Weekend Update: Norway!

I hope everyone had a great Super Bowl weekend stateside. Mine was a little different than years past as I was running around Norway with some friends of mine from London.

Dan and I flew into Oslo Friday night. Chris and Ana had beaten us there by a few hours. Nothing exciting Friday night as Saturday was going to be a long day. On Saturday morning, we hopped on the metro rail to Voksenkollen. This is what is amazing about Oslo. We were on a commuter train for 20 minutes and were walking distance to a ski resort. Many of the locals we talked to said they go there multiple times each week. Pretty cool lifestyle. A map is worth a thousand words:


View Larger Map

I'll post some pictures later, but the views were amazing. I had only cross-country skied once before, but this was on an entirely different level. When I had tried XC in Utah, it was on a snow covered golf course; not alot of elevation to gain. Skiing here involved going up some fairly extended pitches for 1km at times and then kind of steep downhill segments. On those little classic XC skis, hilarity ensued. Chris and I had each been on these types of skis once before, whereas Ana and Dan were entirely new to the concept. Dan had actually never been on skis before at all. Pretty impressive really.

Our best guess is that we covered about 12-15km the first day with almost none of those being flat. There were moments where we felt entirely alone in the woods and then moments where we were reminded that we were 20 minutes from a major city. Lots of people out skiing with their kids, dogs, spouses, etc. Just a great environment: beautiful scenery and really friendly, fit people everywhere.

We also stopped by to check out the somewhat famous ski jump in Holmenkollen. I had never really gotten a sense for how massive/steep these structures are when you watch on TV, but it is somewhat awe-inspiring. Very slim chance I would go anywhere near that thing on skis.

On Saturday night, we went to the waterfront area of the harbor in downtown Oslo and had some of the local fare. I had 'Roast Beef of Whale' and 'Fersk Torsk' with a local pilsner. The whale was fantastic. The cod? Not so much. We also tried a local variety of chowder that was good. The whale was like a really tender beef and was not as fatty as you might imagine. I'd highly recommend it.

Sunday was more of the same: wandering around a wilderness area with a vague notion of what we were doing. By the end of the day, we were all fairly proficient at cross-country skiing as well as pretending we knew which way we were going.

We negotiated our way into a lukewarm soap-less, towel-less shower at a hostel and then headed to the airport to catch our 9pm flights, but not before grabbing some nachos and pizza to celebrate Super Bowl Sunday on the way. Flight landed a little after 10pm in London and I was asleep well before midnight. Stew stayed up and watched the game (which was apparently great), but an 11pm kickoff is a bit much for me.

In summary, it was a fairly cheap, impromptu trip to a beautiful city. I spent almost every hour of daylight outside and my soul is much better off for the effort. I'll post some pictures later in the week. If they are half as good as I think, there should be some memorable ones worthy of a desktop wallpaper.

skål!  ("skoal")

Best thinking on Egypt

I got burned a little overnight on the rally in gold on overheated Egypt fears. I read this piece today from The Big Picture. It is the best thinking I have read so far on the situation in Egypt that both the WSJ and the NYT have missed.

Read the article here

Tough Guy Pics

A little busy to type up a full debrief, but here are the official photos from the Tough Guy (more after the jump)

Former CEO of IBM's Op-Ed in the WSJ

Don't miss Louis Gerstner's piece in the WSJ and Barry Ritholtz's follow-up. To me the ideas aren't inherently ground-breaking, they are just summarized and explored more eloquently than I could hope to.

Chelsea Clinton's Husband Ditches Hedge Fund for Jackson Hole

I'd like to buy this guy a beer: http://www.nypost.com/p/pagesix/chelsea_hubby_hits_the_slopes_opjesOkLF8RS1rILbNoS6O

(Thanks Backcountry.com blog)

BBC: Human Planet

Planet Earth was one of my favorite series of all time. It looks like they took the same approach to capturing the human side. Not alot of doubt that I'm going to watch this at some point. Preview video after the jump (watch in beautiful 1080p!)

(Hat/tip Ritholtz)

Non-Car Guy reviews the new Chevy Volt (and begrudgingly likes it)

I am skeptical of the Chevy Volt. First, its made by Chevy. Second it is the first of its kind (electric drive, can be charged by the combustion engine). Neither of those bode well for it. However, car-neophyte and import-biased Washington Post write Gene Weingarten was given one to test drive.

He loves it. Mildly amusing, and with some really interesting insight. Check the full story out here

(Hat/tip Big Picture)