Arctic Circle Tour - Honningsvag to Alta, Norway

Norwegian
YES/NO Ja / Nei
HELLO/GOODBYE Hei / Ha det bra
PLEASE/THANK-YOU Vaer sa snill / Takk
CHEERS Skal
CURRENCY Norwegian krone

The sun had was already up when we got up at 4.30 for a 5.30 departure on a coastal cruise of the fjords. We picked up our breakfast packs (without fish) from the hotel and boarded one of the Hurtigruten ferries after waiting for a short time on the wharf.

The Hurtigruten coastal ships travel along the coast of Norway stopping at major towns south to Bergan which is west of Oslo. As well as us there were cruise passengers on-board who had cabins and access to meals, educational talks and other facilities. We managed to nab some really great seats in front of some great large windows.

My friend Dawn and I went for a little tour of the boat and unexpectedly got dragged into an aerobics class on the back deck. The weather was quite cool, there was only the occasional rolling

motion (good for maintaining core strength) and the class moderately easy. Dawn looked like she knew what she was doing. Not wanting to take off our overcoats we slipped away as soon as the instructor stopped focusing on our technique (or lack of).

The coast was as stunning from the sea as it was from the shore. We are now totally in love with Norwegian scenery although John continues to make comments like “It’s such a beautiful country. I could live here. Why didn’t Renveig tell me about the price of beer??”

After a few hours we disembarked at Hammerfest and boarded the bus again. The lady who was sitting near us (we will call her Moaning Mona because that’s all she did) complained that we should have visited the villages on the coast by bus rather than view the fjord from a ship. I strongly suspect the villages main activities were fishing or

oil and didn’t cater for tourists.

We continued along the coast enjoying beautiful coastal and mountain scenery. Just before we arrived at our destination we caught a glimpse of a wedding that was taking place at a nearby church. We could see some of the guests wearing traditional outfits. We have since learned that these are called “bunad.” I have stolen a photo from the internet as we were not able to get one ourselves.

Bunad are very beautiful traditional outfits and there are over 450 different variations depending on region, marital status, colours, materials, decoration and so on. Many people still wear the outfits for weddings, baptisms etc. Later in the tour we saw some outfits displayed in shops – VERY expensive due to the complexity of the embroidery and other detail. John noted that, for a change, these

outfits cost more than beer.

We arrived at Alta and booked into the Scandic Alta Hotel. Alta is also in Finmark county and is situated on Altaelva one of the world’s richest salmon rivers. The frequent clear skies are one of the reasons Alta was chosen as an excellent location for studying the northern lights. Unfortunately for me, despite hourly alarms during the very short night, there were no lights to be seen.

Next: Arctic Circle Tour – Alta to Narvik, Norway