If you spend a Saturday in central Oslo and wonder where everybody is, they are in the forest.
Friluftsliv — literally “free air life” — is the Norwegian word for being outdoors, and it is not a hobby or a lifestyle choice. It is closer to a national obligation, it has legal protections, and it explains a great deal about how this city is arranged.
The right to roam
Allemannsretten, codified in the Outdoor Recreation Act of 1957 but far older in custom, gives everyone the right to move freely across uncultivated land regardless of who owns it.
You may walk, ski, cycle, ride and swim anywhere on utmark — rough, uncultivated ground, which is most of Norway.
You may camp for up to two nights anywhere at least 150 metres from an inhabited house or cabin, and longer in the mountains and remote areas, without asking anyone.
You may pick berries, mushrooms and wildflowers freely. Cloudberries in Nordland, Troms and Finnmark are the one exception.
You may light a fire, except in or near woodland between 15 April and 15 September, when there is a general prohibition.
In exchange: leave no trace, take your rubbish, close gates, do not disturb wildlife or livestock, and stay off cultivated fields in the growing season.
That is the whole bargain, and it is taken seriously in both directions. A Norwegian will not accept being told to leave a forest, and will also not leave a bottle in one.
The Marka
Roughly two-thirds of Oslo municipality is protected forest and water. The Oslomarka wraps around the city on three sides and is protected by its own law, the Markaloven of 2009, which effectively prohibits development.
Nordmarka, the northern section, is about 430 square kilometres.
It is reached on the metro, on an ordinary ticket. Line 5 to Sognsvann puts you at a lake with forest starting at the platform. Line 1 to Frognerseteren climbs to 469 metres.
That is the fact that makes Oslo unlike other capitals. Not that there is wilderness near the city, but that it is on the transport map, twenty-five minutes from a hotel, and that ordinary people use it on a Tuesday evening.
Winter
The Marka has roughly 2,600 km of prepared cross-country trails, about 90 km of them floodlit.
Cross-country skiing here is not a sport in the way it is elsewhere; it is transport and recreation that most Norwegians learn before they learn to read. The phrase is that Norwegians are født med ski på beina — born with skis on their feet.
Equipment can be hired at Frognerseteren and elsewhere, and there are beginners’ loops. If you visit between December and March and do not try this, you have missed the point of the city.
Sledging at Korketrekkeren — hire a kjelke at Frognerseteren, ride down two kilometres to Midtstuen, take the metro back up, repeat until dark. It costs very little and it is enormous fun.
The cabin
Hytte culture is the other half of it. A large proportion of Norwegian families have access to a cabin — in the mountains, in the forest, or on the coast — and go there at every opportunity.
Traditionally these were small, simple and deliberately uncomfortable: no running water, an outhouse, wood heat. That has changed a great deal and the change is itself a subject of national hand-wringing, because a cabin with underfloor heating and wifi is felt by many to defeat the purpose.
The DNT, the Norwegian Trekking Association, maintains a network of around 550 cabins across the country, several of them within a few hours’ walk of Oslo. Self-service cabins are stocked with food and firewood on an honour system — you take what you need, write it in the book, and pay afterwards.
Membership is inexpensive and open to visitors, and it is the single best way to see Norway cheaply.
Joining in
You do not need equipment, permission or a plan.
Take line 5 to Sognsvann. Walk round the lake — 3.3 km, flat, signposted. Swim in it in summer. That is friluftsliv, and it is what most Oslo residents actually do.
Take a thermos. Coffee outdoors is central to the whole business, and kokekaffe — grounds boiled in a pot over a fire — is what you will be handed in a cabin.
Dress for it. Det finnes ikke dårlig vær, bare dårlige klær — there is no bad weather, only bad clothing — is a genuine national proverb and is repeated constantly, usually while it is raining.
Do not underestimate the forest. It is large, phone signal is patchy, and people do get lost. Take a map, tell someone, and turn back earlier than you think you need to in winter, when it is dark by four.