How do you say "2 single beds" in Norwegian?
 

I'm looking for hotels in Norway and Sweden for our upcoming trip with our two college age sons. We expect them to share a room, but it seems that Norwegian hoteliers make no distinction between a room with one double bed and one with two single beds next to each other. They're both "double rooms" and that's all there is to it. I've just had an email exchange with one hotel whose website clearly shows that in at least one room, the beds are twins, pushed together. I asked to book that room, or another one with 2 single beds. The hotel's response: they have only double rooms. Is this some kind of cultural thing? Are my sons really the first travelers in Norway to prefer one man, one bed? Or am I failing to use the right words to describe what I want? Can someone tell me how to say "I would like to book a double room with two single beds, please" in Norwegian (and also in Swedish)? Thanks for your help!

If the room shows two twins pushed together - which is fairly normal then can't you just push them apart a bit yourselves?

I can't see that it will be so terrible for them to share such a bed anyway - it will be at least 5 foot and probably 6 foot wide, with separate mattresses and quilts.

I suggest you try using Google translate or similar if no-one can come up with the Norwegian for you.

I don't know if this applies to Norway specifically, but usually in Europe a "double room" always means a double bed. A "twin room" means two beds.

Taken from the Thon hotel website:
Twinbeds: twinseng.
double bed dobbeltseng.

Even then the twin is likely to have the beds pushed together.

When I'm traveling with a friend and sharing a room, I just say "2 beds". Succinct and avoids confusion. Anyone in the hotel booking business in those parts will speak English, at least to that extent.

Thanks everyone, I will try your suggestions. You are right, Hetismij, it does not matter if the beds are pushed together. If it is two mattresses, it is two beds, as I count them.

And Goofle Translate is so helpful. However, we dound that everyone we dealt with in the Scandinavian countries spoke perfect English.

Better use English anyway - you often find that hotel staff don't speak Norwegian - there is free movement of labour in the European Economic Area.

And to hetismij2: the double is also likely to be 2 beds pushed together except in rather upmarket hotels.

Dyoll, I am well aware of that, and pointed it out in my first post.
I am well aware of European hotel beds, and European domestic beds. Ut is very rare outside the UK to find a single mattress on any bed wider than 140 cm.

I just looked at some random hotel and date in Stockholm and there was a drop down box allowing me to select two twin beds. It might be worth a look for you to try that site. In this case it was the Best Western Kom Hotel.

In Swedish two single beds would be: två enkla sängar. They might be pushed together but they are two beds after all. And even if the sons need to sleep close they can be assured of a separate duvet for each person since that's the custom. :). Or, you could always book a room with two double beds instead of two singles to avoid the potential problem.

Two double beds in one room? - that would be considered far to kinky for Scandinavia.

Thinking this is a tempest in a teapot - Scandinavians speak English. They learn it because no one outside Scandinavia (or Finland or Iceland) speaks their tongue - it's their own "secret language" as the leads from Of Monsters and Men said on an interview show.

They might not be two twins pushed together. They are sometimes two bases with either one large or two single mattresses on top (but you cannot separate the base) and usually separate duvets but it could also be one large duvet. So I would check that they are indeed separate beds pushed together that you can separate as there are several configurations.

If I am reading the original post correctly, the poster is writing in English and receiving answers in English; it just appears to her that the Norwegian hotels do not understand what she is asking for or that she is not sure how to interpret their responses. Also it appears to me that she knows the two mattresses might be pushed together and that is fine with her, she just wants to make sure the room has two mattresses.

There appears to be a lot of misunderstanding right here on this thread.

The incomprehensible bit is why the poster doesn't just ring the hotel and ask. Most of the contributions seem pretty relevant - you ask for a twin. In most cases, especially budget hotels, it won't make much difference - there will be two beds, either pushed together or apart - you choose. There is never a double duvet, always 2 singles.

It is untrue in my experience that it is ALWAYS 2 single duvets. I can be, but might not be. It can be one duvet over two mattresses.

I see that this thread has gone a bit cold, but I suspect this is more than a language issue, and would love some insight. I'm an American traveling through northern Norway right now, and my husband and I are having your exact issue - but in reverse.

We've now been to 4 different hotels in Northern Norway (we're on a bike tour, so a different hotel every night), and cannot for the life of us get a room with a double bed. Every "double room" we've stayed in has had two twin beds - sometimes pushed together, but sometimes across the room from each other. At one hotel, we asked to switch to a room with a double bed, and were told that there were no double beds in the entire hotel, but we were welcome to push the two single beds together.

These have otherwise been very nice hotels, but after 4 identical experiences, we're now desperately curious as to why hotels don't have double beds up here! We had no such problem in Oslo. Are these cultural differences between northern and southern Norway? Religious influence? We haven't had the opportunity to ask a local, but we have loved our time here, and are curious just to understand the place better.

Thanks!

Amanda: I think you are looking for the term "grand lit" or "marriage bed".

Thanks! That makes sense.