{"id":3248,"date":"2024-03-22T21:41:30","date_gmt":"2024-03-22T21:41:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/?p=3248"},"modified":"2024-03-22T21:41:32","modified_gmt":"2024-03-22T21:41:32","slug":"bergen-norway-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/bergen-norway-2\/","title":{"rendered":"BERGEN, NORWAY"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Today we have been in Bergen, Norway. We arrived last night at 10pm, so when we awoke we were already there, and able to finally see our surroundings in daylight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To be honest, it was just nice not having to be up at the crack of dawn, and to be able to enjoy a relaxed breakfast at a gentle, civilised pace.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once we’d finished our bredakfast we headed ashore, using the Maps.Me app to navigate our way from the cruise terminal to the Vagen Harbour and the town centre, where our first objective was to visit Bryggen and seek out a shop selling exclusive Christmas Tree decorations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Bryggen – Bergen’s historic harbour district featuring a series of what would once have been important Hanseatic commercial buildings – is a World Heritage site. We’ve been there before, several times, but wandering through the tight, narrow alleyways and admiring the old wooden buildings there never fails to captivate us. The only difference today from previous visits was that it wasn’t raining stair rods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I’m pleased to say that Tracey managed to find a suitable Yuletide dangly thing and once we’d exhausted our hanseatic meanderings, we headed for the funicular railway that would take us to the top of the hill that overlooks Bergen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the railway carriage we got chatting to three guys, two of whom were from York and their friend who was visiting from Minneapolis. As we left the train at the top, we told them we’d probably bump into them again later in the trip – possibly in Flam – as they too were making their way North through the country. We’ll see\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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At the top, we enjoyed clear, expansive views across the city below and down the fjord towards the open Sea. We remarked on how the weather was being so much kinder to us than the last few times we’ve visited, when it’s either been raining heavily, snowing, or been so murky that you could barely see to the opposite side of the harbour below. Needless to say, there were no such issues today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Right next to the visitor centre at the top of the railway is a large, mountainous and wooded area festooned with hiking routes leading off in all directions. Footpaths to suit every different grade of walker lead up, and over, the hills to various viewpoints rising above the trees. We followed one such path, not knowing exactly where it would take us, and was delighted to find ourselves on an exposed pinnacle of rock looking out across towards the snow-capped summits of the next range of hills.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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We loved it. We could have gone further, had we been wearing the right footwear for it. We were both wearing good trail shoes, but going any higher would require proper hiking boots (which we have with us, but are back in the cabin).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Satisfied with our wild mountain climbing adventure, we made our way back down towards the railway, and onwards, back down to the city of Bergen below.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At which point it started raining, making it a good time to head into a Starbucks for lunch; a chicken and bacon bagel, chocolate muffin, and a cup of tea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the weather not looking like it was going to improve any time soon, and feeling that we had achieved everything that we’d set out to do, we walked back to the ship and enjoyed a cup of tea and chocolate chip cookies in the lounge on Deck 4. We felt we’d earned it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have another night in port, and will continue on our way in the morning. With Alesund having been taken off the itinerary, our next port of call will now be Alta in two days time. That’s two sea days, with classes\u2026 Here’s hoping the skies start to clear\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today we have been in Bergen, Norway. We arrived last night at 10pm, so when we awoke we were already there, and able to finally see our surroundings in daylight. To be honest, it was just nice not having to be up at the crack of dawn, and to be able to enjoy a relaxed breakfast at a gentle, civilised...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3251,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[28,4,38,36],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3248"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3248"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3248\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3254,"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3248\/revisions\/3254"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3251"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3248"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3248"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}