All present and correct, we drove to Newcastle and walked to the terminal. Thankfully, the random number I'd scrawled down on a piece of paper was accepted at the check in and the 3 of us (myself and the 2 Matts I live with) had our boarding passes. After duty-free shopping and food we were eventually called through to the departure gate. We got there to find one important thing missing: the plane. Ryanair it emerges runs a very quick turn around. The plane landed 5 minutes before our scheduled departure. We boarded very quickly and after 10 mins of fuel and baggage loading we were off.
Thankfully rumours of constant PA announcements trying to sell us stuff proved false and we enjoyed a hassle-free trip to Torp Airport. After landing we were the last to leave baggage reclaim. Of course this meant we were taken to one side for a customs check. We exchanged anxious glances, fearing the sound of a latex glove snapping...It never came and after Matt explaining why he had so much food in his bag (his were the only ones checked) we continued outside to the Torp-Express bus. The main thing I noticed (apart from the fields of thick, virgin snow - my first sight of snow in absolutely aaaaaages), was that nobody seemed to close their curtains so we could see into all the houses we drove past. Even though it was dark, the views were great, especially when we had our first glimpse of a town, Drammen, situated on the side of a hill. The drive to Oslo took 100 minutes and after arriving we were left, a little bewildered, in Oslo Bus Station at around midnight. We wandered through to the station were we got direction to the hotel. It was at this point we realised how glad we were that most of the population is fluent in English. The subzero degree temperature was initially a bit of a shock but we soon got used to it. A short 10 minute walk to the hotel was followed by us climbing up to our 4th floor room. This was the cheapest hotel we could find, but it was really quite nice - especially the underfloor heating in the bathroom which we will miss back in house 3.
At about half past midnight we decided to head out. It didn't feel that cold and we managed without scarves and hats. We wandered down to the next road which turned out to be the main street in the city. We eventually found a bar to go into. We were stopped on the door by the bouncer, but unlike England it was merely to shake our hands and find out our names and not telling us we had the wrong "kind" of shoes. The only bad aspect of the trip was about to hit us - our 0.33l of beer (2/3 of a pint) cost us NOK42 - about £3.75). VAT in Norway runs at 25% and the government imposes extra taxes on alcohol to curb alcoholism. We sat around until at 1.50am two guys got up and started an acoustics set on the stage. Like much of Europe the bars are open very late, but there was absolutely no sign of trouble or even people staggering around. Oslo 1 UK 0. Eventually Blondie's "gaydar" started picking up strange vibes from the many pairs of blokes in the pub so we retired to the hotel. We had a lot of climbing to do the next day...
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