Tromso, NO

After completing a tour of England last year I decided to keep an old promise made to myself to return to the Oslo Opera House to take a tour and see an opera. So I extended the vacation to include 4 additional days in Oslo and added a day trip 200 mi north of the Arctic circle to visit Tromso, NO. That city proved to be worthy of much more than a day trip. It is not the scant toe hold by an adventurous few on the edge of the World, It has a university, super markets, restaurents, yacht harbors, agriculture (if limited), cathedrals, hotels, and a bright, friendly, well educated population who are all going about there daily routines as though they were in Bergen. Kids in school were of many ethnicities which left a sense that here, as in the rest of Norway was a truly civilized culture. Warmed by remnants of of the Gulf Stream, the north Norwegian coast has milder temperatures than one would expect. In June it was 67F with a Summer record in the 80s. People around me were in tank tops and shorts. The trip was a wonderful suprise experience.