Viking Museum first or Vigeland Park

[uc828]

We are arriving Oslo on Monday, August 10, 2015 on Regal Princess from 10 am - 7 pm. We would like to visit the Bygdoy museums especially the Viking museum. Do you think we have time to go to Vigeland Park and how do we get there from Bygdoy? Will it be better if we were to go to Vigeland Park first by taking Tram 12 and then return to Pier 3 to go over to Bygdoy.

 

Any other attractions we should see? Should we bother to see City Hall and the Parliament with the free tour? Any suggestions and help are greatly appreciated.

 

Thank you!

[tetleytea]

You do have time to do them both. I think which one you do first is a matter of your priorities, but it's possible also that the lines to the ferries will be less backed up if you do the ferry after Vigeland. The metro out to Frogner will be standing-room-only, worst-case (so what, right?). Actually...you can get to Bygdoy without taking the ferry at all, especially if you're coming from Frogner. Bygdoy is a peninsula, not an island. The city buses stop MUCH more often than the ferries. My own experience with Oslo is as a tourist for 3 days (both as a cruise passenger and not), so you can take what I know at that.

[kaisatsu]

If you were arriving earlier in the morning, I would definitely recommend doing Vigelands Park first, since the sun would be behind you as you entered the park. However, if you're visiting in the summer, at 10 am the sun will already be quite high overhead (If there's sun at all! Hooray for Norwegian summer weather!).

 

As mentioned above, you definitely have time to do them both. The easiest way to get between them is by bus, and it's a relatively simple trip, though it does require one change:

 

• From Vigelands Park, take bus #20 (towards Skøyen) from the "Vigelandsparken" stop right in front of the main park gates.
  
• After a few stops (~3 min), get down at the "Olav Kyrres plass" stop.
  
• From there, catch the bus #30 (towards Bygdøy).
  
• After about 7 min, get down at the "Vikingskipene" stop right outside the Viking Ship museum.
  

 

(If you visit the viking ships first and want to go the other direction, take the #30 towards Nydalen, and change to the #20 towards Galgeberg at Olav Kyrres plass.)

[kaisatsu]

One more comment... You said "Viking museum" so I assume you meant the viking ships. Just so you know, the museum is completely dedicated to housing the excavated viking ships and their related archaeological finds. Although the artifacts do provide some general information, the focus is on the ships and not really an overview of viking culture.

 

They're still very interesting and well worth visiting; I just wanted to make sure you had the right expectations. :)

[tetleytea]

Of the Bygdoy museums, I actually liked Thor Heyerdahl's the best. The maritime I could have blown over, except it was right there. (Stockholm's maritime museum up by the Kronberg is the one to see).

[jellybungsters]

We are arriving Oslo on Monday, August 10, 2015 on Regal Princess from 10 am - 7 pm. We would like to visit the Bygdoy museums especially the Viking museum. Do you think we have time to go to Vigeland Park and how do we get there from Bygdoy? Will it be better if we were to go to Vigeland Park first by taking Tram 12 and then return to Pier 3 to go over to Bygdoy.

 

Any other attractions we should see? Should we bother to see City Hall and the Parliament with the free tour? Any suggestions and help are greatly appreciated.

 

Thank you!

 

You could also do Akershus fortress in addition to these attractions.

Check out my blog on how we did this:

http://emeraldprincessjuly6.blogspot.com/2013/07/day-2-oslo-norway.html