Musing While Cruising

Wednesday, July 1

As I write this blog, we have completed our last excursion on the water in Hardangerfjord. The approach to the fjord was spectacular. And the excursion itself was a doozy. But more on that later. Tonight, we head for Bergen for our last day of touring on Thursday. It is unlikely you will receive a wrap up of Thursday’s touring until I return home late Friday as we will be on the run all day and I have a very early start Friday morning. 

In the meantime, I thought I would rewind back to a fascinating presentation we attended Wednesday (the name "Wednesday" is derived from Old English Wōdnesdæg and Middle English Wednesdei, meaning "day of Woden", the English equivalent to the Norse god Odin), afternoon which was all about the Vikings. The lion’s share of the presentation was tongue in cheek; but plenty of interesting Viking trivia tidbits were interspersed throughout. Just for giggles we heard that the Vikings:

Were beautiful specimens and did not wear shirts.
Had exemplary hygiene compared to other Europeans.
Had Tom Hanks of all people among their descendants (he is also related to Abraham Lincoln!).

More seriously, the beginning of the Viking era was in the eighth century in Norway, (in fact, the first documented start of the Viking Age was 793 A.D. with an attack on a monastery in England), and in Sweden and Denmark in the ninth century. They conquered other parts of Scandinavia, England, Ireland, Iceland, and the Baltic states in the 10th century, and then they expanded to central Europe. There are records of Viking presence all the way down to Italy, Baghdad, and Constantinople.  While the Vikings may be the most well known for their raiding, which was brutal, they primarily focused on trading, and their main area of trade was slavery.

There are no actual manuscripts documenting the historic arc of the Vikings, but what we do have are runestones.

According to Monica, the Tauck guide who was doing the talk, after Norway’s independence, their claim to fame was the Vikings. She told us that "the Vikings weren’t the vicious fighters we have pictured them as. They were raiding and trading because they needed to diversify their portfolio." You get the gist of it; I found the talk fascinating, particularly since there have been a lot of references to the Vikings throughout the trip.

There have also been trolls everywhere (especially in the souvenir shops) and with tomorrow being the last day of our trip, I sure hope there’s some kind of explanation of those and if not, I will definitely ask for my readers’ benefit! 

Fast-forward to today. We sailed all morning through the Hardangerfjord. This particular fjord is surrounded by steep mountains and calm waters and offers a landscape that feels both dramatic and serene. And it goes inland about 100 kms from the sea! And compared to the rocky North Sea waters we traversed yesterday afternoon and evening, the waters we traversed today were so still; so calm, nary a flutter. That paid off in spades when we got on the RIB safari this afternoon. But first a photographic journal of this morning, which was truly gorgeous.

With Cruise Director Joffrey

We had a number of excursions to choose from this afternoon and indeed, when I wrote up my evaluation for the whole trip, I made clear that I was beginning to suffer from a strong case of FOMO. All of the excursions look good. As an example, today we had four to choose from 1) a bus tour and then a cider tasting; 2) kayaking on the fjord; 3) a drive and then a hike to the Voringsfossen (Voring Falla) and nature center; or 4) the Hardangerfjord RIB safari. Mona and I chose the Safari. It was promoted as "fast paced, and fun".  We had been forewarned that we would probably get extremely wet, but no worries - we would be outfitted with full body raingear protective suits. We were also forewarned that this would be a bumpy ride! 

Here we go!!!

It being a sunny day with calm waters, the ride was neither bumpy nor wet, and while the tour operator offered all of us the choice between full body suits or lifejackets, not a single person in our inflatable boat (approximately 16 passengers and two giant outboard motors on the rear) opted for the lifejackets. Additionally, using the word boat to describe this vehicle is somewhat generous. It was more like an inflated tube with seats like a pommel horse that we straddled. Once we got going, it wasn’t bumpy at all, but it was very fast! For me, terrifyingly fast. I certainly felt safe, but there were many moments when I questioned my sanity. Why did I sign up for this excursion in the first place?

Click HERE (and be sure to turn on the sound) to get a sense of the adventure!

I should do an aside here that the other RIB safari vehicle had actual seats— we decided to leave those for the folks in our group who were less mobile than us. Still, the pommel seats reminded me somewhat of sitting on a camel— and fondly remembering Wayne sitting on the camel as we went across Wadi Rum in Jordan or the Sahara in Morocco.

The sites along the way were really incredible, including waterfalls, a glacier, stone outcroppings, an up close and personal goat experience, hunters’ cottages, a hiking trail, a bridge presumably longer than the Golden Gate, and more. Perhaps most incredible was how close to the outcroppings we actually got. Eventually, I overcame my terror at the ride and enjoyed it. It was really quite something.

Jane opted for the drive to the Voring Waterfall:

 

We took a brief walk after the RIB safari and I rewarded myself with an ice cream cone— because I could.

We got back on the tender, took the 4 minute ride back to the boat. We returned to the boat and were greeted with today’s featured high tea item— millefeuille pastries. They were truly gorgeous and I took a photo but did not indulge.

After a brief time in our rooms, where we tried to do some packing for tomorrow’s early departure, we went back downstairs because believe it or not it was caviar night. Again, a gorgeous display. And again, I took the photo but did not indulge.

However, there was an additional treat— the Parisian dancers who have been entertaining us all week did a number in French cancan costumes and then they agreed to take a photo with us. what fun! 

Our final dinner on the ship did not disappoint (no surprise). We made sure that Joe was serving us as we’re already having separation anxiety about leaving him tomorrow. He is such a lovely young man. We started with a warm mushroom bisque with chestnuts and crème fraîche. Divine.

That was followed by an extremely artful display of green asparagus mimosa.

Mona, Jane and I all chose the seafood linguine, and Joe was happy to oblige our request to eliminate the squid and mussels.

So over the past 9 nights, I have had fish or seafood every night. No repeats that I can recall! And I hear that fish will be served tomorrow night for dinner as well— so a clean sweep for the trip.  Needless to say, I ordered a vegetarian meal for the airplane going home— don’t want to spoil the delicious taste of fish in Norway with the rotten taste of fish on United Airlines.

The final dessert was pistachio ice cream with a coconut stick (because...why not?).

As mentioned earlier, we leave Friday and early tomorrow morning are getting off the boat in Bergen. We have a city tour, stop for lunch, a walking tour, check into the hotel, and then a funicular ride to dinner. Again, there will be a blog post about Bergen, but I cannot guarantee the timing.

In wrapping up the cruising part of this trip, let me just say that this maiden sea voyage exceeded all of my expectations. Of course, I feel badly for any of my friends who are traveling in Europe right now and have had to deal with the excessive heat, but here in Norway, we had absolutely (abnormal) incredible weather for the whole trip (with a little mist one day and a bona fide rainfall on the day we went to the glacier). The forecast for tomorrow in Bergen is rain and that’s fine because in Bergen they say "there’s no such thing as bad weather; just bad wardrobing" and as you might imagine, I am prepared.

Please know that, even though Wayne has not been on the trip with me physically, he has been, no surprise, the technology smarts behind ensuring this blog was assembled and distributed to each and every one of you. So a huge thanks and more to him for all of his constant heavy lifting during the time when he thought that he could take it easy with me away.

Watch this space for the Bergen wrap up and thanks for traveling with me!

love,

wendy

Something for everyone!