Rest day

While we needed only a day in Stavanger for what we wanted to do, I had a day of rest and in case of weather.  Following the weather forecast, we allowed today as the rest day and tomorrow (in anticipation of good weather) would be for going to Pulpit Rock.

The town is nice enough, inoffensive … more of a base for doing Pulpit Rock than an attraction in itself.  It is quite an important town though being at the heart of the country’s oil industry.  Oil transformed Norway from the poor fishing and potato economy to being super-rich.

We wandered into town around 1100 to confirm that our Pulpit Rock excursion ticket would be OK on the phone rather than as a printed ticket (as indicated in the T&Cs).  No worries they said.

Then, we took a look at the old town which consisted of wooden residential homes dwarfed by the visiting cruise liner.

Next we visited the Oil Museum which was very informative, considering it could be a very boring and technical subject.  We learnt about the formation of oil, the evolution of oil rigs, life on an oil rig, disasters etc.  I reckon we did it justice with the amount of time spent.

We called into the big supermarket for shop-up so that two dinners and two lunches could be catered for.  Particularly good value was the pack of pre-cooked five whole chicken legs.  We couldn’t have got it for less in New Zealand.

We managed kill five hours and return to our apartment around 1600 to stay in for the night.