Hit the Ground Running...Day #1 Norway

I think I've stated before that traveling with Wes is always an adventure. Traveling internationally is double the adventure! We left our house in Sacramento on saturday at 6am. We arrived in Oslo on Sunday at noon. Oslo is about 9 hours ahead of California, so the travel time (with lay overs) ends up being about 18 hours or so. I didn't sleep much, but that was not an excuse to take a nap once we arrived at our darling B&B in Oslo. We hit the trail to the museums and sites of Oslo. Our first stop was the Royal Palace. Norwegian royalty still live there today. The grounds are beautiful and their front door looks down to the central part of Oslo. The art museum and cultural history musuem were next on our list. We weren't able to take photos in those places. The art museum houses the famous painting "The Scream" by Edvard Munch as well as some of his other works. The famous Van Gogh self portrait was also on display at the art museum.

The Norwegian culture is wonderful! On Sunday, people in the city walk around and take in the sites. Many congregate around the center of town. The above picture is a fountain from the center of Oslo. Most shops are closed on Sunday to give their employees the day off. If they aren't closed, they are only open for a few hours. The people are friendly and all of them speak English. I sometimes forgot I was even out of the U.S.

We found some good treats on our trip. The above picture was something we found at a 7-Eleven of all places. It seems the Norwegians love their 7-Elevens! Wes says they have these in Germany as well. They are a huge fluffy marshmallow covered with chocolated and sprinkled with coconut. We also discovered their version of the Belgium waffle covered in chocolate. Extremely delicious! It seems that most trips we go on, the rain follows us. This trip was no exception. I was happy to have good rain gear with me. We made our way in the rain to the fort that overlooks the water (more pictures of the fort/castle to come....we were able to go inside on our last day in the country). From the fort we could see the Nobel Peace Center-the building where the award the Nobel Peace Prize. Across from the building is a nice little park with statues and water fountains and benches. The above picture is taken from that park. We wandered around until about 7pm. I was ready for a shower and some sleep. Wes would have stayed out all night, but I made a deal that I would wake up bright and early to begin day #2 if we could just call it a day and get some much needed sleep. It was a deal!