Sunday – Tromso
Today, we arrived in Tromso. We weren’t supposed to arrive in Tromso; we were supposed to be heading for Alta, but a Captain’s announcement told us that we would have to stop at Tromso for a full inspection of the hull of the ship, as decreed by the Norwegian Authorities. What that was all about, frankly, no-one really knows, but it did mean a massive changearound for the shore excursions team; organising tours that were not planned to take place for a couple of days, and reorganising them so that they could be completed before dark.
The sun has been rising at about 8am, and it’s been getting dark at around 2:30 – 3pm. This is perfectly normal for these parts, apparently; from mid-November through until about March, they have what they call ‘Polar Night’, where the sun doesn’t rise at all. In June/July, they have the opposite; it becomes the land of the midnight sun, when the sun never sets.
Suddenly, then, we were on tour. The ship arrived in port soon after midday, and our tours were the first off, since they entailed a trip up a cable car. To the confusion of everybody, however, both coaches headed not for the cable car, but for Tromso museum, where we spend over an hour not being able to read any of the text accompanying the exhibits, because none of it was in English. The museum visit was boring and unproductive. Most people tired of it very quickly, and the lack of english information made it all the more frustrating. Time was getting on when we finally headed for the cable car.
The trip up the mountain (roughly 400metres) took about 5 minutes. The car itself only carries a maximum of 27 people, though, so it took a couple of trips to get everyone up. At the top was a small viewing platform and a restaurant. The view from the platform was quite impressive; now that the sun had set, the lights from the city were quite something to behold. The fact that we hadn’t gone here first still confused (and in some instances, angered) several people, but the night-time view was, I’m sure, just as exciting, and worthy of the trip, as a daytime ride.
It was all over too quickly. The wind was blowing a hooly on the viewing platform, and since most people didn’t feel like spending money in the restaurant, the queue to return back down the hill started forming early. For some reason, they don’t seem to operate a perpetual, as-required service; they had fixed travel times posted up, and despite the logistics of trying to get everyone back down to ground level (and it only taking approximately 5 minutes), they simply weren’t going to run it until the appointed times.
By 5:30pm, we were all aboard, preparing to sail towards Honningsvaarg.
