Berning Down the House!

From Zurich I made my way to Bern. I had intially planned to take the Luzern-Interluken route but since I had already done this the day before, it was just a one hour trip. I arrived in Bern at about midday to find my next host, Regula wandering around the station looking for me just as I was doing for her. Lucky for me that we found each other at that time, as my train was late and she was about to leave.

In an old house near the train staion which usually had a bar, cafe, womens area, theatre and holds frequent parties, a once a month flea market was being held. Here you could by almost everything you could think of from scooters and bikes to console games, candlesticks and tea. I had to hold myself back as I saw so much stuff that I would have liked to buy but unfortunately can’t carry around with me. We spent a few hours looking around the markets and then decided to head back to her place.

Crazy bicycle for sale

Regula lived in a very old house which was situated inside an industrial area in a town about half an hour out of Bern called Oberburg. This industrial area has a building right next to the house which begins some sort of extreme hammering each morning at seven o’clock which shakes the entire house, continuing until five in the evening. Asides from Regula living there, there was also Nicole and Dino, a suitably hippy couple, another girl whoes name I never found out, and one more guy and another couple who were away at the time. For me this was great as I was given my own room which included its own fireplace to keep me toasty warm in the freezing nights. That night Regula, Nicole, Dino and I just hung out, ate some amazing food cooked by Nicole (who should be a chef), and listened to music. I spent half the evening dashing up and down the stairs to keep my little fire going.

The old house

The next day I was to meet up with a girl called Flurina who has contacted me the previous night on CouchSurfing, asking if I’d like to be shown around Bern. So at around midday, I met her in the Bern station and we set out on our mission. The first place to visit was the house where I had been at the flea market the previous day. I had wanted to get a betting picture of  it.

Flea market location

Next we wandered down to one of Bern’s many bridges. Following this we made our way to the highest tower in Bern at the XXXXXXX church. It was many more stairs that I had predicted and after we fought our way up with a number of stops, we found the the view was totally worth it. Unfortunately over half of the tower was closed to it was next to impossible to get a decent view from the other side.

View from tower

After we headed back down, Flurina suggested that next on the agenda should be “bears and fountains”, so we went for a walk towards the Bern bears. For some reason or another, there is a pit in the middle of the city which for numerous years has held a number of bears. It’s a horrible concrete pit and many people oppose it. The bears look so sad in there, just sitting around waiting for food and most probably wishing that the winter would become cold enough to hibernate.

Bern's Bear

Next were the fountains. Not as amazing as many of the other fountains which I have seen on this trip, but pretty cool as a number of them (which run up the middle of the main pedestrian streets) are statues of folktales. The one which is the best and I think every one agrees with is this one of a man eating small (bad mannered) children – a tale parents would often tell to their kids to keep them in line!

Child eater!

A walk down the riverside followed lunch, and when we were about ten minutes down stream (which was 6.66 degrees by the way!) I spotted the zoo on the otherside of the river which Flurina seemed to think was free. So back we headed and over a bridge which we had passed. Then we just walked in! Past some ponies and mules, fluffy rabbits and then… RACOOONS! My god I just keep having child-like exciting moments! So mischevious looking and so cute at the same time.

Racooooooon :)

Onward we walked up the hill to find a pond full of pink flamingos. I find these birds hilarious, especially the way the walk around in the water. They would move around to find the sun in flocks, flapping their wings to gain all the sun they could get.

Flamingos

Our trip to the zoo was our last activity for the day, and as the sun was setting we headed back to the train station where I thanked Flurina for showing me around and then set off back to Oberburg for another evening of music and hanging out.

The following day Nicole had no work and so decided to come with me on a trip to Gruyères to visit the H.R. Giger museum. This is the guy who invented the alien from the film Alien. It was lucky that she came along as it involved 3 trains and a bus, plus numerous amounts of German and French speaking. On arrival we had about an hour to spare so we decided to have a look around Gruyères, a very quaint little medival town set on the edge of the Swiss Alps.

Gruyères

At 1pm the museum opened. This place was crazy, the mind of this man insane. There were so many amazing pictures of creatures that I could never dream of. Very dark and for some reason, also very erotic. They had this little “adults only” section which seemed pretty pointless as almost all of his work had some weird alien sexuality to it. Unfortunately you were not alowed to take photos inside, but this was on the outside:

Babies in a gun

And there was even a bar which he designed, indeed also crazy:

Giger bar

And soon it was time to make the long trek back to Oberburg. We were not back for long when Regula came in from work, covered in snow! “It’s snowing!” she called, and looking out the window, it definitely was. So after another beautiful dinner made by Nicole, she, Dino and I headed outside into the already 4-5″ snow to play around. Snow fights were not an option of choice, and I was amazed to find that you actaully can roll snow into huge balls, resulting in by far the best snowman I have ever built.

Snowman!

This went on for a few hours and by then we were all tired and soaked and ready to sleep, but not after more music and hanging out, though!

I had initially planned to leave the following day, but it took me a while to find a place to stay so I spent one more day in Bern. This day I used for doing nothing. I headed into Bern to get a train ticket and then just spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing and watching the snow out the window. A quiet evening and my time in Bern was over, again going so fast!

The next morning I was off to Cannes!

Traveling South to the East: Tallinn

On the Thursday morning I made my way to the Helsinki port, boarded the Tallink Star, sat around for two hours, and got off in the Estonian city of Tallinn.

Here I was staying with a girl called Triin, who at my time of landing was working, so I had half the day free to wander around the town before I had to meet her “in the square under the dragons” at 5:15pm. So I locked up my gear, got a map, and start walking towards the city. The map had twelve sights placed on it that were within the Old Town, so I figured that I’d check some of these out.

Walking through the (new) town, there was construction everywhere. It was blatently obvious that Tallinn was fast developing into a very Western city. The architecture was great, the streets were packed, and the people looked like they had taken all their style tips from those living in Berlin, Stockholm or Amsterdam (but probably Helsinki).

I entered the main town through the eastern gates.

Old Town Eastern Gates

To the left was a McDonalds, what an introduction to a well preserved medieval town. To the left, running along the city walls was some sort of knitwear market. These are everywhere. Every second shop is trying to sell you a knitted jersey or (and what I forgot to buy) one of those long woolen hat that you see people skiing with in cartoons.

Knitwear Market

As I ventured in, it became obvious that this was a town that would be overrun by tourists in the summer months. I keep hearing the word “touristic” being thrown around, I’m not sure if it’s even a proper word, but this is what I imagine it would be like. Similar to Brugge but with a more Eastern feel.

I began to follow the map around. It first led me up an old alley which was lined with ancient tablets from the old Tallinn.

Ancient Tablets

Once past this alley, I continued my way north within the town, and stumbled across St. Olaf’s Church, a huge white building with a tower which was once the tallest building in medieval Europe.

St Olaf's Tower

I walked inside and as the day was beautiful, I decided to climb the tower to the make shift viewing platform which they had built into the copper roof, 60m above the ground.

View from St. Olaf's Tower

From the tower I had spotted a huge building full of right and 45 degree angles, which looked to be made entirely out of concrete and left to rot. So I once I had decended the tower’s rickety stone staircase, I made my way further north towards the sea. What I found was a huge Soviet style building, purely in grey with huge staircases, graffiti and rubbish everywhere. Half the place was broken and it looked like no one had used it in 30 years. But it definitely had that Russian “for the people” feel to it.

Soviet Concert Hall

Later I found out that this place was built when Tallinn was under Soviet occuptaion, and amazingly, it is still in frequent use! You would never know it from seeing it, and even walking around on it. I was even on the roof to get some better photos, if I had known there might have been people inside I don’t think I’d be running around on the roof. It turns out that they can’t afford to renovate it, and they can’t afford to pull it down, and they don’t want to get rid of it because of it’s historical significance and architectural value.

I spent the rest of the afternoon wandering the streets of the old town, through alleyways, pasts interesting shops and cafes, and at 5:15, I met Triin outside the town hall, but not after an interesting performance from a group of Hare Krishnas.

Hare Hare Krishna

We walked back to her apartment and hung out for a few hours, had dinner, then not long later, we were out again. One of the CouchSurfing hosts in town had moved into a new flat and was having a flat warming. There I met a number of the other CouchSurfing hosts in Tallinn and the people who were staying with them. There was Mattias from Italy, Ben (an Aussie) from Moscow, and Shigi (a Taiwanese guy) from Austria. We hung out and talked rubbish, listened to traditional Estonian music which they all know from their singing festivals (it turns out Estonians love to sing). Later, Shigi and I decided to meet up the following day at 12 and wander around the city together.

So at 12 the next day, we met outside the town hall.

Tallinn Town Hall

I ended up seeing a number of places that I’d seen the previous day, then I took Shigi to the concert hall. It appears that this is a place that no guide books talk about and no touists seem to know about, so I’m pretty happy thaat I found it on my own. Then we walked to the south end of the city, up into the highest part, past some crazy bird scultpures:

Me and the Bird

…the orthodox church:

Orthodox Church

and ended up climbing the town walls to spy on a crazy Russian wedding, complete with a guy with a megaphone ordering people about and “beautiful Russian women” who seemed a bit undressed for a wedding.

Russian Wedding

That afternnon Shigi and I decided to walk along  the waterfront towards the ruins of the Piirita Convent. This appeared to be a short distance on the map, but in fact took us about an hour and a half to walk. It was well worth it, though. This place was old, very old! There were floor foundations and sky reaching walls everywhere, and amoungst them were scattered gravestones and small underground passages. It was a beautiful place.

Piirita Convent Ruins

Later that night we met Triin and Shigi’s host, Christina, for dinner. Afterwards, they left and Shigi and I checked out a few bars.

The next day Christina and Triin wanted to show use a few more sights. First we headed into Kadrioru Park which was very close by to Triin’s apartment. Inside this park was the Tallinn art museum which was originally built as a Russian palace.

Art Gallery

Next we headed to a huge Soviet WWII monument which was built inside a massive park.  But before this we made a stop at the Estonian History Museum for a look around the ground, where we found a Lenin graveyard.

Lenin Graveyard

Soviet WWII Monument

Later on we visited a large park where these Estonian singing festivals are held.

Festival Park

That night it was the birthday of one of the Tallinn CS hosts. She had decided that she wanted a pirate party, so at about 8 o’clock, Triin, Christina, Shigi and I headed over to the home of Eva (who was hosting Ben the Russian Aussie). Everyone got dressed up in pirate regalia and we headed about 1 hour  out of town. The party was full of crazy Esotinans in priate gear, vodka, rum, and other assorted alcohols.

Pirates!

Later in the night it was time for me to finally experience the Finnish sauna which these people had in their house. So, basically, everyone got naked, went into a 60+ degree room, sat around for a while, and then went running around outside in the 3-4 degree night. Crazy, but very fun!

Finnish Sauna users!

The night was great and ended up with us all sleeping on the hardest floor I’ve ever experienced.

The next day it was time to go. I had decided to head back to Helsinki so I could sort out some visa issues, and I decided that even though my tour to Russia had been cancelled, after talking to Ben, I had decided to go anyway, I’m not going to miss that oppurtunity! So here I am, hanging out in Helsinki for a few days while I wait for my Russian visa to begin on the 1st of November.

Forests, Fun; Finland!

The ferry pulled up to the Helsinki Tallink terminal at 10am on Sunday in the pouring rain. For about 10 minutes I wandered around outside in the rain, looking for my next host, Sampsa, and soon found him before I was soaked. Twenty-five minutes later we arrived at his apartment where I had my own room, a first in a long time.

It was a wet Sunday afternoon, but we decided that we should probably do something as Sampsa had to work 6am-5pm everyday and would not really have that much time for me so we headed out to the local forest. Sampsa had a plan for us to do a ten kilometer round hike through the forest so we left the road and headed into the wilderness. This place was beautiful, even in the autumn with the baring trees.

Lead the way, Sampsa

We walked through the mud and passed the first of many lakes which we would see. What caught my attention, though, were these crazy-huge lumps at the base of many of the trees. Sampsa enlightened me, they were anthills, huge ones at that. He explained that they were always built on the south side of a tree so when you were hiking, all you had to do was look for one of these and you would always know where south is.

Anthill

We ventured further and further into the forest but soon it started to rain. We figure, though, that we would keep going because it wasn’t too bad. Unfortunately but the time we got about a third of the way through, the rain was getting thick and heavy, so we turned back. I fell down a bank and soiled myself, but it only took about half the time to return to the car.

That night, Annika, Sapmsa’s girlfriend, made a delicious fish soup. Later, I found a message on my Couchsurfing account from a girl who I had requested a host with in Helsinki but who could not take me in. Instead, she suggested that we meet up and that she show me around the town.

And so the following day I met up with Meri at the Kaampi shopping centre in the Helsinki CBD. We decided that we would go and check out a local art gallery but unfortunately she had forgotten that all museums and gallerys were closed on Mondays. Lost for ideas, we walked around a bit and decided to check out the Tumio Church.

Toumio Church

Afterwards, Meri wanted to show me some of the more intersting shops in the design district of Helsinki, and we took a tour of some interesting clothing shops, I bought an illustrated story book in an independent book store and we fouraged through a second-hand market. We also had lunch at a Thai restaurant, which was very nice, and checked out what appeared to be the only open art gallery (of which I can’t remember the name), which was showing an Icelandic photography exhibition of images contrasting nature with people who have intellectual handicaps.

I had told Meri that at some stage during my stay I wanted to vist the Helsinki island fort of Soumenlinna, and she suggested that we go that afternoon as it was supposed to rain over the next few days. So we hopped onto the ferry and headed over the sea to Soumenlinna, the fort which has protected Helsinki through numerous battles.

On the way to Soumenlinna

When we got there, the wind was blowing but we still explored our way around the fading buildings in which a few thousand people still live.

Soumenlinna Clock Tower

Soon the sun started to set and we decided to head to the seaside to see the sunset, which was rather subdued as the storm clouds were closing in fast. The wind was strong and blowing a freezing gale but we spent a short time there and ran back just in time to get the ferry back to the mainland.

Fort Walls

Meri and I and the Sea

Back at the mainland, we went out separate ways but not after arranging to meet again the following day so we could actaully visit some art galleries.

At 2:30pm the next day I met Meri at the Atenium gallery. They were showing an exhibition which displayed the works of five friends of Finnish author Mika Waltari, author of a famous Finnish book called The Egyptian. The paintings had nothing to do with the book and some were more interesting than others, but there was an actual mummy in a glass case which was pretty cool! There were also galleries of posters for the book and film, another of Japanese post-WWII photography and lastly one showing Japanese landscapes and scenescapes from over 200 years ago (watercolour).

After this we left and went to find lunch. We walked through What is known as Plague Park, a historic burial place of plague victims which has been converted into a park but continues to be littered with graves.

Plague Park

We went to the supermarket to look for a cheap lunch, and ended up with the Finnish specialty of Carelian pies, mashed vegetables in a crusty open pie. Actually very similar to the meat version eaten by the Lebonese (which I can’t remember the name of, sorry Sarah’s grandmother!). After this, we headed to the Helsinki modern art gallery, Kiasma, only to find that it had closed at 5pm (yes, a pretty late lunch) was closed. Meri had suggested earlier that I come over for dinner, so after a little bit of shopping we headed back to her place on the train.

That night Meri cooked a very nice salmon (yeah, I know), and we drank a New Zealand wine which she was adement to try. We talked about al sorts of things, listened to music, and at some stage, Meri the art student decided to sketch me. I don’t think it was too bad for a 5 minute job either!

Meri's Sketch of Me

The following day the weather was nice again, and Annika suggested that we go to Porvoo. Unfortunately it was too late because Meri still wanted me to see Kiasma and I had to be in town at 5:30pm. Instead Annika and I went for a wander around the forest and lake which was so close to her apartment.

Forest and Lake

We walked for about an hour through the forest which proved to be  some sort of squirrel breeding ground, they were everywhere! I’m going to miss these little guys when I get back to New Zealand.

Tree Squirrel

I made it into town with about five minutes to spare, but had forgotten where the gallery was, and after asking about three or four different people, I finally found it, only ten minutes late. Ridiculous seeing as I had been there only the day before. And now came the third time that I was to miss out on Kiasma. Meri had jsut recieved some bad news about a family member and didn’t really feel like visiting the gallery as the building is a very intense place to be in. We decided instead to do something spontaneous and walked down to the metro where she asked me “east or west?”. I figured at home, west is best, so we went west and ended up at a disused cable factory, Kaapeli, which now housed twelve galleries and a number of small theaters and other places.

Kaapeli

At Kaapeli we found only one gallery open. This was showing the works of what made itself out to be a prestigious art group called the Finnish Artist Group. Unfortunately for anyone who wants to be proud of artistic expression in Finland, this art was terrible. Both Meri and I spent the time in the gallery laughing at how unoriginal and prententious it was. Soon it was time to leave as Meri had TaeKwanDoe that night, so we took on last photo and headed back to the centre on the subway.

Meri, Me and Streetart

The following day it was time to leave Helsinki. My ferrry was at 10:30am and was headed across the gulf, the course set for Tallinn, Estonia. Goodbye Scandinavia!

Tromsø: Above the Arctic Circle

I landed in Tromsø at around 9 o’clock at night. Ula (the girl I was staying with) had given me pretty good instructions as to how to get to her place, so I decided not to follow them and got off at the wrong bus stop. This seems to be becomming a common theme of this trip. So, after wondering where in the world I was supposed to go, wandering around looking lost, I found my self in a psychiatric hospital – asking for directions. I was only 100m away!

I soon found my way up to the 5th floor of the Tromsø University student house where Ula lived. She was a Polish masters student of English Literature. I would spend two nights with her, and then I was to spend the following two nights in the room of her neighbour, Phil, who was a biology masters student, spending his time in a greenhouse germinating seeds taken from Svalbard. That night I also met a couple more students plus Phil’s friend Doris from Vienna. We all stayed up pretty late and Doris and I decided that the next day we would climb the local mountain which during the correct season is usually accessed by cable car.

The next morning I awoke and went out onto the deck. This was the view.

View from Ula's Deck

The weather was not so nice, but it wasn’t raining, so Doris and I set out for the mountain.
As we got close to the harbour, the mountain became visable. It dosen’t look so big, but I gaurantee you that it is definitely steep.

Climbable?

We crossed the massive bridge which links Tromsø to the mainland,

Bridge and Harbour

Passed the modern-style church,

Triangle Church

And headed up into the forest. The path was pretty crazy, it spent about and hour going along the bottom of the mountain and we figured that at this rate it was going to take forever to get to the top, zig-zagging across the mountain. After passing a good number of streams, we finally got to a more intesnse part which, more or less, went directly up.

Mountain Stream

It took about another hour of ascention to reach a point where we decided to go no further. It was freezing, windy and starting to rain. But the view was amazing.

View From Mountain

Me and the View

Soon it was starting to get dark so we began to make out decent. On the way down the sunset, though cloudy, was very amazing. Here is my favourite picture of it:

Mountain Sunset

That night Ula made a very nice Polish-style tomato soup and her and I and Doris and Phil all ate together and talked into the night. The following day Doris was going back to Oslo (where she studies German literature), so we made morning plans and then we all headed off to bed.

The next morning I awoke to this:

Morning View

The weather was amazing! Doris and I went walking again and had to stop and take pictures of the Tromsø Island lake on the way to town.

Central Lake

We got to town and decided that we wanted to walk to the very south end of the island. So we set off, passing some pretty cool street art,

Street Art

and Mack’s brewery, the world’s northern most beer brewery.

Macks Brewery

We never made it to the south tip of the island. We walked for so long but in the end it seemed as though Doris might miss her flight if we kept going. So we left the town goodbye and headed back to the student accommodation. Doris left for Oslo and I moved into Phil’s place. I then pitched the idea of tramping out into the darkness to Phil to try and see if the northern lights were going to show. He agreed, and after a nice dinner of vegetables and rice we bussed back into town, over the bridge, and walked up on of the cross-country skiing trails into the valley and beyond town’s visable light. We walked for hours and hours and the northen lights decided they were not going to show. I was not too happy about this, but cheered up after we did some interesting photography.

Phil and I

We had missed the last bus back but it was getting late and cold so we decided to make out way back home. When we reached the point where we could see the lights of Tromsø, we decided to take a few photos, the first looking like this:

Subtle Lights

We had to double take at the picture because there was definitely some green in there. The sky was almost blank but the photo showed up green. So we waited for a while. And sure enough, the northern lights appeared to us, albiet very subtly. I would have loved it to be amazing and bright and full of different colours, but I guess that it was a bit too early in the season. We watched the subtle green colours dance across the sky for around 20 minutes before they disappeared and then headed off home. We had been (mildly) victorious.

Subtle Lights

It was a long walk back with no bus to catch, but Phil and I got on so well that we never had nothing to say to each other, and we were home before we knew it. It was also very fun to throw rocks onto a frozen lake and listen to them bounce off emmitting a laser-gun like sound.

The following day I slept in. It was well deserved after all the time I have spent getting up early and walking around cities, etc. What happened that day was not a lot. But in the night Phil and I decided that we would do another night hike. So once again it was up the mountain for me. We got layered up in warm clothing, brandished head-lamps, and then set off along the forest trail. It seemed very different at night and we went much slower than I has previously gone with Doris. But soon we had made it as far as we thought we should go – this time we were not going to miss the last bus.

The view was very cool, and it was amazing how much orange from the city was reflected off of the clouds.

Orange City

The next morning it was time for me to head off, I had a lot of travelling ahead of me: A flight to Bodø, a night train to Trondheim, a day train to Oslo, one night in oslo, then a plane to Stockholm at 8am the next day, followed by a train to Borlänge where I was to stay with my childhood au pair, Marie.

Norweige: Olso

From Gothenburg I was off to Norway. I decided that I definately wanted to make it far north in Norway as I could, so I’d come back to Sweden later when it was too cold to be in the far north.

I boarded a 12:45 train headed for Oslo and found myself sitting with two Canadian brothers from British Columbia; ex paper-mill engineers. Garth and Trace. We talked about all sorts of nothing and they taught me a card game which I had never seen before called Cribbage. This was probably the most fun card game I’ve ever played, if not a little hard. But in saying that, I managed to win the first two games easily, losing the third by only a small amount.

After 5 or so hours, we arrived in Oslo. Off went the Canadians and I made a phone call to my 5th couch surfing arrangement –  Bård. With in ten minutes he had shown up and we were on our way walking to his girlfriends place where I was to stay because he was also staying there. It was me, another CouchSurfer (from Solvenia),  Bård, his girlfriend Matinka (from Solvakia), and 15 other flatmates!

Now I would like to run through all the other flatmates, but I only really remember one. This guy was called Shaun-Thomas, and when I asked him what he did, his response was something along the lines of: “I do some modeling and I work in a clothing shop. I have also trained in cook, waiter and was in the military. Oh… and I’m a RAPPER!” You’ve got to be kidding me, I thought – this guy looked like a male model. He told me that he had been rapping for 10 years and had, at some stage, laid down a track with Wutang.

So he asked me if I wanted to hear a rap, and OF COURSE I DID! It was actually really good! But I was laughing throughout the whole thing, just because the situation  was so ridiculous. That night I had dinner with  Bård and Matinka and then we headed out to a club called Blå which had a free twelve-piece swing/jazz band playing. The music was amazing, the band members were really funny, and everyone was dancing like mad. Although a good time, I didn’t stay too long as I was pretty tired.

The following day I hung out with the other CouchSurfer, the Slovenian girl. We ended up taking one of the longest day’s walking that I’ve had in this entire trip. After heading to the train station to buy tickets, we made out way towards the Royal Palace.

Royal Palace

After we checked out the palace, we decided to take a look at a park which was apparantly full of statues. We walked for miles to get to this place, and all the time I was thinking, “I’ve seen so many damn statues”. But this place turned out to be pretty amazing, there were hundreds and hundreds of statues all made by the same guy – it must have taken him years to complete them all. Some were crazy, many were naked figures in strange poses, and then there was the totem-orgy pole.

A small few of many statues

Totem-Orgy

While we were at this park, I noticed something off in the distance which at first I didn’t understand. But through fancy 6x optical zoom techniques, I found that it was a ski jump! People I talked to were very surprised that we have skiing in New Zealand but do not have a ski jump!

Olso Ski Jump

We decided to try and walk to it. The 6x optical zoom was decieving because after walking for almost an hour and a half, we appeared to be no closer than we previously were. We then gave up and walked for about two hours, all the way back to Matinka’s place, where the rest of the night was relatively relaxed as we watched a few films with a few of the other flatmates.

The next day the weather was crap. I had already decided that I wanted to go down and check out the harbourside so I began to walk. The further I walked, the worse the weather got but I was determined, and soon I made it to the Oslo fort.

Oslo Fort

The harbourside the day prior looked spectacular in the sparkling sun. Today it looked so bad that I’m not even going to post a picture up here. I decided to get out of the rain so headed to the Museum of Contemporary Art. This place was  pretty cool, it was full of (obviously) contemporary Norweigian art and a few international exhibitions, one which I had seen parts of in London’s Tate Modern.

Next I visited the Astrup Fearnly Museum of Modern Art which is currently housing an extensive Andy Warhol exhibition which was absolutely crazy. I never thought that I would see some of these very famous paintings of soup cans! Then back for another night of chilling.

One last day I had, and the weather was just as miserable as it was the previous day. This wasn’t going to stop me. My first place of visitment was the newly completed Opera House.

Opera House

One last stop. The Senersen Museum of Modern Art (yes, another one). And another chilling night as the following morning I was up at 6am to catch an early train to Trondheim!

Oslo, over and out.

(I apologise for the terrible writing within this post, I’ve been walking all day after a night train on which I didn’t sleep at all)