Travelogue: Stockholm & Oslo
A life is a universe
STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN & OSLO, NORWAY APRIL 2014
STOCKHOLM
Fri, April 18: Flight to Stockholm
-Terminal 1 of JFK is crowded, with various international carriers all over the place like Turkish Air and Norwegian, the one I'm flying on. I eat copious snacks/dinner right before the flight, as they have zero in flight food or drink service unless you pay. They're a budget European character, with very cheap tickets--the only catch is that you pay a few for everything: seat selection, drinks, food ($45 to reserve a meal in advance). I opt for no frills and bring my own food, which makes the flight very affordable.
-The plane itself is actually nicer and more spacious than I was expecting. So it's a comfortable enough flight. Even with a delay, it's 7 hours of flight time, and I sleep most of it due to it being a red eye.
Sat, April 19: Arrival in Arlanda
-Flight arrives just in time for us to catch a taxi into Stockholm, check in to our hotel, and walk to a food tour around the area we're staying in, Sodermalm. The tour is a lot of fun, and we meet a bunch of friendly locals on it.
-The hotel we stayed in, the Columbus Loft, is on the third story of what used to be a housing building for works and then a brewery from the 1700's. The rooms don't have individual bathrooms, so everyone on the floor has to walk down to shared bathroom & showers, which are in individual stalls. It's a bit of a reminder of college dorms, though a bit nicer. The location is good and the breakfast excellent, served in a homey little area in the downstairs of the hotel and with a vast array of delicious fresh food. Fun place to stay, but I wasn't a huge fan of hauling my toiletries down the hall (serious flashbacks to freshman year of college) or the lukewarm showers.
Just to expand a bit on the breakfast: it's basically a smorgasbord, with cheese, sliced meats, a variety of fresh and crispbreads, yogurt, jam, liver mousse pate, pickled herring, hard boiled eggs, and squeeze tubes of caviar spread. Really delicious and one of the highlights of my time in Stockholm.
The last thing me and friend N did in Stockholm was walk around, and stopped by a nightclub called Berns. It's an old building and a very cool space that served food and had drinks. Swedes like to stay out late, as it turns out.
Sunday - Stockholm Day 2
-Royal Palace - Treasury (with some crown jewels), Royal Apartments (a mini version of Versailles), and Medieval Palace cellar, which was fun and old.
-Arme Museum - museum about the military of Sweden, and the end of conscription. We had lunch in the dining area, which was filled with locals for a reason--the food was a solid fish + potato + salad, with a bar filled with mysterious Swedish spreads on bread. Good stuff.
-Stockholm Cathedral - plain exterior with eclectic interior that was a mish mash of various European styles and some design elements unique to Scandinavia (such as light colored geometric stained glass windows). Interesting building.
Monday - Stockholm, Day 3
-City Hall - fun, inspired by Venetian palazzoos with courtyard and docks on the water for boat access. Lots of tourist and a good gift shop.
-Vasamuseet - museum cenetered around a giant ship from the 1600's which sank on its maiden voyage and was preserved in the seawater right outside of Stockholm. They salvaged it after numerous attempts in the 1990's, and it's a truly striking ship to behold. Very cool.
-Lunch at Oaxen in Djungarden, in which we had beef chuck and potato, plus a cloudberry dessert parfait. For dinner, we ate at Speciriot herring & roe plus a rhubarb and cardomum dessert. All delicious.
-Skansen - an open air on Djungarden about old village life in Sweden complete with actors in costume and reenactments. There was also an aquarium. An amusing museum, probably a place locals bring children on field trips to learn about Swedish history.
Tuesday: Stockholm to Oslo
-Took the ever reliable and speedy Arlanda Express from the train station to Arlanda Airport, for my flight on Norwegian Air to Oslo (plane ticket insanely cheap--around $55 one way).
-Beautiful, sunny day with an easy train ride from the airport to Oslo S (the main train station)
-Short walk to my hotel which is nice, and has another excellent Smorgasbord type breakfast with a few extras (English fry up style breakfast foods, and Norwegian Jarlsburg and brown 'cheese')
-Stockholm is a small city, but Oslo is truly tiny and also under a great deal of construction. The infrastructure is also not as good or consistent as Stockholm, and the tourism is not quite as well developed. Nice city though, with a good public transportation system that very few of the riders appeared to pay for from what I observed (they just stepped on to the light rail or buses and had a seat).
-After walking around the area a bit, I ate near my hotel at a place called Grilleriat that was recommended on both Yelp and in my guidebook. I got grilled cod (the fish of the day) and a small amuse bouche consisting of a slice of grilled duck breast, aioli + pork rind, and flavored popcorn. Everything was well made, with the fish cooked perfectly--not overdone at all.
Wednesday: Oslo Ballet & exploration of Bygdoy (aka Museum Island)
-Enjoyed the delicious breakfast at my hotel, which was served in a less charming cafeteria than my previous hotel, but with a larger selection.
-Set off to Akershus Fortress, which is a medieval fortress that's been updated and changed many times since its first creation. There were hordes of blonde schoolchildren running about, all there to learn more about the history of Norway and its conflicts with neighboring Scandinavian countries (the usual conquest back and forth).
-Went to Museet for Samtidskunst AKA the contemporary art museum, which was housed in a beautiful old building with a surprisingly excellent exhibit from a Cuban artist named Carlos Garaicoa.
-Next up with Oslo Domkirk, an interesting old cathedral with very modern ceiling paintings I liked (though they caused quite a stir when they were first painted and covered up the old ceiling work).
-I took a ferry ride to Bygdoy, which is a pretty island that's mostly residential with various museums sprinkled throughout. I visited the Viking Ship Museum, the Norsk Maritime Museum, and the Fram Museum.
-Viking Museum - interesting to see the intricate wood carvings on the surviving Viking ships/artifacts. Plus, I learned that Vikings decomissioned some ships and put the dead bodies of important people on them, then filled them with travel supplies, food, and animal sacrifices (to send into the underworld, presumably). After that, they then covered the ship/items with clay, dragged the ships onto land, and buried them in these giant burial mounds that are still being discovered today. It reminds me of Egyptian burial practices with Pharoahs and Chinese ones with ancient emperors. Interesting how many ancient peoples had these sort of rituals involving send stuff with the dead into the afterlife. I guess it's a good way to hedge your bets if you aren't sure what comes after you die.
-Norsk Maritime Museum - small, but charming, with a nice panoramic film of Norway's various coastlines and towns to watch. There are a lot of beautiful fjords and tiny towns that look gorgeous, and Norway has a maritime history that stretches from the Vikings to the modern day cruise industry and oil freighting. Also, I had a decent waffle with jam and sour cream (the sour cream as a bread/carbohydrate accompaniment is a sign of German influence, I believe).
-Fram Museum - the Fram was a ship that did 3 arctic expeditions and was designed to be frozen into the ice without being crushed. It was a marvel of modern engineering at the time it was created, and is still a pretty clever solution to the problem of docking and storing a ship in the Arctic for a long period of time.
-For late afternoon, I took the ferry back to the main part of Oslo (beautiful ride) and explored the Vigeland Park, which is a large, pretty public park decorated with over 200 sculptures by Gustav Vigeland, Norway's most famous sculptor. The weather was good and there were quite a few locals sunning themselves throughout the park.
-For dinner, I ate at Lokk, a charming little restaurant. I had char from the North Sea along with delcious bread and 2 butters: garlic & spring greens. The fish in Scandinavia continues to be excellent, as expected.
-After dinner, I head to the Opera House, which is a lovely modern building that appears to rise up from the sea like a white glacier. It was built in 2008 and is vaguely reminiscent of the Sydney Opera house. You also scale up the diagonal sides of the building and view both the surrounding water and sea from different points and the roof of the ceiling. There's also a view of a sculpture called 'She Lies' which is a glass structure out in the water during summer. Apparently during winter the water freezes and people can actually walk out to the sculpture on the ice and interact with it up close. Interesting stuff, though it does make me wonder about safety issues.
-The show I saw was a ballet set to the music of Carmen. It was a very good production, and interesting to see such a youthful cast playing out the story (ballerinas and dancers on the whole tend to skew younger than your usual opera cast). I liked a lot of the acting choices the dancers made, and the live music was wonderful. A very enjoyable evening.
Thursday - last full day in Oslo
-I visited the Botanical Garden, which is nice, though on the small side and not quite in bloom yet. There, I went into the Natural History museum (which consisted of 2 very small buildings, one of which was entirely in Norwegians and geared towards locals).
-I also visited the Munch Museet, which featured several of Edvard Munch's paintings as well as a film on his life. Not the most thrilling piece of cinema, but thorough and gave good insight into who he was and his influences.
-Royal Palace exterior - I returned to the center of Oslo and followed a military parade up Karl Johan's Gate (the main shopping street) to the Royal Palace, and watched the procession for a while.
-Ibsen Museet - this was a pretty nice museum, with a film about his life as well as exhibits of a lot of his personal effects. The most interesting part was definitely visiting his apartment, though, and seeing where he worked and lived.
-Maaemo - I went to my first Michelin starred restaurant (2 stars to be exact). Maaemo means Earth Mother in an old Finnish language and focuses on fresh ingredients + Norwegian cuisine. There's a 20 course set menu (many courses are only a bite, but it still ends up being a very filling amount of food) and most are works of art. Served on imaginative plates, dishes, and even tree branches, the presentation is stunning and service lovely. The restaurant itself is beautiful and intimate, with only 8 tables, and has a nice view through its glass walls. It was a fascinating, several hour experience, with food as art and experience, not merely sustenance. I also got to visit the kitchen, which was interesting, and see them preparing the food. Both waiters served me as well as some of the cooks, who came down to explain what they were making and what I'd be eating. A fascinating experience, and a clearly choreographed dance by all the staff. I don't think I'll be doing anything similar again anytime soon as it is quite spendy, but it was a unique experience and I'm glad I could do it. Examples of dishes: dired and smoked reindeer heart with yogurt and plum sauce, and these cold, rather savoury macarons.
Friday - flight home
-I decided to spend my last day in Oslo relaxing in my hotel and walking around the city center at a leisurely pace. Oslo's such a small city, there was little left to do.
-I went to the National Gallery, a small but charming collection of Nordic, German, and French art. Went into a lovely marble decorated cafe for lunch (fish again, of course).
-The flight home was uneventful--Norwegian Air again, and I tried to sleep through as much of it as possible. I had a lovely time in Scandinavia, and would love to come back to visit Denmark and Finland in the future.
STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN & OSLO, NORWAY APRIL 2014
STOCKHOLM
Fri, April 18: Flight to Stockholm
-Terminal 1 of JFK is crowded, with various international carriers all over the place like Turkish Air and Norwegian, the one I'm flying on. I eat copious snacks/dinner right before the flight, as they have zero in flight food or drink service unless you pay. They're a budget European character, with very cheap tickets--the only catch is that you pay a few for everything: seat selection, drinks, food ($45 to reserve a meal in advance). I opt for no frills and bring my own food, which makes the flight very affordable.
-The plane itself is actually nicer and more spacious than I was expecting. So it's a comfortable enough flight. Even with a delay, it's 7 hours of flight time, and I sleep most of it due to it being a red eye.
Sat, April 19: Arrival in Arlanda
-Flight arrives just in time for us to catch a taxi into Stockholm, check in to our hotel, and walk to a food tour around the area we're staying in, Sodermalm. The tour is a lot of fun, and we meet a bunch of friendly locals on it.
-The hotel we stayed in, the Columbus Loft, is on the third story of what used to be a housing building for works and then a brewery from the 1700's. The rooms don't have individual bathrooms, so everyone on the floor has to walk down to shared bathroom & showers, which are in individual stalls. It's a bit of a reminder of college dorms, though a bit nicer. The location is good and the breakfast excellent, served in a homey little area in the downstairs of the hotel and with a vast array of delicious fresh food. Fun place to stay, but I wasn't a huge fan of hauling my toiletries down the hall (serious flashbacks to freshman year of college) or the lukewarm showers.
Just to expand a bit on the breakfast: it's basically a smorgasbord, with cheese, sliced meats, a variety of fresh and crispbreads, yogurt, jam, liver mousse pate, pickled herring, hard boiled eggs, and squeeze tubes of caviar spread. Really delicious and one of the highlights of my time in Stockholm.
The last thing me and friend N did in Stockholm was walk around, and stopped by a nightclub called Berns. It's an old building and a very cool space that served food and had drinks. Swedes like to stay out late, as it turns out.
Sunday - Stockholm Day 2
-Royal Palace - Treasury (with some crown jewels), Royal Apartments (a mini version of Versailles), and Medieval Palace cellar, which was fun and old.
-Arme Museum - museum about the military of Sweden, and the end of conscription. We had lunch in the dining area, which was filled with locals for a reason--the food was a solid fish + potato + salad, with a bar filled with mysterious Swedish spreads on bread. Good stuff.
-Stockholm Cathedral - plain exterior with eclectic interior that was a mish mash of various European styles and some design elements unique to Scandinavia (such as light colored geometric stained glass windows). Interesting building.
Monday - Stockholm, Day 3
-City Hall - fun, inspired by Venetian palazzoos with courtyard and docks on the water for boat access. Lots of tourist and a good gift shop.
-Vasamuseet - museum cenetered around a giant ship from the 1600's which sank on its maiden voyage and was preserved in the seawater right outside of Stockholm. They salvaged it after numerous attempts in the 1990's, and it's a truly striking ship to behold. Very cool.
-Lunch at Oaxen in Djungarden, in which we had beef chuck and potato, plus a cloudberry dessert parfait. For dinner, we ate at Speciriot herring & roe plus a rhubarb and cardomum dessert. All delicious.
-Skansen - an open air on Djungarden about old village life in Sweden complete with actors in costume and reenactments. There was also an aquarium. An amusing museum, probably a place locals bring children on field trips to learn about Swedish history.
Tuesday: Stockholm to Oslo
-Took the ever reliable and speedy Arlanda Express from the train station to Arlanda Airport, for my flight on Norwegian Air to Oslo (plane ticket insanely cheap--around $55 one way).
-Beautiful, sunny day with an easy train ride from the airport to Oslo S (the main train station)
-Short walk to my hotel which is nice, and has another excellent Smorgasbord type breakfast with a few extras (English fry up style breakfast foods, and Norwegian Jarlsburg and brown 'cheese')
-Stockholm is a small city, but Oslo is truly tiny and also under a great deal of construction. The infrastructure is also not as good or consistent as Stockholm, and the tourism is not quite as well developed. Nice city though, with a good public transportation system that very few of the riders appeared to pay for from what I observed (they just stepped on to the light rail or buses and had a seat).
-After walking around the area a bit, I ate near my hotel at a place called Grilleriat that was recommended on both Yelp and in my guidebook. I got grilled cod (the fish of the day) and a small amuse bouche consisting of a slice of grilled duck breast, aioli + pork rind, and flavored popcorn. Everything was well made, with the fish cooked perfectly--not overdone at all.
Wednesday: Oslo Ballet & exploration of Bygdoy (aka Museum Island)
-Enjoyed the delicious breakfast at my hotel, which was served in a less charming cafeteria than my previous hotel, but with a larger selection.
-Set off to Akershus Fortress, which is a medieval fortress that's been updated and changed many times since its first creation. There were hordes of blonde schoolchildren running about, all there to learn more about the history of Norway and its conflicts with neighboring Scandinavian countries (the usual conquest back and forth).
-Went to Museet for Samtidskunst AKA the contemporary art museum, which was housed in a beautiful old building with a surprisingly excellent exhibit from a Cuban artist named Carlos Garaicoa.
-Next up with Oslo Domkirk, an interesting old cathedral with very modern ceiling paintings I liked (though they caused quite a stir when they were first painted and covered up the old ceiling work).
-I took a ferry ride to Bygdoy, which is a pretty island that's mostly residential with various museums sprinkled throughout. I visited the Viking Ship Museum, the Norsk Maritime Museum, and the Fram Museum.
-Viking Museum - interesting to see the intricate wood carvings on the surviving Viking ships/artifacts. Plus, I learned that Vikings decomissioned some ships and put the dead bodies of important people on them, then filled them with travel supplies, food, and animal sacrifices (to send into the underworld, presumably). After that, they then covered the ship/items with clay, dragged the ships onto land, and buried them in these giant burial mounds that are still being discovered today. It reminds me of Egyptian burial practices with Pharoahs and Chinese ones with ancient emperors. Interesting how many ancient peoples had these sort of rituals involving send stuff with the dead into the afterlife. I guess it's a good way to hedge your bets if you aren't sure what comes after you die.
-Norsk Maritime Museum - small, but charming, with a nice panoramic film of Norway's various coastlines and towns to watch. There are a lot of beautiful fjords and tiny towns that look gorgeous, and Norway has a maritime history that stretches from the Vikings to the modern day cruise industry and oil freighting. Also, I had a decent waffle with jam and sour cream (the sour cream as a bread/carbohydrate accompaniment is a sign of German influence, I believe).
-Fram Museum - the Fram was a ship that did 3 arctic expeditions and was designed to be frozen into the ice without being crushed. It was a marvel of modern engineering at the time it was created, and is still a pretty clever solution to the problem of docking and storing a ship in the Arctic for a long period of time.
-For late afternoon, I took the ferry back to the main part of Oslo (beautiful ride) and explored the Vigeland Park, which is a large, pretty public park decorated with over 200 sculptures by Gustav Vigeland, Norway's most famous sculptor. The weather was good and there were quite a few locals sunning themselves throughout the park.
-For dinner, I ate at Lokk, a charming little restaurant. I had char from the North Sea along with delcious bread and 2 butters: garlic & spring greens. The fish in Scandinavia continues to be excellent, as expected.
-After dinner, I head to the Opera House, which is a lovely modern building that appears to rise up from the sea like a white glacier. It was built in 2008 and is vaguely reminiscent of the Sydney Opera house. You also scale up the diagonal sides of the building and view both the surrounding water and sea from different points and the roof of the ceiling. There's also a view of a sculpture called 'She Lies' which is a glass structure out in the water during summer. Apparently during winter the water freezes and people can actually walk out to the sculpture on the ice and interact with it up close. Interesting stuff, though it does make me wonder about safety issues.
-The show I saw was a ballet set to the music of Carmen. It was a very good production, and interesting to see such a youthful cast playing out the story (ballerinas and dancers on the whole tend to skew younger than your usual opera cast). I liked a lot of the acting choices the dancers made, and the live music was wonderful. A very enjoyable evening.
Thursday - last full day in Oslo
-I visited the Botanical Garden, which is nice, though on the small side and not quite in bloom yet. There, I went into the Natural History museum (which consisted of 2 very small buildings, one of which was entirely in Norwegians and geared towards locals).
-I also visited the Munch Museet, which featured several of Edvard Munch's paintings as well as a film on his life. Not the most thrilling piece of cinema, but thorough and gave good insight into who he was and his influences.
-Royal Palace exterior - I returned to the center of Oslo and followed a military parade up Karl Johan's Gate (the main shopping street) to the Royal Palace, and watched the procession for a while.
-Ibsen Museet - this was a pretty nice museum, with a film about his life as well as exhibits of a lot of his personal effects. The most interesting part was definitely visiting his apartment, though, and seeing where he worked and lived.
-Maaemo - I went to my first Michelin starred restaurant (2 stars to be exact). Maaemo means Earth Mother in an old Finnish language and focuses on fresh ingredients + Norwegian cuisine. There's a 20 course set menu (many courses are only a bite, but it still ends up being a very filling amount of food) and most are works of art. Served on imaginative plates, dishes, and even tree branches, the presentation is stunning and service lovely. The restaurant itself is beautiful and intimate, with only 8 tables, and has a nice view through its glass walls. It was a fascinating, several hour experience, with food as art and experience, not merely sustenance. I also got to visit the kitchen, which was interesting, and see them preparing the food. Both waiters served me as well as some of the cooks, who came down to explain what they were making and what I'd be eating. A fascinating experience, and a clearly choreographed dance by all the staff. I don't think I'll be doing anything similar again anytime soon as it is quite spendy, but it was a unique experience and I'm glad I could do it. Examples of dishes: dired and smoked reindeer heart with yogurt and plum sauce, and these cold, rather savoury macarons.
Friday - flight home
-I decided to spend my last day in Oslo relaxing in my hotel and walking around the city center at a leisurely pace. Oslo's such a small city, there was little left to do.
-I went to the National Gallery, a small but charming collection of Nordic, German, and French art. Went into a lovely marble decorated cafe for lunch (fish again, of course).
-The flight home was uneventful--Norwegian Air again, and I tried to sleep through as much of it as possible. I had a lovely time in Scandinavia, and would love to come back to visit Denmark and Finland in the future.