It has been 5 years (on and off) in the making but our long-awaited trip to Scandinavia is just 10 weeks away. We are leaving Australia at the end of June. Many thanks to those who have made suggestions and helped me tweak our arrangements to arrive at the final version of our itinerary. Whilst it may not suit everyone we feel it will work for us (couple in our mid 60s).
A few things we considered in the planning:
We checked the cruise ship schedule and found 3 consecutive days in Flam where there are no cruise ships scheduled and based our days there on this. Our express boat trip from Svolvaer to Bodo is a Sunday - the departure time is 12.45pm on Sundays which is better (for us) than 6am departures on weekdays. Overnight trains and ferries are a cost-effective mode of travel as you bundle transport and accommodation costs together. The midnight sun will mean that we can enjoy sightseeing into the evening as we travel.
All of our flights, accommodation and cruises/tours are booked. I am waiting for the train bookings to open over the next few weeks and we will book those. We will not have a car on Lofoten Islands so are planning to buy a Travel Pass Nordland which is a 7 day pass that we will be able to use on the bus from Narvik, buses all over Lofoten and the express boat to Bodo which altogether will make it a simple and cost-effective choice.
27-Jun-24 Fly Melbourne to Copenhagen
28-Jun-24 (Overnight Copenhagen)
29-Jun-24 Train from Copenhagen to Gothenburg (2 nights Gothenburg)
30-Jun-24
1-Jul-24 Train from Gothenburg to Stockholm (3 nights Stockholm)
2-Jul-24
3-Jul-24
4-Jul-24 Train from Stockholm to Uppsala (2 nights Uppsala)
5-Jul-24
6-Jul-24 Overnight train from Uppsala to Lulea
7-Jul-24 (Overnight Lulea)
8-Jul-24 Train from Lulea to Narvik (2 nights Narvik)
9-Jul-24
10-Jul-24 Bus from Narvik to Svolvaer (4 nights Svolvaer)
11-Jul-24
12-Jul-24
13-Jul-24
14-Jul-24 Ferry from Svolvaer to Bodo
Overnight train from Bodo to Trondheim
15-Jul-24 (2 nights Trondheim)
16-Jul-24
17-Jul-24 Cruise from Trondheim to Bergen
18-Jul-24 (2 nights Bergen)
19-Jul-24
20-Jul-24 Bergen to Flam (Norway in a Nutshell) (2 nights Flam)
21-Jul-24
22-Jul-24 Flam to Oslo (Norway in a Nutshell) (2 nights Oslo)
23-Jul-24
24-Jul-24 Ferry from Oslo to Copenhagen (overnight)
25-Jul-24 (3 nights Copenhagen)
26-Jul-24
27-Jul-24
28-Jul-24 Fly Copenhagen to Melbourne