Getting to Oslo, I kind of wandered, the aim was to eventually get to the hostel I’d booked at the end of my Burkina Faso adventures. I was pretty aware of the costs of Norway and thought even public transport was a no go. I think with the 35kgs or so of gear, the journey was about 3/4 of an hour. Getting there I was simply shagged. After getting all sorted at the hostel, I met another Aussie who had been venturing from country to country for the past 4-5 years and had a few more years planned. One thing missing from his life, that had been present down under was his Vegemite. Hmm, I had stored 4 jars of Vegemite in my bag, them aim to fulfill the spot called home. Hearing his length of time, I ended up just giving him a jar of it. Now, I had no idea that this was worth a beer, but he pulled out from the room fridge a couple of beers.
With a 5am wake up, he had to call it a night shortly after cracking open the brews. Before retiring, he did direct me to some places to visit around the British Isles, forgot where they were by the following day. Before getting to bed, I had to suss out my following day. I had no idea why I was in Oslo, and had thought it just the thing to do. That night I looked at what I could do around the town, pfft bugger that for a joke. How far north or west could I get for a reasonable price? Lonely Planet claims one of the best journeys one could do around the world is the following loop: Train to Bergen, ferry to Flam and train back to Oslo. Done. Oh yea, if you use some of the travel books, be wary with the prices suggested and realtime prices. Norway was one place out of whack.
The following day, I repacked my bag and left the hiking bag at the hostel, while taking only the back pack and laptop for the journey. It only took 30 minutes now to get to the train station. It was here that I realised I had no idea of Norwegian. All I knew was that I had to head towards Bergen… which was apparently the last stop.
Jumping on this was an experience of what was to be coming for the next 6 months of travel: near silence on the travel from/to destinations. The photos from the train from Oslo to Bergen were… limited. As a part of the repacking, I hadn’t made sure the battery had been fully recharged. It is true that the scenery was inspiring and showed some great variety, ranging from city to farmland and finally mountainous.
After about 9 hours of training it to Bergen the rain began and the trip ended. I had the assumption that the shoddy weather, the lack of events and the expenses of Norway would keep away too many tourists… pfft, wrong. I went to a few hostels and the available rooms were damned expensive. Finally YHA had a decent place that was reasonably cheap.
Bergen, other than all the rain, was an OK city. I think it was going to be the capital of Oslo, walking around most of the dockland area it I could see how it wasn’t the capital… too miserable. As well as the docks, there was apparently some scenic view that was worth a visit. 90% of people take the cable car up and back, but walking up to it seemed right: 2 hours later and photos of wooden trolls and me exploring various playground equipment. Most people at the scenic point would use it to take happy snaps, as well as sipping away at some form of latte.
The rain setting in was the cause of my cable ride back down, pretty good experience but with limited views, and thus a short walk home.
That night I ended up just dumping my carcass next to some elderly women (a Brit and a lass from USA). We were then companied with Peggie, who’d they had known from previous night sittings.
After one lady had said that in all her travels MacDonalds was the only trustworthy place for food, I ignored her as much as possible and ended up talking to the new kid on the block. Hi Peggie.
Peggie decided to just pack up shop and go on holiday for… 6 weeks (?) maybe longer. Actualy, I think it was longer, as she had spent some time. Even though she was going to be leaving the following day, her following stop was going to be Gotenburg (or Gothernburg). I think we ended up speaking for a couple of hours.
