By: Samie

Travel Date: June 2nd, 2023

Total Honeymoon Travel Days: 5

Day 2

(Lillehammer)

Our first full day in Norway was a fairly regular wake up time for us, but it was a much-needed reprieve from the previous day’s early awakening. We started getting up and ready at around 6:30 so that we had enough time to find our way back to the train station for our 8:02 departure time to Lillehammer.

It was a very calm and beautiful morning for a walk back toward the train station we had very stressfully arrived through just 15 hours before. The streets were surprisingly quiet and empty for what we would have expected for a Friday morning. We were able to leisurely make our way to Oslo Central Station. With the sun shining on our faces, we snagged a couple of obligatory selfies to capture our morning excitement and city landscape. Little did we know how different our environment would be within the same country just a few short hours later.

Despite our extensive research the night before, we wanted to make sure we arrived at the train station early so that we had plenty of time to find the correct train, line, and platform we needed to be at. Because we were taking a local line, we booked through a different company than the kiosk tickets we had just grabbed to get from the airport into Oslo city. We used the public transit company Vygruppen (Vy), which is used to find and book departures for journeys by train, bus, metro, tram, and boat across Norway. From everything we read, it seemed like a reliable and trustworthy company to book through, so we just needed to make sure we knew where to go. Fortunately, because train is a very common mode of transportation in Norway, they have it really figured out. It was very easy to find our train on the departure board, it was clearly marked how to get there, and it was easy to board. Departure times are also incredibly timely!

It was just over a 2 hour train ride from Oslo to Lillehammer. We got to enjoy the first look into views of the Norwegian countryside while also slipping in and out of light naps and soaking up the morning sunshine streaming in through the large train windows.

When we first arrived in Lillehammer and exited the train station into the streets of the city, we weren’t quite sure where to go to get to the first of the many museums Lillehammer is known for. We made our way up a slight hill and came across the Lillehammer Art Museum. We decided to check it out, however, we weren’t quite sure where the entrance to the Art Museum was, so we ended up walking all the way around the building before deciphering where to enter. Upon admission, we had to put our backpacks in storage lockers before being allowed to enter the exhibits.

There were multiple levels that would take us to different areas and exhibits of artwork in the museum. The artwork on display in the first area we explored was not our favorite or particularly interesting or engaging for us. Although we have many creative interests, being art enthusiasts isn’t one of them. If you have an interest in paintings and art, you would probably find a great appreciation for this exhibit then we did. It was all still very pleasant to look at as we made our quick loop though!

We moved into a darker gallery next where the walls were all black and the lights were very dim with brighter lights illuminating different art pieces and more three-dimensional pieces, costumes, and sculptures. Unfortunately, shortly after making our way in, I started feeling extremely nauseous out of nowhere, so we had to sit down for a minute on one of the benches in there. There was also what looked like a school group walking around in this area of the gallery at the same time we were, so sitting down let them get ahead of us a little. Once I regained my composure, we continued our way through the gallery, and it was a little more interactive and piqued our interest a little more but still wasn’t quite our cup of tea.

The last and final exhibit we walked through had a bunch of different rooms to walk through with artwork from various artists. Each room had a different theme with different wall colors, furniture, and decorations. I personally liked this gallery the best out of the three. We did spend a little more time and explored the artwork and pieces a little more throughout this gallery. Overall, we probably spent less than an hour in the museum before grabbing our backpacks and making our way out and further into Lillehammer toward the main attractions we had traveled here to see.

A quick walk brought us to the town centre where the streets quickly went from being quiet and empty to bustling and busy. Shops lined the main street through town with many stunning buildings, eateries, and establishments settled quaintly in this mountain-surrounded area with the Lågen river running through it.

So of course our first stop was to get some food at the Lillehammer Bakeri! We were lucky enough to hit it at the perfect time before the crowds flocked in. Everything in the cases looked absolutely delectable. We decided to make sure to get some nutrition from one substantial food item but also treat ourselves to one sweet baked good. We settled on a delicious looking BLT sandwich, pistasjbolle (pistachio bun), and another Solo to wash it down. It was absolutely amazing and not hard to see why people were lining up into the street to get a taste of these baked goods.

After enjoying our meal, we started to make the extensive walk further up the mountain toward Lillehammer’s open air museum. Many others tours were taking buses or car rides up to the museum entrance, and we definitely found out why. Not only was it a healthy distance of about .6 miles, but it was also a steep climb of about 200 feet. Despite it being a pretty brisk morning, we had worked up quite a sweat by the time we reached our destination.

The Lillehammer Museum Foundation offers a 25% discount if you purchase tickets to two or more of the museums, so we went ahead and purchased tickets to all three museums. However, the Norwegian Olympic Museum was unfortunately closed when we visited. It was a bummer, but we still greatly enjoyed the rest of our time, so I can’t even imagine how much more time we would have spent here if we had been able to enter the Olympic Museum (the 1994 Olympics were held in Lillehammer in case you didn’t know!). We do hope to return some day and get a chance to see this historic museum.

Instead, our first stop ended up being through an exhibition called “We Won the Land.” We didn’t really know what to expect when we took our first steps through the door, but we were immediately drawn in and immersed by the sound of melting and dripping water as we walked through a realistic replica of an icy blue glacier. Each step within the exhibition took you further into Norway’s history. Everything around us was transformed into what the people, land, buildings, and even roads looked like during that era of Norway’s history.

After we stepped out of the glacier representing the Ice Age, we made our way through Norway’s Stone Age. Then we were carried into the late Middle Ages, which was a dark time for Norway after the Black Death made its way across the country. Next, we made our way through the Viking Age. Continuing on, we entered the time of World War II. Finally, the end of the exhibition brought us in modern times with paintings, music, and poems by Norwegian artists. We were so intensely immersed in this experience that we didn’t even take a single photo. It genuinely felt like we were living through each time, and we thought this was going to be the museum exhibit to beat!

The Maihaugen open-air museum would quickly rise to the occasion! We first made our way around the more modern part of the area. We got to see the old post office and mail train as well as many other original town buildings, including an apothecary.

As we made our way higher up the mountain and into the older section of the open-air museum, we were even more astounded by the traditional Norwegian architecture. One of the most stunning and recognizable structures is the Garmo Stave Church. It is located right at the top of the hill near the entrance to the Open Air Museum. It was built in the 1200’s in Garmo in Lom but was dismounted in 1880 and reconstructed with the same materials at Maihaugen in 1921. The church is even still used for services during the summer months and the occasional wedding ceremony! Something especially cool for us being from South Dakota, there is a stave church in Rapid City, South Dakota built to resemble the stave churches of Norway!

Despite how stunning the church was, the rest of the museum was just as breath-taking. Many of the roofs are lined with birch bark and covered in sod which makes a beautiful and natural layer of grass covering them. This was used for leak-proofing and insulation, but now it just makes for stunning green roofs! Several of the building doors were open, and we were able to peek our heads in and take a look at the wood cabins and furniture. Everything was just so lush and green. It was hard to capture it’s magnificence in pictures, but it was not difficult to get lost in the beauty, and time just flew by.

We could have easily spent an entire day just wandering the grounds of Maihaugen, but our returning train to Oslo was at 3:03, and we still wanted to see a little bit more of the Lillehammer town centre and do some local shopping, so it was time to say goodbye to the best museum we have probably ever been to and make the 200 foot descent back down the mountain. We wandered in and out of some of the shops, but nothing quite struck our fancy. It was still fun to explore and be treated like locals. Every time we entered a shop, we were greeted with a friendly “hei hei” and even spoken to in Norwegian. We were flattered that the shop owners assumed we were one of their own, and our year’s worth of learning Norwegian leading up to our trip paid off!

To end our day, we made it back to the Lillehammer Train Station to board our train and arrive back in Oslo around 5:00pm. We finished our evening with our second pick for Oslo food choices near our Airbnb. We went with a solid go-to of pizza from Digg Pizza. We went with a classic Margarita pizza with a Solo for me and beer for Luke. We enjoyed our meal so much, though, that we would end up circling back to Digg later during our stay in Oslo!

Lastly, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention one of my personal favorite parts of the Open Air Museum, the animals! With it being an outdoor museum, we came across several animals, some farm-raised and some more wild. Being me, I had to stop and say hello to each and every one. I got to make friends with some chickens, ducks, and sheep!

We had an absolutely stellar day in Lillehammer, so it is hard to imagine our time in Norway getting any better than this, but the main attraction we booked in Norway was coming up the next day, and you’ll want to stay tuned because the Norway in a Nutshell excursion is popular for a very good reason. Whenever we are asked about our favorite part of our trip, it definitely makes the top of the list. I look forward to sharing it with you next time!