Cruise up the West Coast
We went back to Bergen on the Hydrofoil, and although we'd seen the islands and towns, the 4 hour trip was still stimulating. We had time to stock up on some salmon at the fish markets, and our return to Bergen was like seeing an old friend again! Our passender ship is quite big and has seven levels, our cabin being on level 3. It has two fold out beds, one of which doubles as a couch. It has a shower and toilet as well as a small table, arm chair and desk and heaps of cupboard space. Our large porthole looks out to sea rather than on the land side, but we've been surprised that there are very few "open sea" sections of the voyage and most of it is through fjords or amongst islands, so the views from the cabin are quite nice. Often we have woken up at 3am and looked at the scenery for a while as is is light around then.
We call in at various ports along the way and I'll describe some of them. Alesund is a small town that we had two stops in, one for three quarters of an hour and another for an hour. The town is VERY compact and has Art Noveau architecture, so the buildings have turrets and lovely wrought iron. On the first stop we wandered around some of the street recommended by Lonely Planet and found our way to the old town centre. We had a good brisk walk, with not many people around as we were quite early in the day. We made it back to the boat with a couple of minutes to spare.
Then the boat went to the famous fjord (which I hadn't heard of before we planned this trip) called Gieranger. It is a small fjord, with many waterfalls, some whispy and some raging. It has steep sides and typical glacial walls where the rock faces show the waring that the ice caused so long agog. We stayed outside on the deck the whole time, and it really was enthralling. Poor little town of Geiranger which has a population of around 1000 that has 150 cruise ships visit with an estimated 600,000 people passing through! We decided not to go on a land excursion (as we'd just be sitting on a bus for 5 hours) and stayed on the ship for the return to Alesund, and enjoyed the fjord a second time.
Back in Alesund we'd discovered a park (Aksala) with a view over the town, and so we raced up towards the 418 steps to the top. It really was a magnificent view, so we stayed a little longer than we needed to regain our breath. We wandered off the path on the way down and ended up in part of the town we didn't recognise, but Eva avoided panicing and we made it back to the ship with 2 minutes to spare! These adventures are good for our adenaline supply.
I still haven't worked out how to upload photos and often the internet computers are locked away so I cannot get a USB connection. So sorry, the photos may have to wait till I get back to Oz or at least till we get to Munich.
Next stop was at Trondheim, although there are quite a number of stops between, but they are too short to get off. We walked the 20 minutes or so into town and found an old looking bridge with a beautiful view of coloured houses by the river. You could almost picture the viking ships coming alongside! We made our way up a steep path to the old fort, which was a lovely grassed area, with cannons and old white buildings and a lovely view. They had built a cycle lift to help get cyclists up the hill and this worked a little like a skiing t-bar. We never saw anyone using it though. Next we visited the enormous catedral. Trondheim was established in 997 and in 1022 (?) Olav H introduced chrisianity and had this cathedral built which has a very large number of stained glass windows and thousands of arvings of people, angels etc all over its walls. We also visited the museum which had finds from the area discovered when various renovations were being done. The nearby armoury was very interesting and presented very well, in some styles reminiscent of the Australian War Memorial.
We filled up on rolls and fruit and cake and headed back to the ship.
We are now in Bodø and are north of the artic circle. Tomorrow we arrive in Tromsø and get our car there to go exploring for a week. The weather is meant to be improving although the forcast max for Tuesday is 5 degrees. As long as the rain stays away (which it largely has) we are OK. Eva has more layers than a battery hen farm and our gortex jackets keep the wind off very well. But often there is no wind and we always have had some sunshine.
We have used the exercise room on the boat (me for 30 mins and Eva for an hour) and done our washing. We've met a very nice Dutch couple who may come to visit Australia. We are well, happy and having fun!!
We call in at various ports along the way and I'll describe some of them. Alesund is a small town that we had two stops in, one for three quarters of an hour and another for an hour. The town is VERY compact and has Art Noveau architecture, so the buildings have turrets and lovely wrought iron. On the first stop we wandered around some of the street recommended by Lonely Planet and found our way to the old town centre. We had a good brisk walk, with not many people around as we were quite early in the day. We made it back to the boat with a couple of minutes to spare.
Then the boat went to the famous fjord (which I hadn't heard of before we planned this trip) called Gieranger. It is a small fjord, with many waterfalls, some whispy and some raging. It has steep sides and typical glacial walls where the rock faces show the waring that the ice caused so long agog. We stayed outside on the deck the whole time, and it really was enthralling. Poor little town of Geiranger which has a population of around 1000 that has 150 cruise ships visit with an estimated 600,000 people passing through! We decided not to go on a land excursion (as we'd just be sitting on a bus for 5 hours) and stayed on the ship for the return to Alesund, and enjoyed the fjord a second time.
Back in Alesund we'd discovered a park (Aksala) with a view over the town, and so we raced up towards the 418 steps to the top. It really was a magnificent view, so we stayed a little longer than we needed to regain our breath. We wandered off the path on the way down and ended up in part of the town we didn't recognise, but Eva avoided panicing and we made it back to the ship with 2 minutes to spare! These adventures are good for our adenaline supply.
I still haven't worked out how to upload photos and often the internet computers are locked away so I cannot get a USB connection. So sorry, the photos may have to wait till I get back to Oz or at least till we get to Munich.
Next stop was at Trondheim, although there are quite a number of stops between, but they are too short to get off. We walked the 20 minutes or so into town and found an old looking bridge with a beautiful view of coloured houses by the river. You could almost picture the viking ships coming alongside! We made our way up a steep path to the old fort, which was a lovely grassed area, with cannons and old white buildings and a lovely view. They had built a cycle lift to help get cyclists up the hill and this worked a little like a skiing t-bar. We never saw anyone using it though. Next we visited the enormous catedral. Trondheim was established in 997 and in 1022 (?) Olav H introduced chrisianity and had this cathedral built which has a very large number of stained glass windows and thousands of arvings of people, angels etc all over its walls. We also visited the museum which had finds from the area discovered when various renovations were being done. The nearby armoury was very interesting and presented very well, in some styles reminiscent of the Australian War Memorial.
We filled up on rolls and fruit and cake and headed back to the ship.
We are now in Bodø and are north of the artic circle. Tomorrow we arrive in Tromsø and get our car there to go exploring for a week. The weather is meant to be improving although the forcast max for Tuesday is 5 degrees. As long as the rain stays away (which it largely has) we are OK. Eva has more layers than a battery hen farm and our gortex jackets keep the wind off very well. But often there is no wind and we always have had some sunshine.
We have used the exercise room on the boat (me for 30 mins and Eva for an hour) and done our washing. We've met a very nice Dutch couple who may come to visit Australia. We are well, happy and having fun!!
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