1 - Last days in Oslo

During our last 2 weeks in Oslo we had farewell dinners with some of the friends we’d gotten to know quite well. We really miss you all so much! Especially looking at photos of your big heads again ;) Heheh…oops. Damn aussie humour is back. I know, it’s not good!

One of our final evening walks around the neighbourhood.On one of the sunnier summer evenings.This ended up being one of our favourite spots for a drink or bite to eat.We stumbled upon it a few weeks before leaving Oslo...like it had been hiding or something!Summer in Skoyen (hmm, no norwegian keyboard anymore)The start of the sledding hill.We got to go to the premiere screening of Transformers with everyone from work. We, of course, arrived early to enjoy a few drinks first :)Walking home about 10.45pm at night.And then we came across this! The biggest slug we'd ever seen. It was pretty cool. I've put a video of it on Facebook.One night I cooked roast chicken at Shank's place.Markus wasn't feeling well...this is before he knew about his brain tumour! Poor Markus!! He's recovering at home now...get well soon troodle boy!Walking home around 2.30am...the sun is soon to come up!The next day it was back to the miserable summer we'd been experiencing.Eating out at an indian restaurant in Majorstuen.The last dinner we had with Will and Ingvild. Here Ingvild is about 8 months pregnant...but you can't tell in this photo!The food was great...and since we've left they have had a little boy named Fred. Seeya in Oz someday guys!Our farewell dinner with Stine, Jo, Maren and Rich. These guys were great friends to us in Norway. Hopefully we'll see them over here too someday!After such a beautiful Summer in 2006, 2007's summer turned out to be disappointingly rainy!But we all celebrated anyway. This is our final drinks night on our last day of work. We miss all of you guys! Just not the weather ;)Ooo the sun came out! We hurried to the park with our engangsgrill (onetime grill).Then we called up Shank and Markus to come join us for polse med lompe!That night Shank cooked us up an awesum Indian meal...after calling his folks back in India to check that he had the recipe right :)During the last few days of our stay in Oslo we decided to head up to Sognsvann for one last picnic.We managed to pick the sunniest day in weeks.This is of course the spot that we had our picnic...and where Dan proposed!Aww, he's such a sweety :)After all that soppiness, we continued on our walk...past these mushrooms.We were out of water by the time we reached this cafe...only to find it closed on Mondays!Luckily they have a tap so we could refill out bottles for the 7km walk back.Ullevalseter is the place we were just at. Norwegians cross country ski along this track in winter and stop at the cafe for a meal.If only there were more days like this in Norway! Actually it's been like this everyday we've been up here in the Gold Coast. And we appreciate it sooo much now!Our last glance into the Norwegian forest...we miss it!That night we celebrated with some sushi...altho we were feeling very exhausted from our long walk!We got this awesum Ipod video from Funcom as our leaving present. It was very handy to watch programs on during our flights.The day before we left we headed out to Oslo's Folk museum to check out all the old architecture of Norway's past.Here's a couple showing off some traditional norwegian dancing.And here's a rather stern looking lady from an old Vinmonopolet shop (alcohol shop).Trouble often brewed in the queues outside Wine Monopoly shops.I love the design of these old houses. They look like they belong in a game.Shank and Dan were very interested in the construction of the houses.Some young girls learning how to cook traditional breads.I went doorknocking to see if anyone knew the whereabouts of smurf village.Dan disappeared into one of the buildings...Then fell back out again.A family dressed up in traditional gear.Cool!A different mode of transport.An old Stave church.Me and an old Stave church.Lunch with Shank!Our last day. Our last glance at the view from our balcony. This view really helped our sanity during those long winter months.So long Oslo! We dragged our heavy bags to the station to catch the airport express train one last time.Funnily enough, Shank was leaving that day to go back to India for his vacation. So we had once last lunch together at the airport.Then it was time to say goodbye. We miss you Shank! I'm sure we'll be seeing you over here someday too :)And so starts our journey back home...