Oslo

As promised I'm getting back to some of the things which I haven't had time to post about, and surely Oslo is well worth a mention since I enjoyed a lovely trip there this summer.
Oslo, capital city of Norway, is basically just a decent sized town by UK standards. Like most towns in Norway the centre is fairly small and can be enjoyed almost in it's entirety in a single day if you avoid museums, galleries, etc. which tend to bore me anyway. I prefer architecture and scenery.

For this trip I decided to take along a beautiful young woman and leave the wife at home.. ;)  I took my youngest daughter Mary who is only 12 years old and managed to behave just about the same as my wife who is a few years older.. By that I mean that I was made to suffer from looking in shops, eating at expensive eateries, and being told that she was thirsty (which involved me drinking beer), so that bit I will forgive.

So, where to start??
How about on the ramparts of the Akershus fort, with Mary waving the Shetland Flag.

Akershus is a must visit attraction for anybody coming to Norway and since it's nearly in the centre of town I would say it should be a first stop since you can get a good idea of where to go next from there.

The view over the harbour is amazing:

 I think one of the most interesting, or perhaps thought provoking things which can be seen at Akershus fort is the memorial to the Norwegian resistance fighters of WWII. The memorial marks the spot where they were executed by the occupying Germans.

The memorial reads (roughly translated): "They fought, they fell, they gave us all".

I can understand why they fought and died. Norway, and the Norwegian way of life is, and always will be, really worth fighting for.

OK, wipes away the tear that always comes when I see that memorial...  

Back to normal holiday stuff.

Mary in front of the Oslo town house:

 Trams, operating successfully in Oslo,,,, I wonder if the Edinburgh ones will ever be a success?? :

 Mary in front of a fountain just off Karl Johans Gate (The main street).:

 Harbour view with Akershus fort in the background:

 The most recently developed area of the harbour.. I shudder to think what some of the apartments cost:

 Tourist pose in front of the royal palace:

 "ET Phone Home"... She dragged me into a bar, so I had a beer. ;) :

 

Interesting sculpture.... Oslo has loads of them:

 

 Burger & Chips,,,, happy girl:

 On the way back to the hotel Mary insisted that we go into this bar since she need to use the facilities, and she thought the name was interesting, and reminded her of her sister..  And since she suggested I could have a beer I wasn't about to argue.

 Typical of all Oslo bars, the barman wasn't Norwegian.. This one was English.. Language no problem in Oslo.. :)

The next morning we took a tour to the other side of the harbour to visit some of the real highlights of Oslo... Museums...  But, surprisingly, a 12 year old girl was fascinated.. That shows how good these museums really are..
Those museums will be the subject of my next post.
In the meantime here's a nice pic of a ship coming into  Oslo:

Oh! nearly forgot to mention the hotel..

Everybody says that Norway is an expensive place to visit. I keep saying it's not, and keep trying to prove it.. Well this trip was no exception to my rule. 2 single rooms in the City Box Hotel in Oslo cost us 1000Kr (about £100).. Not bad for a hotel which is within a few minutes walk of the town centre. Here's a link to their facebook page. It's a no-frills hotel, but it's clean, peaceful, and very popular...

Onywye... Afore I write a novel...

Yun's aa fir enoo

Today

A couple of interesting pictures from work today.
A bow section for a ship was shipped out. It is about 10 metres high and weighs over 80 metric tonnes.

Heading out the fjord, the mountains looked kinda nice peeping through the morning mist.

The mist hanging around is a sign that temperatures are changing, and not for the better.
So after work it was time to prepare the car for winter.. Norwegian style:

Now that lot beats the hell out of the British system.. Britain won't allow studded tyres and instead relies on putting salt down which rusts your car and creates a dangerous slush to drive on which causes accidents and keeps the ambulance following lawyers busy...
I'll stick with sensible driving on snow and ice. :)

Now.... Since I've been neglecting my blog for ages I have hundreds of pictures saved up which hopefully somebody will enjoy. So I'm going to start posting a few every day... Mostly just scenery, but maybe the odd fish or 3 will get into the mix as well..

Yun's aa fir enoo.

2 hours later....

I've eventually learned how to post something new to my blog..
OK, if I hadn't neglected it for over a year I might have noticed all the changes which have taken place.
This is just a little test, and if it works I'll get round to something sensible tomorrow.
But, as a matter of interest, since I wanted to do a picture uploading test, does anybody know what kind of fungi these are? They were cleverly hiding a tree stump which my son neatly 'docked' his car on.

Just for the hell of it. Here's a few scenes from a failed fishing trip today.

Lovely weather.
No fish..
Typical. ;)

Yun's aa fir enoo

I'm weathersick,,,

And that's a helluva thing for a Shetlander to say...
This summer has been a S.H.I. ning example of how global warming just doesn't exist.
Maybe me and Jeemie caused the problem by thinking we should launch the boat at the beginning of April. We've had a few fishing trips, a few fish, been pissed on by rain, etc.. But we'll keep trying.
It's always worth having a few hours in the boat when there's scenery like this.
Looking in towards the end of Tresfjorden.

Looking east past Bakknesset (guess I spelled that wrong).

Occasionally I allow the crew to use a camera, hence this image of me.

But he only got to take one shot. I got this one of him with a little fish.

And then this image of the relaxed fisherman after he had gutted about 80 Sillocks (Småsei i Norsk) (Small Coalfish in English)..

And, yes, he got sunburned. ;)

More fishing and boating pictures coming soon. And I have to catch up on a few other things which I meant to post about... Here's a taster..

Weather permitting we're heading out sometime in the next couple of days for a small road trip since my youngest daughter is here on holiday. I think we'll head up through Kristiansund, then on to Trondheim. A likely detour from there will be a stop in Hell (Google search for 'Hell, Norway'). Then maybe down to Røros and Tynsett, before heading over into Sweden for a chance to drive on some decent roads.

Onywye, yun's aa fir enoo.

Cheers,
Da Auld Een

Been Fishing

This morning was beautiful with hardly a breath of wind. I just wish it had stayed that way. 

Me and Jeemie had decided to go fishing when the tide turned in the early afternoon. Great plan but the wind decided to show how much it could blow a little plastic bathtub/boat about, so we had to give up and come ashore with just a few fish and very little sunburn (thankfully).

Just for the hell of it I took my old Olympus 740 camera out today, mainly to see if it still worked after not being used for 2 years..

It worked beautifully. Here's the view towards home.

 The main reason I wanted to post that picture has nothing to do with fishing or the beautiful scene. It has more to do with another blogger who has posted pictures from the opposite angle.
Randi I'll be thinking about you, and hope that all goes well with the surgery.

Onywye,
Yun's aa fir enoo
;)

Meet "Meegie da Megane"

I finally took the plunge and decided to get a slightly newer car.
Honey da Honda, which I've featured in a few posts before, such as this one would have needed quite a few dollars spent on her to get her through her test so I decided to put that money towards a newer wheeled device.
Because both me and the wife are getting older and more infirm with each year that passes, the main thing I looked for in a replacement car was ease of access for worn out knees and hip joints. It didn't take me long to realise that a French piece of crap called a Renault Megane was about the best suited of what was available within my meager budget.
This car may grow on me (unlikely), but that is just because my old Honda has been such a faithful friend for the last 4 years.. But never mind, I'll tell the Honda's final story in another post shortly, when I have to deliver her to the breakers yard.

So I've landed myself with a French Bread on wheels which has all the character and personality of a snail, or perhaps a French president. It has more damned electronic devices than a space shuttle,,,,, and whoever heard of starting a car with a button that looks like the 'Print' button on a damned photocopier????

But, maybe she'll be nice. I will judge her with time.
Oh, I forgot to mention the reason why I've called her 'Meegie'. It's quite simple actually. In English the name Margaret quite often gets shortened to Maggie (as in Thatcher). Megan quite often gets shortened to Meg,,, see where I'm going??
Well in Shetland Margaret always seemed to become Meegie, or at least it did before some yuppies decided that Mags was more trendy. So that's how I arrived at the name, (although I did think to give it a French name, such as Brian,,,, after the snail on the Magic Roundabout,,, are you old enough to remember that?)

Anyway here she is:
"Meegie da Megane"

I had to drive 20Km to find some decent mountains to use as a backdrop for the picture to make her look good.

Onywye,
Yun's aa fir enoo.
:)

Motorbikes, various.

Today was the annual display of 2 wheeled mechanical masterpieces from the Vestnes motorcycle club. Here's a few examples of what was on show on a wet, snowy day.

Did I say 2 wheels??? This weirdo just sneaked in . 

 And speaking about weird machines, I don't know why but this bike just doesn't look right. The only thing good about it is the name. Apart from that it looks like a rice boiler from Japan.

But, like em or not, I wish I owned them all...

Yun's aa fir enoo
:)