Elvelangs i fakkellys 2014 - candlelight walk along the Akerselva

As every year at the autumn equinox, when the daytime and night are of equal duration, the banks of the Akerselva river flowing through Oslo is lit up and flanked by artists.
The little river starts in the north of Oslo, at the lake Maridalsvannet in Oslomarka and follows the urban areas of Nordre Aker, Sagene, Grünerløkka, Oslo city centre and Grønland whereby it finally ends in Bjørvika. It's considered as "Oslo's green lung", with many parks and nature trails along its way. There is a trail besides the river, all the way down from the lake to Oslo downtown.

Once a year, between 8 pm and 11 pm, the riverbanks are lit up with candles and set in colourful lights and in between one can find art performances of any kind: musicians, dancers, handicrafts... From totally crazy, over nice, interesting or funny to "little non-sense".
The walk starts in the north at Kjelsås station by the lake and goes then southwards towards the town. However, one can start and stop at any other point along the way. I had previously done only a very little part of it once. In 2011 (click here for the post). I was never there to do the entire walk, though. This year this event fell on September 25th and I was in Oslo this time. So I had organized the walk with some friends and colleague's of Marco. We had decided to start at the very top.

Unfortunately we had to discover that we were not the only ones with that plan. Already the busses bringing us up to Kjelsås were totally packed and we managed to meet up with the others only with delay. At the start of the river we found ourselves among many other thousands of people, all squeezing themselves on the little path along the river, slowly making their way southwards. Consequently it was nearly impossible to really see the art performances along the way. Only rarely one managed to get a glimpse of what was shown or exposed. On top of that it was pretty dark. The few candles were mainly placed on the ground, not reaching the people's faces. So we were quite busy with just trying not to lose each other among the moving mass of people.
Luckily, the further southwards we came, the crowd  became less dense and making headway was a bit more relaxing.

 

Unfortunately, starting on the very top of the river meant that by the time you finally arrived further southwards, some artists had already left or some shows were already over. And well, it was only after 11 pm when we finally arrived in Grünerløkka where Marco and I live and said good bye to the others.

I think if I do it again, I will start the walk not on the very top, but maybe somewhere half way, at Nydalen or so. However, I have passed suburbs of Oslo that evening where I had never been before. And I have the impression that a walk (or why not cycling) along the river during daylight would be very nice as you come through and pass by beautiful places.