Day 1/2 Oslo - Christmas markets and the harbour

29/30 November
Days 1/2 Oslo

I arrived in Oslo sometime mid afternoon and was pleased to see SNOW everywhere!  Finally!

The Oslo airport is rather nice.  Very Scandinavian in design with lots of clean lines and open spaces.  The train to the city was also really modern and excellent.  Interestingly one of the first things I saw on the train was a news headline about Australia banning vaginal mesh.  That's not exactly what I was expecting to see ... it's amazing what makes headlines around the world.

My hostel in Oslo is pretty swish.  It's called a "poshtel".  Basically an excuse to charge shitloads for a hostel with a nice lobby and breakfast but it's still a bargain compared to other hotels in Oslo.  My roommates are very nice and the Japanese girl (Mai) has just come back from Svalbard which is where I'm heading in a few days which is pretty cool.

I'm only here 1 night before I move onto Tromso and by the time I got checked into the hostel anything touristy was closed and it was pretty dark so I just went for a wander around the city.  It's a very beautiful city at this time of year.  There are Christmas lights up everywhere and a light dusting of snow in places and very attractive Norwegian people are everywhere.

And I ran across my first set of Christmas markets!  Not huge but they were there!  Lights everywhere, all sorts of food available, some singing reindeer heads and an ice skating rink.  I think it was the first night of the markets so it wasn't too busy and I'm looking forward to seeing them again in a couple of weeks.  I ended up getting a hotdog and hot almonds to munch on for dinner.

Back to the hostel and ended up chatting to the roommates for an hour or two which was nice.

Breakfast the next morning was really good.  A full buffet spread with hot and cold options.  Quite unusual for the hostel scene but given how expensive food is in Norway I tried my best to eat well :)

I've got a few hours before I need to leave for the airport but not enough to really do anything too interesting so I decided to go for a walk down to the harbour and have a look there.  My first stop was the Oslo castle which I accidentally walked past.  Unfortunately the interior was closed to visitors for some reason so only got to walk around the grounds a bit which are not very extensive but do provide a decent view over the water.

After that a bit of a walk around the harbour district which has lots of very nice looking buildings and high end shops.  By the time I'd done a lap of the harbour it was time to head back and go to the airport.

Oslo was always going to be a short stay because of the flight times but I'll be back for 2 nights before Iceland so I can see a bit more of the city.