Santa's Claus home

Small town Drøbak, located about 40 km from the capital Oslo. The little town is adored because of several attractions. The most important thing (for me) is that this city is referred to as the home of Santa Claus, whose presence you can feel at every corner, and every year there are tens of thousands of letters with children’s wishes. You can visit Sant’s house all the year round, and if you are lucky, you may even meet Santa himself.

Another important thing that people are driving here are the sunsets. It is said that there are the most beautiful sunsets, behind which the Norwegian artists were also going. I can imagine how I sit in the harbor with a glass of good wine and look out into the sea at the sunset.

Oscarborg fortress – a fortress that is only a few kilometers far from Drøbak and spreads on over two small islands. This attraction is famous primarily for the WWII story of “Blücher”. Oscarborg is a fortress that protected Oslo before the arrival of the Nazi Germans. On the island there are cannons that served mostly for a tourist purpose, however, during the invasion of Norway, stopped these cannons by the Nazis and allowed Oslo time (king and government) to evacuate. Funny for the whole situation is that these cannons were originally made in German, so the Germans knew their own weapon. On the islands you can take a beautiful trip and explore the local museum where many exhibitions are held.

So now back to our trip. Drøbak, as mentioned above, is located only a short distance from Oslo and meets all the parameters of a day trip to see some culture.

In summer, you can use a standard ferry from the Aker Brygge station, which goes to this town for a regular ticket. Unfortunately for us, now in the winter ship is not going, only Jule Cruise, when you go a total luxury boat. Unfortunately, one trip cost 590 NOK (about 1500 CZK / person). We decided to travel by bus, which costed us 70 NOK (CZK 200).

Traveling by bus is fine if you do not have a small kid with you. Let’s not overtake, the way there, Matěj nearly slept in the cross. As an experienced parent, we went to Eventyr Fabrikken, a children’s entertainment park full of all sorts of climbers. There we know that Matěj is exhausted and tired and then sleeps for two hours.

Upon arrival to Drøbak, rain was waiting for us. It was only drizzle for a while, and for a moment it was a heavy rain. The bus drove us to Storgata the main street, and from there we went straight to the harbour, which was already visible from our point. During the rain we watched the dismounted sea, which was fascinating despite the rain.

Right next to us, we discovered an aquarium. We decided to visit it. First reason was to hide from the rain, and second that Matěj likes water and we decided that he might enjoy it.

The aquarium was a bit of a Back to the Past. No one was anywhere, so we could enjoy this old-fashioned place alone. Matěj was left there alone, because there was no danger of anyone being able to interfere. It has to be said that we have seen a lot of aquariums and we thought that nothing could surprise us, but this small aquarium also surprised us.

When we left the aquarium, it was just a little fussy outside. We took a walk around the harbor. The sea splashed over the ships and slowly began to dim.

From the harbor, we returned back to Storgata and walked through the city’s streets. The city was beautifully decorated with Christmas, and it was not even possible for the weather to fall into the christmas atmosphere. We scattered over small houses until we finally got into the local (recommended) café where they say they have a great pizza.

The Håndverksbakeriet Café was such an unconventional café. When we arrived, there were quite a lot of people there, but all of them left during our harvest, so we finally stayed alone. We ordered coffee, cinnamon snail for Matěj and two pizzas. We got coffee and snail right now, but we was still waiting for the pizzas. So I was politely asking if they had not forgotten us. At that moment the boy said very unfortunate Aah, and pulled out burnt pizzas.

With apology, he brought us some other pizzas two minutes later, and gave us a full bag of sweet pastry as a present, which we really enjoyed at home. Back to the pizza. It was great!

S omluvou nám asi o dvě minuty později přinesl jiné pizzy a jako dárek nám dal celý sáček plný sladkého pečiva (na kterém jsme si doma pak hrozně pochutnali). Zpátky k pizze. Byla skvělá!

Když jsme odešli z kavárny, opět jsme si prošourali město. Už byla uplná tma a všude svítila světýlka nazdobeného města.

Cesta zpátky už ovšem nebyla tak ideální. V průběhu jsme zjistili, že Matějovi vadí cesta autobusem. Asi po 20 minutách nám začal zvracet a já i Petr jsme měli co dělat, abychom se udrželi a nezačali zvracet také. Zbytek cesty jsme museli vydržet v hrozném smradu a s kňourajícím Matějem, kterému bylo hrozně špatně.

Sice to byl pouze jednodenní výlet, ale domů jsme přišli tak utahaný, že jsme si jen na chvíli pustili seriál a šli spát. Matěj usnul asi v 18:50.

Do Drøbaku pojedeme určitě ještě jednou na jaře/v létě až bude jezdit loď a nebo až si pujčíme auto. Protože ani jednu z těch vyhlášených atrakcí, které v Drøbaku jsou, jsme nestihli :D¨