Just Landed in London: August 2014

I'm so behind in my posting. After Prague, we went to Salzburg, Vienna and Budapest. Grace and Kyle then stayed for another 5 days before they headed back to Jakarta. I loved spending time with them. I haven't spent that much time with my sister since 1992, when she left for college in the US. I was still in high school. Since then, we pretty much lived in different states or countries.

Anyway, a few weeks after that, my mom came to London. I was not as excited as I was when Grace and Kyle came. I have a rather difficult relationship with my mom. I'm working on it and I'm trying. That's the reason I invited her to come and took her to Norway. I was nervous that I would get in an argument with her that left one of us (or both) crying because we were upset.

My mom came on Saturday night. I picked her up at the airport. The next day we went to Royal Academy Summer exhibition. I had never been to RA. Since I live in Westminster, I got free tickets to the exhibition. Our tickets were for 9.30AM. The rooms were perfect for art shows. High ceiling with plenty of natural lights. I don't know if we could take pictures or not. There was no sign that said you couldn't. We got a booklet that listed the items on display, the artist and the price. My mom had fun matching up the price tags with the art piece. She was fascinated at some pieces that were a quarter million pounds.

Tiered cake

It was like a cartoon cut out but worth over 100K

All three paintings were drawn by the same artist. The top one was a quarter million pounds

Royal Academy from the outside

The next day we flew to Bergen, Norway. I can't remember how I found this place. I think, reading Rick Steves' blogs or forums, or maybe I just ran into a website on Norway. I can't remember. Bergen is just a small town. It's located on the west coast of Norway. I bought Norway in a Nutshell tour. There's no tour guide. It's just a series of train, bus and cruise tickets. You can start in Bergen and do a round trip, start in Bergen and end in Oslo, or do a round trip from Oslo. I opted for Bergen to Oslo one way trip. We would spend a night in Flam.

Bergen-Voss-Gudvangen-Flam-Myrdal-Oslo

After a two hour flight, we arrived in Bergen. I know weather can be very wet and unpredictable. We brought waterproof jackets and umbrellas. It was raining when we landed. I bought airport bus tickets to the city center. I knew we had to get out at the Fish Market or Fish Torget. It's right next to the tourist information. I google mapped the directions from the tourist information to the place that we stayed at.

Tiny living room on the second floor

Narrow and quite steep stairs to the third floor

The place that we stayed is an apartment style bed and breakfast. There were three bedrooms and two full baths. Kitchen and dining room to share. It was a really cute place. It just felt so Scandinavian, airy, lots of white walls, simple and neutral decor. I felt I was in the IKEA catalog. After we checked in and dropped off the bags, we went back to the fish market area. By this time, thankfully, the rain stopped.

Bryggen

Bryggen is an area where 61 wooden buildings are located. They were built from pre-Hanseatic period. It's on the UNESCO world heritage list since 1979.

Even Louisiana cajun came to Bergen, Norway.

Fresh seafood. everything is so expensive. A platter of seafood is around EUR 50.

Elk Sausage and Goat Cheese rolls

Stacks of houses sitting on the hills

In one of the alleys in Bryggen

It was time for lunch. I did some research and read raving reviews on the best fish and chips in Norway. The chef is Scottish. That explained why fish and chips are on the menu.

I have to agree that it's the best fish and chips that I tasted ever. The batter was very crunchy and well seasoned, actually a bit too salty for my taste. The crab cake with prawn was really good too. Like most Americans, I dunk the fries in ketchup.

After lunch, we walked on a hill where the funicular to Mount Floyen was located. Maybe since it was Monday afternoon, there was no line. The view was absolutely amazing.

The white building on the left is the ticket office for funicular.

Half way to the top.

Almost at the top

Bergen from the top of Mount Floyen

The sun stated to peek through the clouds

Even though the sun came out and the rain stopped, it was pretty cold, around 50 degrees. It was breezy, not too windy. I definitely couldn't take off my jacket. From Mt. Floyen, I could see another mountain behind. That is Mount Ulriken. Apparently there are 7 mountains surrounding the city of Bergen. I was debating whether we should go to Mount Ulriken or not because I could see the sky was getting cloudy again in that area. On the way from the airport to the city center, I saw a sign that said "A visit to Bergen is not complete without Mount Ulriken". I decided to go for it. We may as well since there's not much to do in the city and the chance that I'm going back to Bergen is very slim.

Some pictures back in Bryggen after Mt. Floyen visit. It was sunny!

You could see the dark cloud on the right where Mount Ulriken located

We rode a bus to the base of the mountain. It was around half an hour. The road was pretty steep. The cable car ride was around 7 minutes.

At the top

There was no barrier behind me. My mom didn't want to pose for a photo.

Worth a visit!

After 10 minutes, the weather turned for the worse again. It started raining. We almost decided to head back down. My mom was cold. She was staying at the small shop while I was walking around outside. I had to get my $50 worth. I'm so glad we didn't go down because less than 15 minutes later, the sun was out again. The sky was clear.

The sun was peeking out

The view was quite different over here.

What's missing in this picture? sheep in the background. There was actually a lot of mountain goat's turd on the ground. It looks like they come out at night.

The view going down. So glad we waited up there.

We went back to the city and had dinner. Bacalao is tomato based dried cod stew with potatoes. It's not the best fish stew but it wasn't bad. The original creamy fish soup was good.

Fiskesuppe on the left. Bacalao on the right.

A few more pictures of Bryggen before calling it a day

The next morning, after breakfast, we went to the train station to board the train to Voss. It was approximately an hour. Then at Voss, we had less than 7 minutes to hop on the bus. The bus station was right next door, timing wasn't an issue. The view from the bus ride was amazing. We were on Stalheimskleiva, it was one of the steepest stretches of road in Northern Europe. I believe there were 7 hairpin turns. The bus was moving and turning very slowly, made it perfect for photo ops.

Stalheimskleiva

One of many waterfalls that we see in Norway

We arrived at Gudvangen, where we boarded a cruise ship to sail along two well known fjords, Naeroyfjord and Aurlandsfjord.

Before boarding the ship

Cute wooden houses on the hill

A Japanese woman volunteered to take my picture on the deck.

About 15 minutes after we boarded, it started sprinkling. There were seating inside and a lot of people grabbed plastic chairs that were provided and sat on the deck despite the rain. I did the same thing, while my mom sat inside. It was cold and a little wet but the views were so amazing.

We passed some small towns along the way

The boat was moving slow. It allows you to take it all in.

This is Aurland. A pretty big town right off the fjord.

We then arrived in Flam, where we stayed for a night. It was around 4PM. We took a short walk to Heimly Pensionat.Everything in Norway was super expensive. The place we stayed was around $180 per night. It was a room with two beds and a small bathroom. I paid a little extra to get the room facing the fjord. We walked around in town after check-in. Flam is a town of 400 people. Because it's located at the bottom of the fjord, it became a popular spot for tourism. There's always one giant cruise ship that docked every day.

The view from the room

The theme of Norway, lots of rain that constantly starts and stops every few hours.

These are the tourist information office, souvenir shops and cafes.

After a quick nap at the hotel, we went for an evening walk. The sun didn't go down until around 9PM.

The water was so clear.

One of the cruise ships that docked.

The next morning, we went for a short hike.

Since we didn't leave until 4PM, we had time to do a short excursion. We went to Stegastein lookout.

Then boarded the Flambana train from Flam to Myrdal. It's an iconic train ride. We sat on the right side since it had better views.

This is the only spot when the train stopped and let us out for 5 minute photo ops.

It sounds crazy but suddenly there was music playing and a women in red dress came out and danced in the middle of the Kjosfossen.

In Myrdal, we had to wait about an hour because the train to Oslo was delayed. The train to Oslo was around 5 hours. I booked a hotel by the Central station, maybe around a half a mile away. We were to arrive around 11PM. I never thought to google Oslo as far as the safety around the area especially at night. As the sky was getting darker, I pulled up my phone and googled Oslo central station. Crap! it wasn't at the best part of town. Women were not advised to walk alone at night. I then googled the best taxi companies in Oslo that have great reputation and wrote the company names down.

Of course, I didn't tell my mom about the area. I told her that we'll take a cab to the hotel even though it was close. We followed the taxi sign but we got to the area, there was no taxi. Maybe because it was late at night. I knew exactly where to go, so I told her that we'll just walk a few blocks. I was nervous but I didn't want to show it to her. She followed my steps but asked me a few times how far we had to walk. We found the hotel with no issues.

The next day, we walked from the hotel to opera house at the pier. We had about an hour to kill before going to the airport.