Back last winter 2023, when Dominique was visiting us, we chatted about turning 60 next year.

Somehow the subject came to how we both wanted to visit Norway and Scandinavia and I floated the idea of going together with my husband Chuck, Dominique having just recently lost her wonderful husband Alain.

A few weeks later, we were still messaging about it and the idea took root.

Here we are now, landing in Oslo for a 3 weeks tour of Norway – all 3 of us very excited!

On our first leg, we were spending two nights in Oslo so only had one full day and made the best of it.

We did a self guided city walking tour and walked by several beautiful buildings.

We walked the Norsk Folkemuseum, where we observed multiple reproductions of houses and buildings hundreds of years old. We learned they were all made of pine and were untreated, yet survived beautifully the years.

We visited an amazing exposition of the Polar Ship at the Fram museum. We were able to descend deep into the hull to really understand how the men on ship lived.

Arctic expeditions and exploration is a topic very dear to Chuck so this was a real treat.

We all decided to walk up the beautiful opera house. What a spectacular building!

The Nobel museum was really impactful. It focused mainly on the Peace prize recipients and we were able to read about the many amazing change makers over the years.

The display of the medal as well as the stand/picture/description of each winner was very eye opening.

There was a large display on the art of listening to each other that particularly resonated with me. Something I’m working on.

We also learned that the artist who designed the Nobel medal is the same who built the amazing sculpture on Human Relations in a local park – Gustav Vigeland.

So many amazing depiction of human interactions!

We walked up to the Royal Palace

Tomorrow we embark on our train journey across the land and to Fråm and beautiful fjords!