It
was -13c today and you can’t take that for granted and forget a second pair of
thermal undies and a second scarf or decide not to do up the last button and
just walk out into the street. So, appropriately attired we set off on a very
short walk to the library and a coffee at their café. We then watched a couple
of little kids walk up the frozen steps, which were completely smooth and slide
down on their butts to waiting Italian parents. We, on the other hand, hunted the non frozen
footprints to get access to the Opera building.
The
English language tour was fully booked with a dozen people and a retired opera
singer giving the tour. Now, you will get all the design and architectural descriptions
of what is a pretty impressive building on Lady P’s Penguin site. You know… why
have a dog…
And
on that subject, a Canadian, well at least a North American woman, had a big
bag and inside that bag was a little doggy. Almost at the end of the tour, the
little silky terrier poked his/her nose out of the bag, to the amazement of the
tour guide and the rest of the tour.
I
worry about some people.
After
the tour, we adjourned to the bar for a drink and Flashy composed a rather nice
photo of his drink and a clock. There are not many clocks in Oslo.
Then
we re-wrapped, buttoned down and caught a tram to the Vigeland Park. This is quite
famous, being the largest (30+ha) and most (212) sculptures in bronze and
granite in the world, by a single artist – so they say. Certainly, very
impressive and worth the walk in the snow and ice. Most sculptures were life
size. All of completely naked men, women, children and babies.
After
that, Lady P found a cocktail bar that is the hippest place in Oslo. We got a stool
at the bar, which I always reckon is a pretty good spot. The alcoves and rooms
were either all occupied or booked. This is 4.00 pm on Friday. I guess some people
still work and have after work drinks these days. A couple of excellently made
Negronis helped fend off the cold.
We walked home to de-robe in our little room and pre-pack for tomorrow’s early departure. A bit of research on a place to eat, identified that Oslo is like Stockholm, in that there are a lot of Italian restaurants and pizza joints; some high end eateries; and not much in the middle.
Luckily for us, we knew that the
little café in our hotel still had some Primitivo red wine and despite closing
at 7.00 pm, we had time for a pre-dinner refresher. (Primitivo is an
Italian red grape that produces bold wines with smooth flavours of blackberry,
dark chocolate and liquorice. Originally from Croatia, it found its true home
on the eroded limestone plateaus of Puglia. In the New World, Primitivo thrives
in California, where it's known as Zinfandel.)
After deciding that we didn’t want to walk the
streets looking for dinner, we opened up our campaign chest in the room and
feasted on prosciutto, goats’ cheese, Manchego, olives, fresh tomato, the last
(almost) of the hummous, and some of that black bread and dry crackers.
Delicious.
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