So, later on the same day that we went to the playground and saw the handpan player, my mom wanted to go to Frogner park to visit the Vigeland sculpture park. So we hopped on the tram for the first time and off we went.
Gustav Vigeland was apparently a pretty troubled guy but was a phenomenal sculptor, and this park is the largest sculpture park by a single artist in the world. All of the statues are naked (I believe) and to be honest it was a little bit unsettling. The grounds were pretty, though, and the sculptures were very... anatomically accurate. I'm just going to dump all the photos here and caption them (warning: there are quite a few!)
When you first enter the park, it is pretty tame. Lots of grass, trees flowers and a fountain or two. The next thing you encounter is a bridge lined with sculptures... of naked people. Many of the sculptures feature adults and babies together in various positions. Some are just adults and some are just children. It's along this bridge that one of the most famous statues is situated. There is a pic of it coming a little later.
There are several tiers of stairs and landings leading up toward this monolith of humans. I'll get to that in a minute.
At the top, just before the monolith (which you can see in the background) there is a ring of statues. Corky asked to pose for a photo with this one, for whatever reason.
Corky camouflaged in front of the monolith. I found the monolith VERY creepy. It's just a huge pile of people.. men, women, children... all of whom appear to be dead! I didn't really like it, although I was awed by the size of it and the amount of work that must've gone into it.
The view looking back toward the bridge from the top where the monolith is.
Mara loved all the open space and ran and jumped to her heart's content! Soon after this
photo was taken, she tripped and fell into a puddle. She was fine, just wet! Lol.
Once you go past the monolith plateau area, there are stairs leading downward and then you come to this. A large set of stairs leading back up to... whatever that statue is at the top. It's a circle of people. Mara insisted on walking up the stairs by herself and I took this photo.
The view from the top looking back at the monolith.
That's Corky walking down with the stroller on the right and Mara and me going down the stairs hand in hand in the center. We counted the stairs - there were 41!
My dad and I took a selfie in front of the monolith.
This is the famous statue on the bridge. It's a little boy having a tantrum. My mom thought we needed a pic in front of it for two reasons. First, because Mara can tend to resemble that baby sometimes when she's having a tantrum and secondly because the baby is a boy and we are having a boy. I was less than pleased when I saw the picture because his genitals are right above my head! Anyway, at the gift shop, Mara chose a bib for baby brother with a photo of this statue on it. She chose a pink one for him and I didn't have the heart to say no because I thought it was just so sweet that she thought of her baby brother! So now he has a pink bib. Lol! Whatever.
After we left the sculpture park, we walked further into the Frogner area in search of dinner. My sister was craving Italian and the lady at the gift shop had told us there was an Italian restaurant about a 5 minute walk up the street from the park. We never did find it though and it started pouring so we ended up at an Indian restaurant. Mara devoured a plateful of rice and naan bread and then Corky took her back to the hotel to get ready for bed as she was starting to crash. The rest of us took our time and headed back a little later.
Now, I have no idea what day this happened. It might have been the next day... I just can't remember. But anyway, my parents offered to take Mara for the evening so Corky and I could go on a dinner date. It was chilly and windy so I layered my own jacket underneath one of Corky's hoodies to go out. I run cold anyway and in pregnancy it's no different. However, before we went, I had to take a belly pic.
22 weeks!
Layering up to brave the Oslo wind.
We went to Lektern, a restaurant situated ON a ship at the pier. I got a salad with quinoa, tomato, avocado, chicken, corn and lettuce. It was the best food I'd had since arriving in Norway!
My handsome dinner date.
The view from our table.
This is actually the same boat I took a photo of the day we went
to Bygdøy, I think, just from a different angle.
After dinner we got ice cream. I don't know if this is an all-of-Europe
thing or just Norway but they put cocoa powder on ice cream! I didn't
know what it was and called it "chocolate dust" until the guy corrected
me, LOL! Banana ice cream with chocolate dust. Mmm!
All right... one last post should cover the rest of Oslo easily. Dang I have so many pictures!! Hang tight for Volume 4 (hopefully the last one for Norway!) coming soon... maybe tomorrow. Haha. Xo.
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