Scandinavian tour with Cris!

Friend Cris from UT Austin and I got together recently since she had a conference in Amsterdam the first week of June. Great opportunity for another adventure! Brussels was our plan. I booked tickets. Then the horrible terrorist attack at that airport made us change our minds. Cris came to Bergen, then we took the train to Oslo, another train to Stockholm, Sweden, and finally a flight to Amsterdam.

Cris and I walked through sunny Bergen to the train station

Up at the top of the ride between Bergen and Norway

First class gave us not only good views, but electricity and free coffee and papers

This is where the Parliament rules Norway - beautiful flowers everywhere

The Royal Palace, which you don't go inside - they really live there

Nobel Peace Prize Museum, with the recipients of last year

Tunisia did an amazing job with their Arab Spring. No civil war. The Nobel Peace Prize went to these four leaders who communicated, communicated, communicated, through it all. The Nobel Peace Prize 2015 was awarded to National Dialogue Quartet "for its decisive contribution to the building of a pluralistic democracy in Tunisia in the wake of the Jasmine Revolution of 2011".

Noah's Ark was docked in Oslo - with a gigantic Noah

We also enjoyed Vigeland Sculpture Park. It is filled with hundreds of human forms sculpted from stone. It's amazing how much feeling Gustav Vigeland was able to capture in stone. Check out the toddler temper tantrum at 1:55 in the video. 

Museum Island, Bygdøy, was fun. Viking ships, polar exploration ships, rafts to cross the Pacific; Norwegians have such a love affair with the sea.

Onward to Stockholm. That trip went a little less well. The website for the Swedish train company promised us seats facing each other next to the window, and a chicken lunch. The seats were in different rows and the lunch was what they had - not what we ordered. Grumble, grumble. Then Cris' credit card and drivers license disappeared at the end of the trip. Pickpocket? We don't know, but she had a different card she could use with her. Cancelling the first one wasn't fatal. And we had a wonderful dinner on the top of the hotel overlooking all of Stockholm.

The Ice Bar got us back on the fun track! The bar is made of ice, the drinks are served in ice glasses, and everyone gets to wear warm coats.

Stockholm's Nobel Prize Museum

 At the Nobel Prize Museum, they have a display of sketches by prize winners, and asked us to make one. Here's mine showing gravitational waves from colliding black holes.

The Stockholm subway stations are art forms! We rode around stopping at all the stops admiring them, for the duration of one ticket.



On to Amsterdam! I call this post "Scandinavian tour", but Amsterdam is not actually Scandinavian. Calling it Scandinavian plus Amsterdam tour seems a little unwieldy, though, don't you think?

Sally, from the conference, joined us for an afternoon of being tourists

We took a canal tour - a great way to see Amsterdam

Cris behind the I AMSTERDAM sign with the AM in red

 I AMSTERDAM is all over - clever little play on words, there. It's gigantic in front of the Rijks museum, where the Dutch masters are displayed. Cris and I visited the Van Gogh and the Rijks museums.

The museum was really crowded

Final dinner was in a restaurant basically made from wine casks. Even the restrooms were in 7 or 8 foot tall cask ends!

 Another wonderful adventure exploring Europe with Cris! Thanks for suggesting it, Cris.