Spring mood: Oslo at sunset and night (14.04.)

Today, the weather was cloudy, greyish and a bit drizzly. Considering the smell of the air when I came home in the evening, it probably rained at some point during the day. Not that I cared much as I spent the day at school, mostly in the library. (Speaking of, they will change the access code to the super exclusive master area tomorrow - still need to check the new code online.)

However, on Saturday and Sunday, we got the first real spring weekend. Since I was planning on being out all day on Sunday (once again, there's gonna be a separate blog post about that), I kind of felt I should (try to) be productive on Saturday. Which was a bit sad because the sky was blue - and you could actually leave the house without a jacket without immediately freezing to death. It was basically a Norwegian summer's day, I guess. :P

Anyway, I decided to at least make use of such a nice day in the evening and once again went to Operahuset. Nope, no modern ballet performance this time. I went there to see the sunset from the opera rooftop another time. The last time I went up there, the rooftop was icy and walking on there was a bit of an adventure - remember my slippery path to sunset in early February? It's actually been more than two months already, I just realised. Time flies!

Also, I feel like I should mention the difference in the time of day! When I went to see the sunset in February, it was around 16:30. Now, it was around 20:30!

This time, the rooftop of Operahuset as well as the area around the building were ice-free. And there were so many people walking around or sitting, relaxing, talking, enjoying the view! It seriously felt as if the whole city had just come out of hibernation to enjoy the spring. :)

I had some time before meeting my friends to walk around in a spring night (just strolling around at night would have been unimaginable in January, February and basically also the whole of March - way too cold!). Therefore, I took a lot of photos again and will not refrain from spamming a bit at this point:

Hi swans! ;)

Ice-free rooftop & a lot of people

More people!

People everywhere!

And you know what? For once, all the people in my photos don't bother me. I actually really liked the fact that there were so many people, more than I'd ever seen in the city centre (I'm not talking about crowded T-banes on the way to the skiing and sledging places :P). Oslo suddenly felt so alive. :)

Afterwards, I met up with two friends and we wandered from the central station through the centre (people everywhere!) to Aker brygge and a bit further along the water to Tjuvholmen:

I had actually never continued walking past Aker brygge - I only went there to take the ferry twice. But it's really nice there, so I guess I'll come back during the daytime at some point...

That's Rådhuset, the city hall, in the background.

That's probably Akershus festning, the fortress, in the background?