Northward bound

The thought of a long flight should fill me with dread but all I can think of is" will it be clear during the flight to get pictures". We are on the 2nd flight and don't have to be at the check in desk till 10:30 but seen as we had eaten breakfast, been back to the room to pick up bags, checked out of the hotel and were standing outside of the airport greeting people who were on the 1st flight who had to be at check in at 9:30. The reason being that we were dressed in some of our arctic layers to save on baggage weight and they are a bit warm, people are trudging past looking like they are working in industrial freezers and I'm standing in a T-shirt! We have checked the time stamps on pictures and it shows we were outside the airport at 8am but were in the queue for check-in at 09:45 and were still ahead of the Muppet's who should have checked in by 09:30. Security and passport control are a breeze for seasoned travellers like us, so we headed off for a cup of tea and some juice to get hydrated before we boarding at 12:30. We are joined eventually by the Scouselets who tell us of passengers from the first flight who are just turning up now. While sitting watching the departures board both myself and Mrs Scouselet did a double-take and stood up abruptly. The reason being that a cancellation of a flight to Svalbard had just appeared in the middle of the board exactly where our flight was positioned. I scrambled out and across the concourse to get a better look as I wasn't wearing my glasses. Phew, someone had entered an errant flight number and the system showed it as cancelled but our flight was still running. Time was getting on so we headed flight-side to look for restrooms before boarding. We found our gate at the far end of the airport and went through passport control again and headed downstairs to get on the bus. After we all got on the plane it was announced than one passenger was missing or had slipped through without her details being recorded properly. Its the policy of Oslo airport not to make announcements over the PA system for missing passengers so we must wait and see if she turns up at the gate. Its now thirty minutes past our departure time and the ground crew are removing the staircase and the chief purser is closing and locking the door. Travel Quest has chartered two Boeing 737 800's from a sister company of KLM called Transavia to take us North to Svalbard. Our plane has the fancy drop down video screens so we know exactly where we are in relation to interesting places on the ground and yes the clod cover below us is broken-ish. My face seemed to be squashed against the window for most of the flight trying to make sense of the weird and wonderful topography thirty seven thousand feet below us. The video screen showed when we had left the north Norwegian coastline behind us with the cold Arctic ocean between us and Svalbard. We knew when we were nearing the Svalbard archipelago as the sea ice  started appearing looking like drifting snow on bare dark rock and also the video screen just showed sea below us. Air pressure changes alerted me that descent had started and land would be sighted soon as the ice flows were getting larger and the bergy bits becoming more defined in shape. The plane banked and land appeared through the broken cloud as we lined up for the approach and entered the glide path. The airfield flashed by and we caught sight of the World Seed Bank up on the hillside, bump, clang, thump and we are down on tarmac or more precisely "a thick layer of  ice on tarmac"! Low cloud scudded across the sky bringing billions of wind driven ice crystals across the  airport apron as we descended the steps. Some people wanted pictures of the grey ice blasted airport but all we wanted was to escape the -25 wind tunnel and get into the warmth of the terminal. The journey to the Hotel didn't take long and soon we were inside and taking of our boots in the changing room for the first time. After a very quick check-in we had our keys and headed for our room to see if it was as good as the Oslo Radisson, its not as large or as new but it is lovely and warm and  is a great base for our 5 days here. We couldn't find the Wi-Fi code so headed for reception only to find the bags had been delivered, but had been left out in the car park! Its at this point that the rule of taking your boots off every time you enter the building reared its ugly head and I spat my dummy out of the pram along with my teddy and rattle. I had my little rant and stormed off with the two bags and my boots on my feet back to the room. The Boss found my dummy, teddy and rattle and told me I was a prat, She was right as usual and I still don't know what really sent me off the deep end, ah well.
As we had booked extra excursions for while we were here our trip to Camp Barentz would be rearranged for another night and after dinner we were going Aurora hunting. The buffet dinner was interesting in its content and very well presented and what we had was delicious but eating late and then having to get dressed up like a burst pipe in a warm room is not a very pleasant experience. It would be an experience that would be repeated every time we had to leave the Hotel and it wouldn't get any easier. As we waited outside for the bus the sky didn't look very promising but then again we didn't know where they were taking us. We drove to the two other hotels then headed out of the town into the darkness where cabins could be seen off the side of the road. I don't know at which point on our journey that I realised I knew where we were headed but it did make sense when we turned off the road onto a track with a few huts and a car park at its end. The bus reversed into its parking space and our armed guard approached and informed us where we would be going and if anyone wished to stay outside would they please stay near him. We made our way towards the biggest hut passing a sign for"Camp Barentz", security and access to toilets being a must there wasn't really anywhere we could have been going. We were there for 3 hours listening to stories and historical tidbits from the guides, all the while people were in and out to check on the sky conditions. We headed outside around 11pm into the wind tunnel and to test the effectiveness of the Arctic clothing we had which worked as long ad you didn't want to hear what people were saying or reply in any comprehensible language known to man! We thought we could see streamers through the thin cloud but weren't convinced so headed down to the car park as the bus had just returned. We said goodnight and thank you to our guard and climbed onto the bus to begin the unzipping of layers for our ride back to the hotel. All the photography equipment was stowed away and people were settling into their seats as the doors opened and our guide popped his head in and said" I think You might want to see this".
Everyone is off the bus and trying to zip up all the open layers, the cold was soon forgotten as everyone stared up and went very quiet. Directly above us green streamers were pulsating across a starry background. We watched them for about twenty minutes and some even went back on the bus and retrieved camera gear to get some images. Our quest for the night was to observe the Aurora and observe the Aurora, we have clearly achieved this so we can mark it down as a resounding success and headed back to the hotel. We have all morning and part of the afternoon to ourselves tomorrow so who knows what mischief we will be getting up to.

Cooling off outside Gardemoen

Selfie

Raring to go

Northern Norway

Northern Norway

First ice flows

Landfall Svalbard

Lining up for approach

Landed at last

Oslo day 2

We had arranged the night before to meet our friends the Scouselets at the pickup point for our city tour so after breakfast we made our way to the pick up point with plenty of time to spare. Rather than sit and wait outside we headed for a cafe we noticed yesterday which just turned out to be a vegetarian cafe, well we know where we are going for our tea. We were met by our tour guide and told to give the driver our booking form and take a seat. We were going to the Holmenkolbakken ski jump first but we would go there via the city centre and see all the sights to be seen. Oslo is quite a big place and has so very interesting historical architecture as well as some very new and up to date  designer buildings.. The ski jump park is very well laid out and gives impressive views of the city centre and Oslo Fjord. Our next stop would be at the Vigeland sculpture park where we would have to walk to the other end and the bus would be waiting. Our guide gave us a very comprehensive history of the park and the sculptor Gustav Vigeland who cast all the original models life size and then had artisans craft the granite figures and bronze statues to his exacting specifications. He also did the layout of the park and all the trees were planted according to his wishes. The Norwegians especially the ones in Oslo seem to have a thing for naked sculptures, they are literally in every open space controlled by the city council. This park seems to have a naked form of all age and gender in all differing proportions which chart life's journey from conception through to death and whatever is beyond! Next a museum we had been hoping to visit, the Viking Ship museum on the Bygdoy headland which has on display artifacts and ships dug up from the Oseberg site which have been dated at over a 1000 years old and are the best preserved wooden viking objects found anywhere in the world. Very interesting and loads of pictures taken we are now heading for the Fram and Kon-tiki  museums on the same headland. They both contain the afor mentioned ships and are housed in purpose built buildings which are well laid out with a pictorial and video history of their journeys successful or not. Our time on the tour was soon over and we were now heading back into the city centre where the guide said if we had the time the town hall was well worth a visit to see the public spaces where the Nobel peace prize is awarded every year. We entered the building through massive oak doors and walked into the main auditorium, it was so big and picturesque I started taking pano shots on my phone. Not realising that the phone makes horrendous noises as it composes said panos, I was asked politely by a film crew from the national broadcaster to stop forthwith as they were recording an interview with the Mayor of Oslo, oops! Me bad tempered, never. The fresco's and artwork within the rooms are very good so to is the display room with all the gifts from foreign governments. So after a visit to the Vegetarian cafe for a fantastic tea we headed to the Akershus fort which has protected the citizens of  present day Oslo since 1624. Because of the time we went in we seemed to have the place to ourselves for most of the time. It really is a commanding position with views over the harbour and all water approaches. Soon we found ourselves exiting the fort and heading towards the opera house which is on the way back to the station anyway. When we visited yesterday the light wasn't that good but today its much better. We walked up and round the outside of the building taking in the views and vistas of the early evening. Unfortunately the staff were preparing the building for an evening performance so there was no public access to the interior so we used the facilities and headed for the station. As we are off on our travels again tomorrow the plan is to take out the heavy boots and coats and repack the bags so they can be weighed again. This being accomplished quite successfully we headed for the land of nod.