NORWAY IN WAR TIME

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 183, 29 April 1919, Page 3

NORWAY IN WAR TIME

A MID-WINTER VISIT

FROZEN, BUT GAY CAPITAL (From Our Correspondent.) Christiania, February 6. Norway as a holiday resort in mia-win-ter. with a temperature ranging from 12 to 24 degrees below freezing point, will not sound enticing to most New Zealanders. In reality it would be difficult to find a more delightful holiday ground —provided always that one is active and in fvuud health. Tho cold is dry and bracing, and causes no discomfort at all when one is well wrapped up and moving briskly about in the open. Anyway, wo liave enjoyed our week at Christiania to the full.

It' is a far cry from Lambton Quay to Cliristiania, and the arrival of your correspondent in such n» out-of-the-way spot was duo to the ship in which ho, was concluding his war service being detailed to accompany H.M.S. Curucoa, carrying the Queen of Norway home from a visit to England. We had n vile passage across, travelling at 25 knots against a head sea, and when our steering gear went out of action, and we had to talco to steering with the engines, most of ua felt that joy-riding to Norway was a very much overrated pastime. Our discontent vanished when we entared the snowy fairyland of Christiania Fiord, with its dark-coloured fir trees on the hillsides standing out in brilliant relief against the universal background of whito. and snug cottages nestling m the hollows by the water's edge. Then the winter sunrise at about 9 a.m. began to turn the heights of the distant mountains to a glowing pink, and it would be difficult to find a more beautiful panorama than greeted our eyes as we sped up the winding fifty miles of the fiord. Christiania itself looked a picturesque enough city in the thin winter sunlight, with the walls of its buildings showing in vivid contrast under the huge blankets of enow on the roofs. The city Jias a. population of something over a quarter, of a million, and its chief characteristics are its cleanness and modernity. In these respects it is markedly different from the average English town. This is largely due to the fact that the whole place lias bc*n ?efraltti "in stone within the last half century. The town is handsomely laid out with squares and open spaces, and has many fine shops. Hardly anybody in the streets or on the watersido seomed down at heels, and one looked in vain for signs of poverty. IV instance, almost every other man was wearing a black fur cap, and when we sought to purchase some, of these as souvenirs of our visit wo found the standard price in the shops raneed from i's to £11 Cliristiania is a prosperous city, hut a very expensive one, and,, the visitor who would enjoy himself needs a well-lined pocket. Our first day ashore provided U6 with a series of shocks. Afternoon, tea for three, consisting of three cups of tea and some bread and cheese, cost just a trifle under two shillings a head. Oysters cost Is. 2d. each, port is 30s. a bottle, dinner a the Grand Hotel, without wines, runs,into at least Mor 255. The best stalls at the Opera Coniiquo are sold at about 17s. 6d. It is stated that on the whole the cost of living in Norway has risen about 150 per cent, since the - beginning of the war. Wages havo gone up also, but, as usual in such cases, not'quite correspondingly. Ordinary unskilled day labour is now paid at the rate of about £1 to 255. a day. Bread and meat are very short, but "fish, the Rreat natural food product of the country, is plentiful and comparatively cheap. The proplo generally have been solidly with the Allies in the war, but latterly it is stated that Bolshevist emissaries have- been abroad, and endeavouring to stir up strife. -It is difficult to see what Bolshevism can aim at in so extraordinarily democratic a country as Norway. There is absolutely no aristocracy, and outside the town even Hie ordinary courtesy titles of "Mr," "Mrs.," and "Miss" are dropped. University education is free, and the political institutions of the country are probably the most-'denio-cratic in the world, it is) true Norway possesses a King, but Royalty in Christiania wears a very modest air. The grounds surrounding the Royal Palace are unenclosed, and it is possible to walk along the public footpaths with one's hand on the walls of the building, and look right in through) the windows, Just under' tho windows one will see hunches of the town urchins gaily tabogganing down the slopes, and it is stated that Prince Olaf, tho little HeirApparent, is frequently discovered to have escaped out of doors and to be plav. ing with the street children. The great winter pleasure resort is not to bo found in Christiania itself, but on the heights of Holmen Kolbanen, which rises up to about 900 or 1000 feet on the western outskirts \>t the city. An excellent electric tram service runs up to the summit of the hill, and at the week-end at this time of year is packed with merry crowds off. for a day's skiing or tobogganing. The cars have special racks on their 6ides on whioh tho toboggans and skis are hooked, and the general programme is to ascend the mountain by tram and descend by toboggan °r ski- It is possible to go down the whole; five miles into Christiania by toboggan, but the latter stages are tamo from a sporting point of view. There are many sharp corners and steep grades on the toboggan track, and, with the snow frozen hard, sonic skill is needed to ■hold the road when travelling at speedmore skill than most of the officers and mon from the British warships possessed, and the local inhabitants collected in crowds at the difficult spots to watch our invariable disasters. On the Sunday morning of our visit heats in the skijumping sports were being run off. Most people are familiar with these by moving picture, but it is a marvellous thing to see the huge jumps of something like 70 yards, or possibly more. The competitors dash down a steep hill, halfway down which' is a platform with a drop of 15 or 18 feet from its outer edge. It is from this that the jump is made, and tho momentum noquired in the glide down the hill carries the skilful eki-jumper an incredible distance. Ihe sport is not one to be tackled by novices wearing skis for the first time, I and eyen the practised competitors come nasty-looking croppers at times. All over the mountain side are restaurants and hotels, crowded with visitors alike in summer and winter. When one dines, one leaves one's skis leaning up against the fence outside, and with hundreds of pairs of six-foot skis ranged up on end tho restaurants at a busy hour have the appearance of being surrounded by Maori pallisades. At Frogtiers Aetern, on tho summit of the mountain, is a substantial look-out tower where one may enjoy the panorama of mountain and fiord. On the top of the tower i 3 a little dial to which is attached a bar with two sights. On the dial is marked the bearing and distance of all objects of interest, and to know at what one is looking all-'that is necessary is to bring the sights to bear on it and then glance nt what is written on the dial beneath. It was the first time I had seen suoh a useful little arrangement and it would be an excellent tiling for our Tourist Department to adopt. One officer told me that on the Malvern Hills, in Worcester, there is an even better device. Instead'of the pointer being over a brass dial marked with bearings and distances, it is over a reliof map of the district, so that when one brings the pointer over the hill or river on the map one sees the real hill or river at tho end of it. Something of the sort would certainly be very welcome at some of our famous viewpoints in Now Zealand, as, for instance, on Ben Lomond at Lake Wakatipu, or R-angitoto. # As we are proparing to leave Christiania the drift ice in the harbour is thickening, and in a short time the winter coating will close to navigation all those portions of tho fiord in which a cleared channel is not maintained. It was with regret that we left Christiania. Every, body did their best to make us welcome; and we felt that the Norwegians, though forming only a littlo neutral State of 'something over two million souls, wore not so very foreign after all. At »>ny rate, their seamen have played the game through the war. and five thousand of them have lost their lives in the course of the German submarine warfare.