(photo from web)
The perks of my job.
One of the best perks of my job is the freedom to travel when I want / need to. I was on a business trip with Mike this week. He is speaker at the NDC or (Norwegian Developers Conference) in Oslo, Norway and he wanted me to come along for the ride. Yay me!
We left Dallas bright and early Monday for a day of travel, with the time change we landed in Norway at 10:30 Tuesday morning. The first order of business was getting out of the airport... easier said than done. Immigration was a breeze - reading or trying to read the signs to find the exit was another problem. Then came the train station..... one nerd and one blonde.... you get the picture.
(photo found on web)
We finally made it on the train and to our destination then getting out of the train station was as bad as getting out of the airport. It might have seemed that bad because I was the only and I mean only person that did not sleep on the plane and by this point I was a grouch. The other problem was the map that I made was packed in our suite case and I did not want to open it in the middle of a train station. Major blonde moment while packing on my part I will admit.
Our hotel is the brown building in the middle of the photo.
Clarion Hotel Royal Christiania
Biskop Gunnerus Gate 3
0155 Oslo
Since I was beyond done with travel and way over tired I stayed in the room to rest and recoup since Mike had a business meeting. He went out and found me some food and I had dinner in bed. Then sleep.. then I explored the room.
We almost started a fire because I read a tip about taking a power strip and one plug converter. Plug the converter into the wall then your power strip. Well the concept is genius unless you forget about the different electric current. We need a voltage converter too for this to work. One power strip is toast and smoking, the hotel had to change a fuze since we blew all the lights in the room (twice) - hey the desk clerk tried it the second time just to see.
Then Mike went downstairs and purchased a USB charger for Europe. Now we can use the adaptor we bought for the laptop's because they have dual voltage (that box that is attached to the power cord) and we can plug in the phones and tablets into the USB charger because it is made for small electronics. Lesson learned and I will be marking the adaptor as a Europe cell phone only plug so we do not fry a laptop on accident. Thank goodness for the understanding desk clerk and many thanks to her for not laughing her butt off at us.
Things not found in the room:
a clock of any kind
a dresser for clothes
space (room is tiny)
a wash cloth
bar soap
no plugs in the bathroom
no shower curtain (half glass wall)
Things that are different than US in the room:
Liquid soap for whole body
2 towels only
electric plugs
light switches (key card)
TV only shows hotel ads
King size bed with 2 twin blankets
take 2 people to figure out how to turn the shower on
Things I love about the room:
wood floors
oversized bed pillows
Mike can not steal the blanket (he has his own)
simple beautiful style of room
beautiful bathroom once you figure it out
Those twin mounds on the bed are the blankets.
I took a warmish shower because I could not figure out how to get hot water then Mike came in and figured it out and thank goodness I packed a bar of soap from home but I forgot the wash cloth. It will work out.
(early morning thoughts)
There are exactly two plugs in this room. Two! There is one at the desk and one by the bed. The great part is they are at the right height so no crawling around under furniture to plug something in. Bad part - I really want to make some coffee but since it is 2 in the morning and no plug in the bathroom I would have to plug the coffee pot into the desk wall plug and I do not want to wake Mike up. Normally I would make coffee in the bathroom. I also do not want to turn the lights on in the room to figure out the coffee pot. You put your key card in a slot on the wall and ALL the lights turn on together. I can not just turn a lamp on. I have the bathroom light on just to be able to walk around. The sun will be up in an hour, maybe I will just wait and open the curtains a bit.
I really want coffee.....
Mike finally woke up at 4:00 am and I was able to make.... hot water!
By the time Mike was moving around I could care less about the coffee because I was starving! I am so thankful that I packed instant oatmeal.
See this little water kettle... It heats up water super fast so I used it to make the oatmeal for a very early morning snack. There is no coffee maker, only this kettle and instant coffee in the room. Oatmeal was the better choice.
Stayed tuned to the next blog post to see how my first day of exploring went.
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