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Category: Norway

Skiing in Indre Østfold

Skiing in Indre Østfold

We had a lot of sunshine this weekend, but as I was knocked down by the flu, I haven’t been out at all. So instead, here are some photos from last weekend when I went went skiing near Rakkestad (Indre Østfold) with Marie and Pål. A beautiful area, with narrow tracks through the forest – quite a challenge for me (I am used to having lots of space 😉 ) which resulted in some bruises 😀 but it was a great day out! And an advantage of being out with Marie: I end up with some photos of myself 😀

Next to a tree thick with rime - photo by Marie

Coming out of the forest and onto one of the marshes - photo by Marie

Nice trees

Another tree covered in rime

Where to? - photo by Marie

Frosty sign

Snow in Oslo

Snow in Oslo

Oslo got another fresh layer of snow last weekend, and when the sun came out on Saturday I just had to go for a walk through the snowy city 🙂 I ended up in Vigelandsparken, which I had never seen in the snow before – it was so pretty!

I am trying something new with my blog – instead of the small thumbnails they are now much bigger. You can still click on them for an even larger version with a caption though 🙂

The snowy streets of Oslo

Even the sculptures were freezing ;)

Low sun in Vigelandsparken

Sculpture in Vigelandsparken

The central group of scultures with the monolith

Vigelandsparken in the snow - so pretty!

I love those gates

Frozen toes both for me and this sculpture ;)

As the sun was setting...

I discovered a group of baby sculptures that I had never seen before!

The ducks were a bit restless and didn't have much open water

Leaving the park, time to go home

On Sunday I joined Teresa and her family at Korketrekkeren (the corkscrew) which is a 2 kilometer long tobogganing track. When you reach the bottom of the track, you can take the subway back to the top! They have sleds for rent at two different places (near Frognerseteren station). It was so much fun!! The only problem was that there were LOTS of people on a sunny Sunday afternoon, which caused queues and crashes 😉

I had brought my ski’s with me, and after watching the fantastic sunset, I skied the lit skitrack from Frognerseteren to Sognsvann via Ullevålseteren (10 km, mostly – but not only 😀 – downhill)

Sunset view of the Oslofjord

Sunset panorama from Frognerseteren

Beautiful pink sky!

Incredible twilight colours on the lit skitrail from Frognerseteren

So pretty...

Father and son skiing through a Christmas card

 

This was my first ski trip in Oslo, and I loved it! Looking forward to more 🙂

Light Pillars

Light Pillars

It’s been really cold in Oslo (down to -13) and a couple of days ago, a really cool optical phenomenon was visible: light pillars. Some people thought they were seeing the northern lights, as the pillars were quite strong and very colourful, but this is a different phenomenon where city lights are reflected by tiny ice crystals in the sky.

I thought of going to a viewpoint over the city, but as it was really cold, I decided to stay closer to home (lazy…) and take some photos in the park surrounding the palace. They were making fake snow in front of the palace, as they also do at several ski areas around the city – this might actually be the source of the ice crystals floating around.

Colourful light pillars over Oslo A large blue light pillar
I wonder if the source of this light pillar is the blue artwork in the bottom left corner? Light pillars over the statue in front of the palace

The guards at the palace came to ask me what I was doing – not sure they were really suspicious or they just wanted a walk/talk 😉 but they let me continue even if they probably thought I was a little crazy.

My photos made one of the biggest newspapers in Norway, they were used in an article by VG. Yr also wrote an article about this and other cold weather phenomena. Those are both in Norwegian, here is a short article in English.