We are just sailing away from Oslo after a great day of sight seeing. Mark noted that Oslo is our first "return city" together; it was our first port of call on our Honeymoon cruise and it's our last port on this one. Therefore we did the city on our own this time and went to different places.

Today we both became fans of two famous Norwegian artists: sculptor Gustav Vigeland and painter Edvard Munch. Vigeland spent his life in Oslo creating hundreds of statues for the public park. The statues depict humans in different relationships and life stages. We had a lot of fun taking pictures and choosing our favorites.

Later we went to the National Gallery which is not very large, but has a great collection of art from ancient sculpture to the early 20th century. We took a lot of pictures of pieces we liked, but pictures are forbidden in the Edvard Munch gallery so officially you won't see any of those here in the blog. (The surreptitious photographer strikes again. Hey, if he isn't intimidated by the Vatican guards in the Sistine Chapel...). We sat for quite a while in that gallery and found several paintings that we liked as much or more than Munch's masterpiece "The Scream" (which, btw, has definitely surpassed that stupid Pearl Earring girl on the list of great paintings, IMHO!). Munch's "Madonna" is really interesting, especially placed next to his "The Day After" as they have done in this gallery.

Those were the highlights, but we started the day with a walk to the new opera house which is designed to look like an iceberg and allows visitors to stroll all over the sloping roof (which we did). We bought an Oslo Pass (which allowed us to ride the trams, buses and access to all the museums), successfully navigated the public transportation system, visited the cathedral (open this year, unlike 2008 when we found it wrapped in renovation plastic), went through the Norwegian Resistance Museum, and watched people in the park while we picnic lunched. The weather was beautiful with blue skies and a high of 73, so the pictures are pretty good today. Check them out!

Tonight is our final formal night dinner and then another lazy sea day before we head home. You may have noticed that we've had a little trouble posting the last few days because of a shaky Internet connection, but we still appreciate hearing from folks back home!