We swung by the Palace on our way into the city of Oslo this morning...
...... where I checked that the time on my watch, matched that of the Domes Academic clock. This is the exact spot where playwright Henrik Ibsen stopped & checked his watch en route to the Grand café for his morning imbibe, every morning between 1895 & 1906!
We noticed that the flower plantings have been changed since we were here at the beginning of June. They are just as stunning & we were just as impressed!
En route to the History Museum we got a bit lost, but felt much better when we looked down a street & saw this.
After queuing to get in to what we thought was the History Museum, we discovered that it was actually the National gallery! The happy discovery that this was where the Gerhard Munthe exhibition was, made up for the devastating realisation this morning that the museum I MOST wanted to see (Decorative Arts Museum with lots of tapestries) was closed & packed up in preparation for the big move to the NEW museum currently being built, & not due to open until 2020!!!!
It was wonderful to learn more about Gerhard Munthe & see such an extensive display of the variety of artistic work he was commissioned to do. It was also exciting to see his original ideas in tapestry form. (This is called 'Bewitched').
It didn't take us long to realise that there was a lot more to the National Gallery than Munch's 'Scream'.
We enjoyed seeing work by Norwegian artists like Hans Heyerdahl, who painted this 'At Asgurdstrand'.
After a brief coffee & sit down, it was time for our food tour. We started with a huge plateful of food including salmon, reindeer patties & beef patties with accompaniments. We enjoyed the reindeer very much, especially with Lingonberry jam!
The next stop had nothing to do with food.
In the ground floor of a bombed out building is a temporary exhibition entitled '22 Juli'. This was the Gov't building that was bombed by Anders Breivik on July 22, 2011, before he drove on to the island of Utoya where he shot down numerous young people who were there for a camp. This exhibit tells the events of that day & in a memorial room, we got to see the faces of most of the people who were killed. It was very distressing seeing so many beautiful young faces. One of the exhibits is the above display, of cameras & phones that were used to record what was happening at the scene & were used as evidence against Breivik.
To be honest, we were both so emotionally churned up after this, the last thing we wanted to do was eat!
But who can say no to waffles!!
This tour involved LOTS of walking & because we were making such good time, our guide took us for a detour past an area renowned for it's street art.
Our next stop was Jeff & my idea of heaven! CHEESE! We loved the bright coloured waxes that the cheeses were wrapped in. Such happy colours.
There was a thunder storm & some rain early this morning & consequently, today has been very hot & humid. It was an enormous relief to be handed a glass of refreshing Lingonberry & lemonade. I would have liked a jug full!
A beautiful platter of tasting morsels was given to each of us. Cheeses, salamis & meats, including whale. (Not Blue!)
More walking and at last the tour ended in a pub, where Jeff was given 3 different beer tastings (I opted for a cider!) & we got to taste Aquavit. I was very impressed that Jeff could finish his shot of this potatoes & caraway seed spirit. I thought it was what embalming fluid might taste like, but with a hint of vanilla!!
It was then time for a very long walk back, where we have collapsed and will remain so until further notice!!
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