2024 France and Northern Italy

The centre of Avallon

23.7.24 under the English Channel

Sitting inside the front carriage of the Eurotunnel train, passing under the Channel to France.  But rather than on a train, it feels more like a wormhole from the UK to France.  The gentle rocking, and occasional external noises sound like the workings of mysterious technology.  The slight bumps and shakes feel like ripples in space-time…

The road to the Eurotunnel terminal through southeast London, the unlovely part of the city.  Traffic good, even on the absurd contraflow on the M20, necessitated by Brexit’s self-harming madness.  The journey through France is part of our annual transhumance to Italy, passing through rural France and the Mont Blanc tunnel, an experience in itself, especially after the very different tunnels in Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan.

First stop Carrefour by the French Eurotunnel terminal.  Pretty grim, but makes me think of the Carrefour in Tbilisi, of all places - rather smaller, but more romantic just by virtue of its position. In Carrefour car park.  Very windy - the three wind turbines nearby whirling around…  Patches of blue in the sky.  Since I am edge-on to the wind turbines, I can see them reposition themselves slightly by gyrating, as the wind shifts directions.

In Saint-Omer.  A gentle carillon tinkles away.  A bit of a nightmare finding somewhere to park - a bloke sitting in his car for 30 minutes - I ask if he is going, he says “no”, he is waiting for his daughter.  Meanwhile, another place becomes free, but impossible to get to directly because of all the one-way streets here.  I make a circuitous alternative route back and manage to grab it.

Our small square - Place Sithieu - is actually a triangle.  Old buildings around it - some extreme prismatic roofs, like those in Paris, but less grand.  In the middle, a bronze statue of Pierre Alexandre de Monsigny - a musician apparently, but not one I’d ever heard of.

On the way here, driving along the almost deserted A26, some fab French place names: Fréthun, Les Attaques, Ardres, Louches, Zutkerque, Fecques sur Heim, Éperlecques, Sengues, Tilques.  They sound like the sort of place Proust would have visited and raved about.

The organ in Saint-Omer cathedral

Just noticed our Place is under the ever-loving eye of a fat CCTV camera, which rotates to view different angles and streets.  Around the town.  To the cathedral - beautiful aged white stone, with one of the biggest church organs I’ve seen.  The Jesuit college - incredibly tall - a symbol of arrogance and aspiration.  Built of bricks too.  Crazy mouldings - coats of arms, and at the bottom a huge broken pediment a metre thick.

The Jesuit college in Saint-Omer

Sitting by the theatre, an interesting rectangular structure with a roof similar to Mole Antonelliana in Turin.  Set in a square that would be rather grand were it not for the huge car park in the middle.  The architecture of the buildings around the square very varied, but very French.  Four/five storeys, steep roofs - very steep roofs. One opposite us with the inscription “Ludovici XVI Munificentia”.  It has two rows of windows in its tall steep roof, with four statues perched on the top balustrade at the foot of the roof.  Terrifying.

24.7.24 Saint-Omer

Up early, and onto the streets, the cathedral bell ringing out its one sonorous note, echoing off stone and brick.  To the boulangerie, the smell of fresh bread in the air.  Nobody about, even though it’s 8am now.  This place is beautiful but so dead…  As we return, the cathedral’s bell has become two, a tone apart, ringing with more urgency.  I doubt whether many will respond and attend the imminent mass…

Avallon's clock tower arch

In Avallon - or rather back in Avallon, since we were here almost exactly a year ago.  Our destination a huge living space near the clock tower arch and the amazing ancient church of Saint-Lazare.  Quite weirdly created from a couple of rooms, with the dividing wall removed to leave only the supporting beams.  Works, though…

The theatre in Avallon

Hellish journey here, took seven and a half hours.  Two main problems.   First, a big jam on the A4 by Reims.  This is anyway my least favourite road section, where the A26 mutates into the A4 for no reason, and then turns back again.  Totally trivial roadworks caused 30 minutes of blockage.

Then past Troyes - yes, as in Chrétien de Troyes - onto the D444 to Tonnerre.  Beautiful villages along the way, particularly Chaource.  Past Tonnerre, a sign saying “route barrée” - but without offering a workaround.  We plotted a longer alternative route and turned back towards Tonnerre.  Luckily, on the way we noticed a sign “Deviation” that was almost invisible.  It was the official alternative route, down very small back roads.  It passed through Viviers, Yrouenne and Poilly-sur-Serein, the heart of Chablis country - the town itself is nearby.  Finally back on the D944, quickly to Avallon.  It’s a nice town, livelier than Saint-Omer, but also more touristic.  Knowing the place a little made it easier to find our lodgings, and park the car nearby.  Always interesting going back, layering memory on memory….

25.7.24  Sallanches

Easy drive down from Avallon, along the A6, then A40 to here, Sallanches, chosen for its propinquity to the Mont Blanc tunnel.  To avoid the insane queues, we need to get there early tomorrow morning.  The hotel, Ibis Budget, lives up to its name: two-star, and everything minimally comfortable.  Interesting: no key, just a code to enter.  Very basic, but cheap-is (100 euros), and close to the tunnel.

Mountains in Sallanche

As ever, the landscape nearby is stunning - great walls of stone glowing in the afternoon sun, which is strong now.  30°C+.  The mountains look greener than I remember them: maybe more rain this year has made them particularly verdant.

20.8.24  La Thuile

In the Hotel La Thuile, in the village of La Thuile, in the Aosta valley, bordering France.  This place is schizophrenic: popular ski resort in winter, and hiking centre in summer.  In fact, my one and only experience of skiing was not far from here, in La Plagne.  I’m glad I did it, but it’s not something that ever really grabbed me as it does some.  I think skiing is popular in part because it is quite straightforward – you fall down a hill with a certain care – while accessing instant excitement in beautiful scenery.  

In fact this place is more than a ski centre, it’s a kind of Butlin’s holiday camp in a stunning location.  There are lots of mini shops here – including a butcher – as well as various games and activities.  It’s easy to see why there are lots of families with small children here.  Less clear is why there are so many older people.  Most of them seem unable to walk very well, let alone go hiking in the mountains.  Perhaps it’s the thought that counts.  To be fair, the air here is great – we are at about 1500 metres.  Nothing compared to Kyrgyzstan, but higher than the tallest UK mountains.

We chose here for a location near to the Mont Blanc tunnel, so that we could get there early and avoid the sometimes horrendous queues.   We didn’t spot that it was not only among the mountains, but actually up them.  

We turned off the main road in Aosta, to Morgex, then a positively Georgian road with nine rather steep and sharp turns took us up high quickly.  Mountains stunning in the late afternoon light.  The only problem I have with this particular beauty is that it is so neat and well-tended.  In this, it is the opposite of Tajikistan/Kyrgyzstan.  But I can imagine that one day both of these will be as popular as here, and just as neat.  Something will be lost, but of course the local economies will gain, so I shouldn’t carp.  And as with so many places, I have been fortunate to see them before this happened.

Driving through the village of La Thuile, it was striking how un-Italian it looked – all Swiss-style chalets and buildings.  The hotel too has wood everywhere – not unattractive.  Outside, the evening air is noticeably cooler here.  One bonus: no mosquitoes, which were bad in the low-lying parts of the country.

21.8.24 Avallon

We arose early, in order to get to the Mont Blanc tunnel before the queues formed.  Air markedly colder than in the other parts of Italy we had visited.  As we drove down from the ski resort/summer station, the sunrise illuminated the mountain wall towards France with the topmost peaks picked out like towers along a massive fortification.

About three cars at the toll booths for the tunnel – we didn’t even queue for ours.  The tunnel itself quite empty towards France, more traffic coming in the opposite direction – big lorries mostly.  Out into France, and huge horizontal banks of low-level cloud lay alongside the mountains.  This part of France with its huge swooping viaducts is particularly beautiful in the broken sunshine.  So dramatic, it makes driving here such a pleasure.

Easy road today: straight along the A40, on to the A6, to here, Avallon.   Not just to the town we stayed in before, but to the exact same place, by the clock gate, with the handy car park opposite.  Coming back makes the journey a real joy, because I knew exactly where I was going, no stress.  Ditto with the accommodation, which feels like a little home from home, since it required no effort of familiarisation.

Inscription on church in Avallon

Avallon warm and bustling with people.  Mostly people with dogs, it would seem, oddly enough.  Got to see inside the collegiate church of Saint-Lazare nearby.  Amazing stonework around the door.  Inside musty but atmospheric.  A fine organ over the door.  Outside, a carved inscription that starts fully legible, but becomes more and more eroded towards the end, a wonderful metaphor for time and loss.

Tomorrow, we go back up to Troyes (hi, Chrétien), then on to Saint-Omer.  Not the same place, but nearby, so at least navigating the one-way streets will be easy.

22.8.24 Avallon

During the night, the big bell on the clock gate tolled the hours not once, but twice, with a distance of a minute or so.  It also gave a quieter semitone tinkle for the half-hours.  But it’s amazing how you can sleep through such things – I only heard a couple of them…

Clos du Bailli hotel in Saint-Omer

More bells – this time back in Saint-Omer.  More precisely, in the Clos du Bailli hotel.  This is barely 50 metres from our accommodation here a month ago.  The hotel’s design is unusual. It was clearly a house of some local well-to-do individual.  Today, it is kitted out with period furniture, prints and even tapestries: all rather impressive.  There is a courtyard at the front, visible through railings, and the hotel entrance alongside – where the carriages passed, I imagine.  The rooms lie in the house itself, which sits at the angle of Place Sithieu and the cathedral’s Enclos Notre Dame.  We are in room 12, which has a great view of the triangular Place.

The journey here split in two: from Avallon to Troyes, passing through a series of picturesque villages, the best of which was Chaource.  The downside of these charming villages is that they often have speed limits of 30 km/h – about 19 mph.  The surrounding countryside is attractive, agricultural, with plenty of trees in same places, in others, vast open spaces.  At Troyes we joined the A5 briefly, before turning north, on to the A6.  Then a long and rather boring drive up here.

Saint-Omer seems busier than before – more tourists presumably.  Lots of people smoking cigarettes here – I thought that was out these days.  I saw lots of individuals limping as they walked, and others with knee braces.  Weird.

In search of a supermarket we walked along Rue de Dunkerque, which seems to be the main shopping street.  Found a small but decent Carrefour there.

Tomorrow, a short trip to Calais, then under the Channel and home.  As ever, the journey back is easier than out, because the destination – home – is known.  And the journey home has about it a sense of the inevitable, because transhumance by its very nature – a temporary transfer of residence - implies a return.

More destinations:

1992 Paris

1993 Paris

1994 Paris

1994 France

1995 Paris

2023 Paris 

Moody's Black Notebook Travels

1993 Urbino

19.7.93

Urbino: a name that has hovered strangely in my consciousness for more than 20 years (at King’s, an article referred to “The Urbino”). The reality – as opposed to the vague image of a hilltop town – is perhaps more striking than I thought.  Seen from afar (as we drove up in the car after someone had to pick us up when we had failed to catch the original train, after misreading the orario) – it was muted, but as soon as we had taken the lift up from the car park (300 L.) and were greeted by the amazing facade of the palace, it was clear that the place was a bit different.

Walking along the fine arcade opposite, we came to the main Piazza della Repubblica, an irregularly-shaped space, and then we turned left along Via Raffaello, up the hill towards Raphael’s birthplace, then moving off to the right towards a classical facade, a primary school that stood in for the music summer school registration office.  That smell of paint, that sound of high, hard rooms.

Then back to the car and we sneak into the city – closed to non-residents’ cars – to leave our luggage.  The place we are staying at in Via Saffi, on the edge of the city (not that this is far).  From here (and where I now sit in the living space of the mansard) there is a stunning view over the Marche hills (or maybe Umbrian?), now blue with haze, and not so much rolling as tumbling.  Not much sun – great fleecy clouds.  Everything in the attic rather low in height for us grandi.

Yesterday evening, a lovely stroll to the antipodes and restaurant (Ragno d’Oro, Viale Don Giovanni Minzoni, 2) that serves a characteristic dish: crescie, made in the open kitchen with pig’s lard and panache, twirling the pastry round into coils, and then spirals – cooked, they are cut in two and have various savouries put in them – verdure, rucola and cheese etc.  Yummy.  Then to the piazza for an unsatisfactory (bottled) juice.  But the situation made up for it, the night falling, the lights coming on, the people gradually filling the tables.

Strange to be here, if only because now I feel in an odd, rather frightening prepartum stage, with Doing The Business about to come.  I have with me printouts (Word, XL, Project) of the various plans; I hope to work a little on it, since I am only down for one course – clavicembalo with Rinaldo Alessandrini – had to practise for the last week, 2/3 hours a day: Byrd’s "The Carman's Whistle", Couperin "La Couperin" (Ordre 21ème de clavecin in E minor), Scarlatti F major sonata and Bach C major 48 prelude and fugue (the lush, not pretty, prelude).  

I have woken reasonably early at 6.30am, showered, and smell heavenly coffee from somewhere… Walking around the city (the sun now strong) after breakfast in the Piazza della Repubblica.  The particular quality of the bricks: they look like carefully treated masterpieces themselves.  The Piazza del Rinascimento: stunning set piece.

20.7.93

A strange day.  To the cembalo class with Rinaldo Alessandrini – where I sit for four hours on my bum and listen to others.  But this afternoon in the main church (cathedral) by the palazzo (great facade) working on Doing The Business which is coming along.  Before, a walk, rather hot and sweaty in the city.  The narrow streets, with their brick pavements, a little oppressive.  In some ways, Urbino is Siena upside down, everything falling where Siena rises.  Last night very civilised meal at Ristorante Oxford.  

My position here is rather ambiguous: playing the harpsichord briefly yesterday and today is the first time for two years (since 1991 Dartington) – most of this music for the first time ever on the harpsichord.  Strange too this school with its hard seats and semi-desperate musicians.  Rinaldo impressive technically, but rather down – shyness apparently.  Musicians give so much and yet generally receive (from this world, at least) so little.  Like actors, but the latter are more extrovert – when they’re not playing, musicians are almost invisible.  A world full of musicians would have to live in harmony - they couldn’t risk damaging their hands/throats/mouths….

21.7.93

On the hill opposite Urbino, looking across to the palace.  What a view...the whole city at a glance, almost.  Strange, but rather like Mowley in Doing The Business, I find myself increasingly worried by the state of international affairs: things are really going to get worse, I fear.  

A bell rings – that clangorous after-sound, hollow, other-wordly…

23.7.93 

A day off.  (Interesting night before last – trapped by torrential rain, very impressive lightning.)  At the Palazzo Ducale. In the library – rather bare.  Always interesting to see third-rate pix – reminds you how good the others are…

Finally Piero – The Flagellation: much smaller than I expected – also very grey, not brown with age.  And the Madonna too – very grey.  With the strange stillness in the figures – very modern.  The Flagellation – the extreme perspective of the marble floor.  The isolation of the spaces.  The blue of the sky.  The very low viewpoint.  That stillness again – as if caught in a moment of pensiveness.  Strange to see the naked wood around the outside. The Madonna – the angel with folded arms like a heavy.  The imperious gesture of the child.  The moulding on the wall behind.  The mother’s downward glance.

To the study – the smell of wood.  Like painting by numbers – but in wood.  The music in the wood, the lute strings.  The Tempietto delle Muse with 88 putti, all different, in the ceiling.

La Città Ideale  – possibly Piero, or by Luciano Laurana – reminds me of Canary Wharf – all the grey marble and classical forms.  Strange that in the ideal city there are no people.  Just the hint of them: a door half open, a few plants, paths in the hills.  No animals either.  At once serene and disquieting.  

Odd: pic of Giusto di Gand (Ghent) - apostles and Federico with his nose…  The Raphael tapestries.  Unusual colouring of Giovanni Santi saints.  Weirdest – Signorelli – two pictures – what drugs was he on?  The space very odd – god outside.  Raphael – La Muta – very unusual – big-jawed woman, like a horse-faced Gioconda.  Two dull Titians.

24.7.93

Work today – more on "The Carman’s Whistle" – and nothing on "La Couperin".  Also played the Prelude and Fugue in C, Book II.  Very incorrectly, it has to be said.   Trouble is, I am not built for practising, and tire quickly. 

To the concert: Roy Goodman and the Euro Baroque Players.  Roy looks like a pint-sized Dennis Hopper, and jigs around in a very unbecoming way.  Good play of the Rameau and interesting Dutch bloke – Hellendaal.  Vivaldi awful – very muddy.  Left before Handel.  Pity about the acoustics of the church (San Domenico).

More destinations:

1988 Venice

1994 Rome

1994 Bari

1994 Trieste, Ljubljana 

1995 Siena, Bagno Vignoni, Pienza

1996 Torino

1998 Elba

1998 Modena

Moody's Black Notebook Travels

2021 Gibraltar

19.10.21

On the 9th floor of the Eliott Hotel, looking out across the Bay of Gibraltar from the near-empty hotel restaurant.  Spain in the hazy distance, tankers moored or moving.  Cloudy but pleasantly warm in this Mediterranean outpost of the UK.  The tell-tale sign that all is not as it should be: they drive on the right here…

Gibraltar seemed the perfect post-Brexit/Covid trip.  Short – just three nights here – but enough time to see more or less everything.  Safe – Gibraltar has one of the lowest incidences of Covid.  And weird: a little chunk of limestone that will be forever England (well, not if the Spaniards have anything to do with it). An alienated piece of the EU, just a few kilometres from Africa…

The flight was good but horribly early: 7.10am take-off meant getting up at 3am.  At least it was Terminal 5, Heathrow, one of my favourites.  Swooping from the east of the Rock, its gaunt vertical face, around to Gibraltar Bay, where the improbable runway sticks out into the sea.  No room for error.

Then the inevitable checks.  Mostly done before leaving, online.  Very efficient: after you have submitted your Passenger Location Form, you are taken straight to the test booking site.  On the ground, less impressive.  First, you queue at passport control; then you queue for your lateral flow test; then you find there are no taxis left to take you into town.  So you walk.  It's not far, but there's a unique obstacle holding up vehicles and people.  Planes are taking off, and the runway cuts across the road.  So the road is closed while the planes take off – rather close.

Finally, the barrier lifts, and off we go.  Strange to see UK road signs, but cars on the right.  Also many signs in Spanish, not unreasonably.  We walk through the Landport Tunnel, once the only land route in.  then along Main Street.  Which turns out to be a perfect distillation of English seaside towns like Blackpool or Bournemouth.  Small, tacky, full of horrible "souvenirs" – and people who look as if they would buy them.  Mostly old.

In Grand Casemates Square – the Piazza San Marco of Gibraltar.  Here via the dock area – not just ugly, but oppressively chaotic – no plan, no style.  Huge blocks of buildings closing off the way – no road through.  Here vaguely attractive, open at least.  Moorish Castle just visible, Main Street ahead of us.  Huge building to the right, looks like the abandoned concrete hulks of Chișinău.  This place is weird.

20.10.21

Out to the cable car base.  Following Main Street, I was surprised to see its character change once it became for cars – vastly better.  Where the pedestrianised part is twee and naff, the part to the south has some good buildings.  Passing by St. Jago's Arch, things fall apart – hard to find the sense of roads, with the paucity of street names hardly a help.  But we finally made it to the cable car to find zero queue and just a couple of people waiting inside the cabin.  £30 each for the full works, but Moody's Second Law of Tourism applies…

The ride up quick and smooth, though I am not totally convinced by this technology.  The upper cable station nothing special, aside from its location, which is stunning.  The views from the two platforms just fantastic, with the harbour and runway laid out clearly, Spain in the distance, and Morocco looming out of the haze.

Three apes nearby, picking over carrots, apples and watermelon.  Magnificent beasts, with a golden-brown fur.  Pretty indifferent to humans, more interested in food or finding fleas on each other.  The biggest (alpha?) males were superbly disdainful as we walked past them.  A Spanish family foolishly had a plastic bag, and the apes were keen to inspect it.  The bloke shooed them away, but was unwise to bring it.

Along to the Skywalk – pretty dull, but some nice views south.  The eastern side of the Rock is pretty impressively precipitous.  Further south to St. Michael's Cave.  Better than I expected – really majestic forms, rather spoilt by the lighting's garish effects.  A dozen minibuses outside disgorging people.  We moved off down to the Apes' Den – where there were sadly no apes.  But we had seen plenty elsewhere.

We decide to descend to the town, rather than ascend to take the cable car.  A long way, but shielded from the sun by the Rock, with great views.  I saw a couple of planes swinging round from the south to land – tiny dots moving over the sea and Spanish mainland.  The tankers and container ships playing to and fro.  The filthy pollution they create is evident.  Yesterday, we saw an obscenely large P&O cruise ship pull out – a ridiculous floating hotel, with hotel and cold running Covid: I wouldn't go one even if you paid me.

Finally down to the town, and to The Angry Friar, opposite The Convent – the Governor's Residence.  Just as we were about to order, the power went off – something that happens here apparently.  After salad and sandwiches, back here to the hotel to rest.

In Jury's, nice atmosphere. In the afternoon, to the botanic gardens by the cable car station.  Lots of interesting plants and trees, but a strange feeling of chaos, of things not hanging together, which seems to be the dominant theme here.  Then to the harbour – the new one – and the Harbour View restaurant.  Next to flash catamaran.  Gibraltar should be more like this, although I noted with disapproval that the marina was "private" – enclosing the commons.  Tut.

21.10.21

Up on the Rock again, staring across at the mountains of Morocco.  Brilliant sunshine, fresh breeze, nobody else up here.  Wonderful – surely one of the greatest views on earth.  We were so near to Morocco that our phones switched from Gibtel to a Moroccan provider… 

Exploring the northern part of the Rock.  Along to the Great Siege Tunnels.  Amazing achievement, with great views of airport where planes take off infrequently, but impressively.  Before each take-off, a police car clears the road, with siren blaring.  

Two things seem more common here than I expected: people speaking Spanish, and people smoking...it's like going back in time to the UK in the 1970s.  Which seems appropriate.

Back in the Water Front, where we had a drink yesterday, but now for supper.  Busy, lots of people who look as if they belong with the very swish boats in the marina.  But getting here from the hotel was madness.  This town seems designed to stop easy access anywhere.  There are long physical obstacles – bastions from the past, blocks of offices or flats from the present – that require huge detours to pass around.  This is the worst-designed place I have every visited.

22.10.21

In Grand Casemates Square, sitting in the sun as it rises from behind the Rock.  The fact that the city is in the shade for several hours lends it a very particular quality.  As does the number of old people hobbling along with walking sticks. 

Yesterday, I forgot to mention that on the way down from the Great Siege tunnels, we visited the Moorish Castle.  Just a bare shell now, but impressive enough in its own way.  A useful reminder of the Moorish heritage here – even down to its name [according to Wikipedia, the name is derived from Arabic: جبل طارق‎, romanized: Jabal Ṭāriq, lit. 'Mount of Tariq' (named after the 8th-century Moorish military leader Tariq ibn Ziyad)].

Now in the ultra-swish, rather empty airport building.  But its main feature is the north side of the Rock in all its gleaming limestone glory.  Certainly a memorable sight – the White Cliffs of Dover packed into a single, soaring spire – rather like the similarly shaped church in Reyjavik – but much bigger.  Rather let down by the dull and stumpy flats and hotels at its base, dwarfed by Nature.

This morning, we walked around the city.  I always want to call it a town – city sounds too grand, but it has not one, but two cathedrals.  The Roman Catholic one (very dull) and the Anglican one, which has an appropriately Moorish cut to its ecclesiastical job (sic).  Inevitably, it reminds me of Mezquita in Cordoba, but a pale, genteel version.

The thing is, there really isn't that much to see in Gibraltar.  Except the Rock, of course, and its delightful apes.  And indeed, the view from the top in clear weather is certainly one of my top sights – along with that from Gergeti Church in Georgia, from the Sugarloaf Mountain in Rio, and from the top of Mount Batur in Bali.

More destinations:

Moody's Black Notebook Travels

1989 Oslo

12.5.89

Oslo – why Oslo?  I have been here before for a press trip – to Norsk Data – since plunged into the red, as predicted – probably because it took irrelevant journos like me on junkets.  My vision of the city was a fleeting one.  But pleasant.  Going north to colder climes and dour people was attractive.  I needed to get away for various reasons.  As soon as I arrived at the airport, it felt right.

Oslo is so neat and civilised.  There are fountains everywhere, attractive blonde women, long broad streets, a lack of tall buildings.  Everything is on a human scale.  Vastly exciting, it is not: the what's on guide is embarrassing in its paucity of offerings.  I arrived at 11am, and went straight to my hotel – the Savoy (sic) on Universitetsgata.  Then a wander down to the tourist office to pick up maps and info.

I am now in the café of the Grand Hotel, eating reindeer liver pate – very strong.  The price of food is terrifying here.  Across from me is the Stortinget, a Romanesque fantasy which reminds me of the Victoria & Albert Museum.  Karl Johans Gate reminds me of Helsinki.  Beautiful weather – hot sun, cool air.  Good news: no  smoking in public places; bad news: cyclists on the pavements.

In the Slottet grounds: two guardsmen in navy blue, with green epaulettes and feathered helmets, walk with a strange formal loping, left hand on their belt at the front, right hand swinging.  Earlier, I saw a procession with brass band – for the changing of the guard?  The palace is a rather modest affair, a miniature Buckingham Palace, two guards on duty, talking to passers-by.  The creamy, yellow colour seems quite common here: most of the older buildings seem eighteenth, nineteenth century.  They look like those in Leningrad.

After lunch, to the Nasjonalmuseet.  A few good old masters – especially Delacroix, interesting Norwegians – the stunning scenery makes "landskips" a doddle – and the cream of the Munch.  Strange pix for such an urbane-looking young man in his self-portrait.  "The Sick Girl" is slashed by deep lines – a battle of a surface.  "The Scream" is thin and almost a sketch.  The door to the Nasjonalmuseet very heavy – as have been several others – I almost gave up.  As in England, young mothers with kids everywhere.  

9.45pm – out into the cold rain – and a surprise: it's light.  I had forgotten this consequence of northward travel.  Otherwise an evening watching French, Norwegian and Swedish TV – plus Sky and Super Channel – the last two dire.

13.5.89

A grey morning, but clearing.  Out to the Munch Museet.  The Oslo underground is new and ultra-clean.  A wonderful smell.  And expensive.  Out to the suburbs, full of neat blocks of flats.  The museum is a low squarish building, easy to miss.  Rather fewer pix inside than I expected.  But big rooms full of wild garish colours.  I was pleased that most were familiar.  Interesting that those in the Nasjonalmuseet are often duplicated here – "Skrik", "Pubertet", "The Sick Girl".  New were the etchings.  Best of these were eight of "The Sick Girl" in close up – obsessional reworkings, all the more effective for the cumulative impact of the eight versions.  A very personal vision, but once again, I am glad I am not a painter.

Back on the T-banen, then to the harbour to take a boat out to Bygdøy.  Glorious weather now, scudding clouds, stiff breeze.  It is the first time I have looked out into the fjord.  Low islands across the sparkling water.  In the harbour a gleaming tall ship, three or four masts.  A proud beauty.  As we pull out, I see the castle which I must visit.  Looks unimpressive compared to Brit stuff.  Nice modern architecture along the harbour – why can't the Docklands get this?  Mooring on Bygdøy, then I walk to the Folkemuseum.  Very plush here: BMWs in quiet roads outside immaculate weatherboard houses, white in the sun.

I am sitting in the famous Stave Church – thirteenth century, and one of the most remarkable buildings I have ever seen.  Unlike most, it feels authentically old.  Outside is like some hazy northern pagoda. Both the church and the other buildings have a strange and wonderful property: their spaces seem particularly real.  That is, the space is won and constructed.  Modern buildings are typically divorced entirely from the outside space: there is no relation between in and out.  Here the two communicate, perhaps because the imperfections of the buildings never let you forget the act of construction.  The assemblage of these old empty buildings is touching.  As is the old ghost town which has been constructed.

It is starting to rain, so in to the Folkemuseum proper.  [Parenthetically, in the Munch Museet, three glorious portraits: Ibsen, Strindberg and Nietzsche.  It is strange how each seems defined by their facial hair.]  I write this in the old assembly room, a northern, scaled-down version of Palladio's Teatro Olimpico.   The museum is deserted.  I am left only with the smell of old wood and leather, and the still gazes from beneath wigs and perukes.  This place is thick with time.  To the building opposite.  A crazy exhibit of log chains.  Glorious smell of pine.

To the Viking Ship Museum.  Aptly enough, this is in the form of a church-like cross, three ships in three arms.  And what ships.  Black monsters, superbly preserved.  Very shallow draught, and intricately ornamented on the prow and stern.  And the carriages and sleds.  It is hard to connect these fearsome Viking images with the civilised people here today.  A nation which changed the face of England, France, Sicily, Russia and elsewhere.

Back on the boat to a sunny late Saturday afternoon in Oslo.  Most of the shops were shut by 3 o'clock.  I am now sitting down from the Stortinget, in an open air café – exorbitant but worth it.  The rows of elms are a bright, young green; the horse chestnut is a mass of leaves.  Behind the latter, more fountains susurrate.  Everywhere there are pretty, attractive blonds.  Blue skies.  "Selig", as a poet once said.

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Glorious weather: strong sun, refreshing breeze.  Out to Frognerparken to see the Vigeland sculptures.  Those on the bridge as less impressive than those around the column.  The latter are more varied and inventive, and gain from their grouped setting.  The rock is beautiful: it looks so sensuous.  The carving is remarkable for its consistency.  The column is artful: lower down the basic lines are flat; then a diagonal enters – a left corkscrew into the sky.  At the top, verticals.  But I can't help feeling more tapering would have helped.  Aren't women's buttocks wonderful?  From the column, you get a splendid view down the alley to the road.  Hordes of tourists disembark like locusts.  Alongside the simple strength of the granite figures, they look mean and tawdry.

The main fountain is impressive – even in this city of fountains.  The bronze figures surrounding it are curious: they stand or crouch beneath trees; the trees look like alien flora from a Dan Dare comic strip.  

Last night, walking home from dinner at Mona Rosa's, I passed a young woman sobbing violently as she sat in a doorway.  What could I do?  You can't comfort in a foreign tongue.  I walked on, but felt sick at heart.

I am sitting in the chapel of the Akershus Fortress.  An organist – typically attired in suit and organist glasses – has just entered and started playing a strongly modal piece on some softer stops.  Outside the sun breaks through white and dark clouds, sending blurred images of the windows onto the blue carpet in front of me.  This is a real Sunday.  The sound and the occasional fluffs remind me of the short time I learnt the organ.  I was still at secondary school, but I remember driving to a church for practice.  I had to knock someone up for the key.  I remember vividly the smell when the door opened, the fat man wiping a hand over his greasy mouth, chewing still.  I had disturbed his dinner.  The air was think with lower-class living; children squealed distantly.  Once, upon obtaining the key, I went into the church to find a corpse laid out in its coffin.  It was cold and the darkness seemed thick around the light on the organ.  But it all seemed appropriate too.

Old glass in the church windows.  Seven o'clock and still as warm as an English summer's afternoon – the sun as high.  After the concert – before an audience of 12 – I have spent most of the afternoon near Stortinget, sitting in the sun, drinking coffee, watching the world – and young ladies – go by.  Unfortunately these erstwhile Vikings are smokers.

Dinner: devastating avocado, prawns, roe and cream; then reindeer medallions followed by summer fruits in champagne.  This lack of night is so disconcerting.  I am sitting on the wharf side opposite Akershus Slott (Akers is Oslo's river), which is eerily illuminated in the gloaming by sodium glare.  There is a very impressive waterside development here – far better than Docklands.  One warehouse has been converted into shops and boîtes – very lively.  But who are all these boys and girls in red/blue boiler suits?  And what are they selling?  To my left, the Rådhuset blocks stand out like blocks of patterned chocolate.  Half moon tonight.  The smell of sawdust in the air; new buildings behind.

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Beautiful morning again.  A walk round the deserted city – a holiday today.  Then to the cathedral, the bells ringing clangorously with wonderful software discords of major seconds.  Inside, and I am immediately back in Helsinki cathedral – a memory long lost.  A Greek cross with a low crossing painted with a wild pointillist frieze.  Gilt everywhere.  I preferred Helsinki.

To the Rådhuset, which really is a beautiful building.  The dark brickwork conceals a wealth of detail – diagonally set bricks, rose circles.  It is, obviously, a very vertical building, emphasised by the tall vertical slots above the regularly placed windows.  Also, the squat central building throws the two flanking towers into prominence.  The astrological clock is a superb stroke: like an intricate jewel on a great flowing robe, it draws the eye in.

There are many races here: orientals, blacks, Arabs, other Europeans.  It will be interesting to see if the melting pot melts.

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Moody's Black Notebook Travels