My French Connections: 36 hours in Norway

I receive a text message from Catherine saying flights to Oslo, Norway, are fifty euros round trip. "I'm booking right now so tell me immediately," the next message says .

"I'm in."

Fast forward a month and we're on our way to the Paris Beauvais airport 4 and a half hours before our flight leaves. We knew it took a while to get that airport (55 miles from Paris) so we wanted extra time. Just before the RER (commuter rail) stop where we get off for school, Catherine realizes she forgot her phone charger. We turn back and are on our way again 20 minutes later.

We're doing fine on time; we just don't have time to stop at Chipotle on the way. Two stops before we have to switch trains, the train slows as stops for a few minutes on the tracks. This happens all the time on the rail, but we're running low on time now. Our bus to the airport leaves in 20 minutes. At the transfer station we sprint from the RER to the metro, our over stuffed backpacks swinging from side to side on our backs. There's a train there waiting for us. We jump on it before even thinking about how good that timing was. Three stops later, where we need to hop on the bus; we sprint through the station to the airport buses, our bus leaves in five minutes.

We reach the bus station, panting. We made it in time, but our bus in full. Our only chance is the next bus, which leaves 15-20 minutes later. We should still make it in time. Well, that's what we thought.

The bus sits in traffic for an hour, doubling the ride to the airport. We finally make it to the airport 45 minutes before our flight leaves. We have to get our visas checked at the Ryanair desk and that desk closes in 5 minutes. We make it the desk, but they're not letting us check in. They tell us our flight is in the other terminal. Our boarding passes don't even say anything about a gate or terminal.

The other terminal is about a quarter mile away. We take off running as fast as we possibly can in our bulky shoes, large jackets, and backpacks; shin splints flaring up. We make it to the desk 2 minutes before it closes, but there's a line. "Excusez-moi, notre vol part en trente minutes. Pouvons-nous aller avant vous?" We manage to skip to the front of the line and get our visas checked. Flight leaves in 30 minutes, boarding begins now.

There's no line at security. Somehow, I manage to set off the metal detector, which warrants a full pat down. We're panicking about making our flight now. Getting out of security we see our gate is right there and the line is moving at a snail's pace. We are ravenous, it's 7:35 pm and we haven't eaten since noon. By the grace of some benevolent higher power, we have time to get a sandwich before getting on our flight.

Two hours later, we land in Oslo...well, Moss, a suburb of Oslo. At 10 pm, it looks like a nice dusk outside, still plenty of light to see. We reach our airbnb at midnight, barely able to keep our eyes open.

The next morning our minds are blown. Oslo is the most beautiful place we have ever seen. We wander the city, exploring fortresses, museums, restaurants, and palaces. Everyone speaks English. Everyone is nice and happy to help us. Everything is expensive. For lunch I get a glass of house prosecco and a bowl of pumpkin soup, which costs 188 Norwegian Krone. That was about $26 or about 22 euros. One tram ticket was 50NOK, or nearly 5 euros.

We decide to cook dinner ourselves back at the airbnb. Figuring out prices and goods in a grocery store in a truly foreign language is no easy task. Our dinner was some adulteration of fusilli carbonara; it was cheap and easy to cook with pasta, cream, onion, bacon, salt, and pepper.

After dinner, we decide to go out, despite our alarm being set for 8 am to make it to our 9:50 airport shuttle in time. We go to trendy little wine bar around the corner from the apartment where we're staying. The entire 12 page wine list is in Norwegian. I manage to pick something out that we're both happy with. This gives me hope for the wine tasting course I'm taking next year. We then try to go to a club we read about on Yelp. However, it was a 150NOK cover, nearly 18 euros. We turned around and go to another bar with free entry and bumping top 40 dance remixes. Everything there is still pretty darn expensive. Sitting at a table a few guys come up and ask if they can sit with us. At least they said it again in English after I said I didn't speak Norwegian. They were very nice. Students our age. One of them, William, was doing an exchange semester at the University of Virginia in the fall. After talking to them for a bit they leave to dance and meet some girls. Another group of older Norwegians, older than the students but still seemingly in their late 20s or early 30s, sit down at our table and start talking to us. They're a teacher, a software designer, and a financier. Before they leave they tell us about supposedly the best view in Oslo. "It's about 300NOK each way, not bad at all." Right. That's about 36 euros each way. We go to McDonald's for a 3 am snack instead.

Our heads hit the pillow around 4 am and the alarm goes off 4 hours later. We're too exhausted to even open our eyes, but we drag ourselves out of bed and to the bus terminal. 9 hours later we're back in Cergy, unable to believe that we just spent an unforgettable 36 hours in Oslo.