Norway?

The snow here in Morecambe hasn’t settled any length of time. Little flurries land & disappear as quickly as they appear. Not so on the Lakeland fells across the Bay or the on the Pennines behind Lancaster. They all have snuggled into deep blankets of snow.

We finally got to the travel agents yesterday to enquire about a holiday to Norway. We came back saddened in some ways. They could find few options to recommend.

However, they did find one new brochure to look at. In it has come the idea of going on the Hurtigruten Coastal Express. These are ferries that go up the western coast of Norway from Bergen, stopping at villages & towns along the way, right the way up to the Russian border in the Arctic Circle. Some places they stop for several hours so you could get off & explore a bit, others they’re just in port for 15 minutes, time to offload & reload with passengers, cars & goods. The Fox is excited about the idea. I’m not quite so sure.

To my mind it is a lot of time on board ship – 11 nights for the return trip. It will also be very cold in the furthest north regions. However, I will look into the possibilities a bit. We don’t have to do the full trip. We could stop at Tromsø for a day or so & catch a different ship back to Bergen.

The Hurtigruten are much more a normal ferry transport for Norwegians rather than “luxury” cruising. The culture on the ship should be Norwegian & most of our fellow passengers would be Norwegian. In theory we should then be able to meet some local people & eat more Norwegian food. Going so far north we would also have the possibilities of seeing the Northern Lights, whales, walruses & puffins. There are some definite attractions.

If we do decide on these ferries we would add on some time spent in Bergen itself. Our brief look at Bergen last year made us think it a place well worth a visit. It also decided us, if ever we go again, we’re taking waterproof leggings, coats & hats. A place that rains 285 days in a year suggests it will probably rain. Our few hours exploring last year proved to us the rain can be torrential. It took us a couple of days for our clothes to fully dry out.

Time I got looking & finding out more. Decisions need to be made soon if we’re going to be off in the spring.