Where we’ve been...
Norway
Seeing the Northern
Lights has been on my
list of “things to do” for
many years, probably
since seeing the Joanna
Lumley documentary
which brought the whole
phenomenon to my
attention.
“
So with the excuse of a special birthday
to celebrate this year and the fact that
the Northern Light activity was due
to be at a peak in 2013, the decision
was made and me and my husband
Dave booked a six-night voyage on the
Norwegian Hurtigruten Coastal Steamer
followed by a three-night stay in Tromso
(to extend the time in the Arctic Circle
and maximising our chances of seeing
the Lights) and we rounded off our trip
with three nights in Oslo visiting friends.
Of course, you are in no way guaranteed
on seeing the Lights, you can pick the
right year, the right month, but if the
weather takes a turn for the worse
then its hard luck! I was trying to think
about it in a practical way and kept
telling myself ‘we are going to see some
amazing scenery and its going to be a
wonderful holiday and if we do manage
to see the Lights, it will be an added
bonus’ but I know in the back of my
mind that the whole holiday was based
on seeing them and I would be hugely
disappointed if we didn’t.
So February arrived and with the cases
packed full with every type of thermal
you can imagine, we boarded the flight
to Bergen, Norway, and our adventure
began.
We had planned it so we would have
a few hours to explore Bergen before
boarding our ship, it was a beautiful
sunny day and I was glad I packed the
sunglasses as well as all the layers of
warmth for later in the trip. Bergen is
beautiful coastal port, the main feature
being the Bryggen Harbour area which is
one of UNESCO’s world heritage sites.
Neither of us had done a cruise before but we knew that
this was not going to be your typical large cruise liner
“
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