Tromsø!

On Saturday morning, after sleeping just a few hours, I got up at 5.30 and fixed myself to go to Tromsø, where I was about to board the northbound Hurtigrute towards Kirkenes and the North Cape! Getting up after the Christmas party of the day before wasn’t easy at all. I was still slightly tipsy and totally dehydrated.

Anyways, I eventually got to the airport and took my flight up to Tromsø. It was pretty eventless and routine in a way. I took the airport bus to the city center and there something funny happened; We are selling, well Authentic Scandinavia is selling many winter tours starting from Tromsø. In the bus, I was a bit hung over, I suddenly recognized the logo of the company. The people sitting in front of me had vouchers of our company and were reading the travel description we sent them! So random!

I took the bus to the city center and went to the Rica Ishavshotel, where I left my luggage in the luggage room. Since Tromsø is rather small, doesn’t have a railway station and also no lockers in the tourist information this is the only possibility to leave luggage.

So there I was at 11 o’clock, still slightly tipsy and with a whole day to spend. The first thing I did was going to a kiosk to get something to eat, a coke and a coffee. I ate the slice of pizza straight away, had half the bottle of coke and took the coffee with me for a walk around town.

I went down to the waterline, where the wind was blowing pretty strong and walked with the wind in my back along the harbor. I didn’t really know what to do and where to go; I had been reading before in my guide and had some things I had considered doing, but I really had no plan. So I just walked on and suddenly stood in front of the Polar museum, which was on my list. It had just opened and so I went in.

I was walking around the rooms, which were showing exhibits about the life in the arctic; About fishing, whaling, trapping and also about the arctic explorer Roald Amundsen. It was really interesting and I spend a long time there looking around and also talking to the employee, who was a real Viking with blond hair, a long braided beard and eyes so blue, you really can’t imagine!

After the museum I went over the bridge, left the island on which Tromsø is located, and walked to the Ishavskatedralen a very famous church, but it was closed. So I walked on along the icy roads towards the Fjellheisen cable car. 

I was lucky, the cable car was just about to leave 5 minutes later, so I waited. The cable car brought me and one other guy up to the mountain top. From the top we had a wonderful view over Tromsø. I walked around and tried to take some pictures, but the wind was so strong and I was freezing; I was just not wearing the right clothes. Instead of spending the time outside I went into the café and got a coffee. I actually intended to stay just half an hour up on the mountain, but it was such a nice view, that I stayed 1 ½ hours.

When coming down it was already dark, but not late. Tromsø being some 400km into the Arctic Circle doenst have so much sunlight during the winter and it usually gets dark at around 2 o’clock in the afternoon. I walked back along Ishavskatedralen over the bridge back to the down. While I was up on the mountain the ship had arrived and wanted to check in already, leave my luggage and put my real winter clothes on.

After having this done I made my way back downtown, to the old church and along the main street to Stortorget, the main square. I passed the Polaris museum, another museum about the life in the arctic and went once again over the bridge to the Ishavskatedralen. I knew that it was open from 4 o’clock and since I just took pictures of it, when it wasn’t illuminated it was totally worth it!

After some time I walked to the supermarket to get some food for the time on the boat. I just had breakfast included and the other things onboard were quite expensive to buy and so I decided to buy some small things for the two days on the ship.

I boarded the ship, went to my cabin, was settling a bit and was just coming up again to explore the ship when we left the harbor of Tromsø and my trip, direction North Cape, begun!

~M~