Scandinavian cruise

May 1st is labor day in Switzerland as well as some other countries. As May 1st fell on a Tuesday, we used the opportunity to string together a long weekend and took a five day Scandinavian cruise. The cruise left from Amsterdam, Holland on Friday, arrived into Copenhagen, Denmark on Sunday, and ended in Oslo, Norway on Tuesday morning. We took an overnight train to Amsterdam on Thursday night and arrived bright and early on Friday morning. The cruise was not scheduled to leave until 5PM so we had the whole day to explore. We wanted to see one of the famous tulip fields; however, the fastest trip would have taken 4 ½ hours so we decided to make better use of our time exploring the city. We started the day with a canal cruise. Amsterdam is actually much like Venice with its system of canals. There are approximately 2000 house boats all along the canals, which thanks to a government program a few years ago, all have gas and electricity running to them. The number of house boats is now fixed, so if someone wants to “park” his boat on the canal, they have to wait for someone else to leave. Another unique thing about Amsterdam is the construction of the houses. They are very narrow and steep, which made it difficult to get furniture and things to the upper floors. For that reason, all houses have a beam sticking out of the gable with a large hook on it. Pulley systems were attached (and are still used today) to move large items in and out of the house through the upstairs window. The gables of the houses are also very interesting, with some of the more popular styles being the clock, neck, step gables. After finishing the canal tour, we took a walking tour of the city, and saw among other things: The Westerkerk, which is the church where the famous painter Rembrandt is buried, the Anne Frank house, and the Royal Palace. We cut our walking tour short and raced back to ship to start our cruise. On our way, we took a wrong turn and ended up walking through the red light district. Its actually a charming part of town, but as we walked, we realized that the girls standing in the windows were not mannequins and we high tailed it out of there and got to the ship.

We sailed on Royal Caribbean’s Jewel of the Seas and it was the biggest ship in the world at the time it was built 20 years ago. It can hold about 2,500 passengers and another 1,500 crew. In general, we had an incredible time. JP was old enough to join the Aquanots playgroup and did so when he was not enjoying family time in the indoor pool or playing in the arcade. For Sydney, there was a separate playgroup requiring parental involvement, so we participated in this playgroup with Sydney while JP was next door in his playgroup. We did casual dining for breakfast and lunch, but ate in the formal dining room for dinner. We had a three course meal every night, but since the kids eat like birds, Sandy and I ended up eating almost 2 three course meals every night – we must have gained about 10 lbs each! At night, we put the kids to sleep, and went to the nightly show or the movies, and finished off the night in the casino – we were ahead at the start of the cruise, but lost it all by the end.

Our first port of call was Copenhagen, most well known for the famous writer, Hans Christian Andersen, for whom the Little Mermaid statue in the harbor pays tribute. It was a cold day, so we took a bus tour of the city. In addition to the Little Mermaid statue, we saw “The Thinker” statue by Rodan, the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek art museum, National Museum, Christiansborg Palace, and Amalienborg Palace (winter residence of the Royal Family) where we observed the changing of the guard. Copenhagen is also home to the Tivoli Gardens, a beautiful landscaped amusement park filled with restaurants, rides, and games. The spent the better part of the afternoon in the Garden’s playground before returning back to the ship for dinner and another late night.

The final stop was Oslo, Norway, probably the most expensive city we encountered in our travels (even more expensive than Zurich). After having breakfast, we departed the ship and made it to the train station where we put our luggage in a locker before starting our tour of the city. We started with a short walking tour of the city and passed the Oslo Cathedral, Parliament building, and City Hall, which is beautifully frescoed on the inside. We made it back to the port area, not far from where our ship pulled in, and took a ferry to Bygdoy, a peninsula where some of city’s more popular museums are located. We toured a Viking ship museum which displayed the remains of three Viking ships found in burial mounds by the Oslo fjord. The ships were buried more than 1100 years ago to carry their royal owners to “the other side”. Close to the Viking ship museum was the Norwegian museum of natural history, which is an open air museum displaying 155 traditional houses from all over Norway, including Gol Stave Church from 1200 AD. We spent some time at the museum’s playground, before catching the ferry back to the city center. On the way, we could see the Holmenkollen ski jump tower (Norway’s most visited tourist attraction), built especially for the 1952 Olympics. We concluded our tour with a stop at the Royal Palace, did some souvenir shopping, and caught a train to the airport where our hotel was located. The next morning, we hopped on an early flight back to Zurich so that I did not miss another day of work.

We probably got 5-6 hours of sleep per night, so with all the activity, light sleep, and heavy eating, we were ready