Norway has Europe’s ‘first underwater restaurant’, says report

KUALA LUMPUR (March 21): If you happen to find yourself in Baaly, Norway, do not forget to check out “Europe’s first underwater restaurant”.

And it has been aptly called “Under”, which is actually “wonder” in the Norwegian language.

The design of the restaurant is the work of Norwegian architecture company Snoehetta, which also created the Opera house in Oslo and the National September 11 Memorial Museum in New York, reported Reuters yesterday.

“The fascination is just this movement from above water to underwater through the building... The big window exposes the underwater not like an aquarium, it’s the real thing,” Snoehetta’s founder Kjetil Traedal Thorsen told Reuters.

The restaurant has large dining area that can accommodate about 40 guests and “walled by a gigantic transparent window to the ocean”.

Traedal Thorsen told Reuters the design can cope with “very harsh weather and is shaped in such a way that it can withstand a ‘wave of the century’”.

How about the food? Well, it is not cheap.

The Reuters report said that a “full 18-course meal, based on local ingredients and seafood, can cost up to 3,700 crowns (RM1,765) per person including drinks”.

Still interested? Well, get to southern tip of Norway first before deciding.