I just spent several days in Norway and I thought I'd recap some parts that might be relevant to the FT crowd.

We first stayed in Oslo at the Hotel Continental - on the Amex program using our $200 off times 2 cards. The other option for us in Oslo would have been The Thief, also on the Amex program, at around the same price. I can't remember now why I ruled out all of the points hotels in Oslo.

I think we made the right choice with Continental. The location was very central, even if the immediate neighborhood wasn't perfect. It's on Karl Johans Gate which is a bit like the Champs -Elysee - non-stop tourists and souvenier shops and mediocre restaurants. But it's also close to Redhusset, the Opera House, the subway, and plenty more sights, and the train from the airport stops literally across the street.

The Thief, on the other hand, was over in Aker Brygge which is a nice very new area near the Astrup Fearnley museum and very new condo and office buildings - I'd liken it maybe to Playa Vista in LA. Still walkable to plenty, but definitely further from what we wanted to see. That said, and while the room at the Continental was in great condition with a new bathroom, I expect that we would have liked the actual room at The Thief more, although we didn't go inside.

One more note on Oslo: meals. We ate at Smalhans (excellent casual multi-course meal), Fyr (more standard, very good, gorgeous and comfortable outdoor seating), and Katla, which was probably my favorite restaurant of the trip and I highly recommend it. I think our menu there was seven courses, and we added a cheese course. We should have nixed the cheese course and tried to add the takoyaki from the a la carte menu, but we didn't have the foresight. Anyway, the flavors are generally SE Asian with mostly Norwegian ingredients and we loved our meal there. Casual vibe, great music, a nice pared-down industrial atmosphere all made it a fantastic meal. Strangely, it was actually located right near the Continental.

We did a one-day Norway in a Nutshell trip from Oslo to Bergen. Leave at 6 AM, five hour train ride (last two or three hours began the stunning vistas). Then change at Myrdal to take the tram down to Flam - and if I hadn't been impressed with the creation of the first railway in an inhospitable environment, the second one sure nailed it. Spent some time in Flam, took the slow boat to Gudvangen which really exceeded my expectations (and it was electric, so being on board was peaceful and the beautiful fresh air was never once marred by diesel fumes). Then the bus up to Voss and the train into Bergen. It's a long day, but we think it was worthwhile. Another option would have been to fly to Bergen and do the Nutshell as a one-day loop back to Bergen - shorter day there, but then you have to spend the time to fly, so I think this was the right choice. We did use the Nutshell porter service which picked up our roll-aboards at the Continental and dropped them at Opus XVI in Bergen before we arrived (and we had a little fun watching them along the way via AirTags).

In Bergen the hotel choice boiled down to be between Opus XVI on Hyatt points and Moxy via Marriott points. Moxy seemed very small and not as well located, so we chose Opus and again, like in Oslo, we ended up with the better-located, but older hotel, still with a nice room. I would even liken the Moxy neighborhood to Aker Brygge in Oslo - full of the same style new architecture mixed-use buildings - even the same energy over there.

Our one real meal in Bergen was at Lysverket which we enjoyed quite a bit. I still liked Katla more - I think I might have just had enough of the slow, tiny plates, multicourse meal that Lysverket puts out. Katla was less fussy, a little more hearty, and just more fun and lighthearted to me. Lysverket was probably tweezing while Katla was using fingers for plating. But both great meals.

I hope that helps people planning a Norway trip. Overall, this was a fantastic part of a longer trip and while I'd maybe make some modifications here and there, I'm pretty happy with the way it worked out.