After returning from Drobak, we headed back to the hotel for a quick snooze and freshen up. We didn't make it out the night before as the long day meant we were knackered and both fell sleep. We were determined to see what Oslo's nightlife had to offer, so we walked into the city. we were hoping to find a bar to watch the Six Nations rugby, but it soon became apparent that rugby doesn't feature highly in the Norwegian national psychy. Every other sport was being shown including Dutch football and rather bizarrely Swedish Premier League ice Hockey, which the locals seemed quite passionate about. We went in Harry's Sports Bar where one guy was almost in tears when he beloved Malmo lost.
Having a beer in Oslo is a dangerous activity.
Cafe Con Bar
Dangerous for your wallet that is. I can quite categorically say the 'Ringnes' (local lager, actually quite nice) we had in Harry's Bar was the most expensive pint I've ever had. Two pints cost us 172 NOK, which equates to about £19, or £9.50 a pint. Luckily the bar staff also offer a financial advice service to get you a loan to enable you to purchase a drink (they don't really, but it would be quite helpful for us non-Scandanavians!). After recovering fromthe mild heart attack caused by the bill, we supped our beers.
It didn't get much cheaper anywhere else - only the more alternative bars on Frogevein (I think that's how it's spelt!) were seriously cheaper at about 55 NOK a pint, but thats still about £6.
Al's bad dancing!
50. And people say London's expensive. Try getting drunk in Oslo for less than £50! Still, the bars were all fairly laidback, a slow paced evening culture seems to be the norm, with lots of sitting and chatting - perhaps that's due to the price of the beer! Music is what I would describe as 'eccletic' - a bit of a random mix generally. Gloria Flames bar was a case in point - made all the more amusing by the ridiculous beard of the DJ and shocking dancing of the girls on this particular night! We stayed only one drink in each bar as we tried to find somewhere with a bit of life - eventually we found Cafe Con Bar (we weren't sure if they were referring to their drinks tariff), not far from the main Central Station. This was open til 3.30 and people were a bit more energetic and the small dancefloor was busy the whole night. I managed to get chatted up by a pretty local girl (who was pretty inebriated, I must admit), but rather embarrassingly, she wandered off with some Norwegian guy only seconds after we made it onto the dancefloor - she clearly wasn't impressed with my famous 'lawnmower' dance!
The night ended with us getting surely the world's most expensive taxi back to the hotel, £20 for all of about 2 miles. Cheers for that.
