Trip Outline:
- Flight to Oslo - 1 night
- Train to Bergen - 2 nights
- Hurtigruten cruise - 6 nights
- Kirkenes - 1 night
- Flight to Oslo - 3 nights
- Flight to the U.S.
Day 2: Oslo: My flight arrived in the evening. At the airport, I followed the signs for Trains. The Vy and flytoget trains were in the same general area and I just followed the sign to the Vy train ticket machine and track. I purchased my ticket onsite since I didn’t know exactly what my time frame would be - and the price was the same. The ticket machine was simple to use (I used Apple Pay) and the ticket gave me the next available train and track number.
Stayed: Thon Hotel Astoria, about an easy 5 minute walk. It was perfectly fine but fairly small and was just for a short night of sleep. Breakfast was good. I booked direct for a bit of a discount.
Day 2: Took the 8:25 am train to Bergen. I had prepurchased tickets 90 days ahead. I did pay a little more and buy Pluss for what might have been more space, coffee and tea available all the way, and potential date/time change (if there was a delay on my flight).
The train ended up taking about 7 hours and the scenery was stunning. There wasn’t snow on the ground in Oslo, but there was plenty going across the mountains! I didn’t attempt the Norway in a Nutshell detour this time - with jetlag, heading on to Bergen took precedence. There was food available to,buy on the train, but I had leftovers from arrival night dinner, so didn’t go to the cafe car.
It was about a 10 minute walk to the hotel from the train station.
Stayed: 2 nights at Magic Hotel Kløverhuset. This was a really nice stay
Day 3: Today I slept late, then wandered the old town and went to the Hanseatic Museum.
Day 4: Packed up, checked out and left luggage. Then rode the funicular up the mountain for great views. This would make a lovely place to take a picnic in warmer weather - but I had sunshine for several hours and not much wind. After some soup at bread and coffee at Got Brod, it was time to reclaim luggage and head to the port to board my Hurtigruten ferry up the coast.
Uber was available, fast, and easy in Bergen, but somewhat expensive; and if you choose carefully, almost everything you could need is a 5-15 minute walk.
Hurtigruten, Days 5-11: I will start with saying I don’t cruise, so have no experience with big boats. Because it was winter, one of my kids was with me and this was a bucket list item for them, and we wanted to see the northern lights, March was a good choice for this trip. I chose a Polar Outside cabin so there was a starboard cabin view, which was nice - although I didn’t spend a ton of time in the cabin except to sleep.
Breakfast and lunch were always buffets and dinner most nights was a 3 course meal, with 3 choices offered for each course. There were two nights with a buffet dinner. There was also two other choices for lunch and dinner, plus a bakery for breakfast items, if you did not have the included meals (or didn’t like what was being served). Deck 7 was the inside (or outside) lounge with big windows and lots of seating.
Continued…..