At Sea - Bergen to Rorvik

Monday 21^st May

A slow start this morning as we were checking out of the hotel and check in for our Hurtigruten Cruise wasn’t till 3:00 pm.  We left our luggage in the hotel store and walked a block to check the route to the ferry terminal as suggested by the hotel, a much better route than the one we had planned, the hills were nowhere as steep. 

We continued on to a park with a large lake and some of the biggest and best flowering cherries we have seen and a large display of tulips in the garden beds and around the perimeter of the lake.  Today was a perfect spring day, sunny and no wind with dozens of people sunbaking everywhere, in fact every park we walked through today was crowded with people enjoying the sun and in the little lanes people were sitting in front of their houses in the sun.

Some food observations, Europe still has lovely grainy bread with crusts that crunch, not like the plastic bread that is sold at home.  A Big Mac Quarter Pounder in Bergen costs $17 and speaking to an Australian who bought one and said “it was revolting!”

After collecting our luggage we walked to the ferry terminal and checked in but had to wait an hour and sit through a safety briefing before we could board at 4:00 and passengers weren’t allowed into their cabins until nearly 6:00.

Dinner tonight was a buffet with open seating but from tomorrow we have set seating and allocated time for dinner, though breakfast and lunch are open time and seating.  After dinner we had a briefing on shore excursions and given a booklet about all the ports we will visit; we have just been out on deck at 10:30 pm to watch the sun set, a huge red ball.  It’s now nearly 11:00 and still light so I think it’s time to draw the curtains to darken our cabin and go to bed.

Tuesday 22^nd May

I’m writing this, sitting in our cabin at 9:00 pm looking out the window at magnificent snow covered mountains bathed in sunshine.  Last night after leaving Bergen the ship called at two ports, at 2:00 am and 4:00, we didn’t bother to get up to watch and during breakfast it stopped briefly at Torvik before continuing on the Alesund.  After breakfast we had half an hour for a quick look around the harbour and the Art Nouveau buildings built after the big city fire in 1904.

 

We then left to sail for four hours up the Geirangerfjord surrounded by mountains with waterfalls cascading into the fjord, from time to time passing an open area with a small farm house clinging to the shore, many of them roofed with sod.  Arriving at the end of the fjord at Geiranger there were three passenger liners moored offshore, we were transferred ashore in a small ferry and boarded coaches for a tour back to Alesund, the ship returning there to meet us.

Geiranger, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is a town of 280 people but today our guide estimated that there were 6000 people in town.  Our first stop was at the museum where we watched a slide show of the town and surrounding area before driving up the Eagle’s Road, so named because it zig zags up the mountain and looks like the outstretched wings of an eagle, stopping at several spots to look out over the town and the fjord as we drove back to Alesund.  The road climbed to over 400 metres before descending but still travelling high above the fjord and passing through about six tunnels through the mountains, the longest being 4 km.

Arriving back at Alesund we drove up Mt. Aksla for a view over the town and fjord and while there we watched the ship arrive at the wharf, so after a drive around the town to view the architecture we arrived back at the ship in time for a 6:30 departure.

At 9:30 pm we arrived at the next port, Molde and on the wharf to greet us was the Molde Brass and Drum band.  All the drummers were girls and many of the members of the band also and we were treated to half an hour of drum and brass numbers, before they marched off to loud applause from all the passengers.

Wednesday 23^rd May

We were half an hour late sailing from Molde last night, the Tour Leader went ashore, apparently ill and we had to wait for his replacement to arrive before the ship could leave.

During the night the ship called at Kristansund for fifteen minutes but we weren’t aware of the visit.  Even though we were late leaving last night we arrived at Trondheim on time to find another Hurtigruten, south bound ferry docked.  The Captain swung the ship 180 degrees and backed past the moored ship to dock behind it, he handled the “reverse parking” better than most people can park their car.

The ship stayed four hours at Trondheim but we didn’t elect to go on any of the tours as we will be leaving the ship here on our return trip, staying for four days, instead we walked into town to check out our accommodation.  We will have a thirty minute walk on our return.

We sailed at noon and two hours later passed an old light house in the water, built in 1880, it must have been a lonely existence for the old lighthouse keepers and they didn’t even have a rock to walk on.  Later we entered a very narrow section of water and the Captain had to sound the ship’s siren to warn of our approach to any ships around the corner.

  

After dinner we docked at Rorvik for a short time and went ashore for half an hour, being a small town there was very little to see except the turbines and blades stacked on the wharf, for a series of wind generators being built across the harbour.

We cross the Arctic Circle around breakfast time tomorrow and maybe the snow will return as today the mountains have been much smaller and snow free.