A family snow holiday in Oslo, Norway 
Here’s an idea for the February half-term which we did earlier this year. We wanted a snow holiday, somewhere to just have some fun in the white stuff and weren’t too bothered about an all-out skiing holiday, so we decided to book up the Norweigan capital for a five-day stay.
Flights & Accommodation
We booked a well-priced flight with Norwegian Air from Gatwick and found the whole experience very pleasant with modern planes and also efficient with both flights boarding and departing early which is rare nowadays.
We wanted a local experience and also one with its own kitchen and a few separate bedrooms, so we came across a lovely spot on Airbnb which we booked. The family who owned it were lovely and very responsive and the downstairs of the house had all that we needed, with two bedrooms and a kitchen/lounge area with a large TV etc. There was a supermarket just ten minutes’ walk away so we cooked our brekkie and dinner on some nights. It was just outside the city but just one tram line straight from central and that also meant it was closer for us to get to the snowy mountains. https://www.airbnb.co.uk/rooms/51161842
Sauna & Sledging
One of the main reasons why I booked was after seeing an epic sledging hill on fave travel show ‘The Travel Man’. The corkscrew is a former bobsleigh run and you can rent a sledge for around £12, then sledge down the Korketrekkeren 2k route which takes 10 mins of continuous sledging. So much fun racing down and then at the bottom there’s a tram stop, you hop on to get back to the top to do it all over again. A definite highlight.
Playing in the snow some more with the kids, we decided to make a snow person together, rather than a snow person competition don’t they look great? Of course, playing in the snow whets the appetite, luckily there are coffee spots nearby, so we enjoyed hot drinks and sweet treats, these waffles were the perfect snack to share between us, and the hot drinks warmed us right up.
If you are brave enough you can try this local experience by the waterfront, you book a session which lasts 1.5 hours and costs around £15 and you alternate between a selection of hot saunas and then dipping in by ladder to the freezing waters of the bay which was icy at the time. A rejuvenating experience, and a must-do in our opinion, but no photos of this one, I’m afraid.
Oslo Badstuforening – Communal sauna – Langkaia
One-day skiing – Oslo Ski Center at Grefsenkollen
There is plenty of options to try some normal skiing as well as the Norweigan fave cross-country skiing which requires a bit more stamina but is great for exploring the forests around Oslo. We did a day on a local ski slope where our 9 and 12-year-olds had their first go at skiing with a fab 2-hour skiing lesson to get the basics down with an instructor. https://www.skikurs.no/en
Getting around
It was really easy to get around and efficient with the transport too. There are two very simple 30-minute direct train options straight from the airport to the city centre, a fast-track one and a normal one. Once in the City, you can take the trams around and simply pay on the Reuters app which you can download for free. You can pay for single passes, an all-day ticket, or a multiple-day pass which we did on quite a few of the days.
A short trip to Oslo is a lot of fun for families so check it out!
