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!

Art Nouveau and Crowds

 Tuesday, June 30

Last night we were truly rocking and rolling. Even my cruise-experienced travel mates remarked it was rather severe. However, our breakfast buddy Mike from Atlanta made clear that this was nothing for the North Sea. So I suppose we should consider ourselves lucky.

We are now docked in Alesund, the 9th largest town in Norway though the population is 55,000! We had an Art Nouveau architectural walking tour this morning and will be asea (always wanted to use that word) for the next 24+ hours.

We debarked at 9:15— there were several excursions that left before us, including a more vigorous walk up 415 steps, and a bus tour, presumably through the Norwegian winding roads (we found out afterwards they were not really particularly winding). There were approximately 40 of us who had chosen the architectural walking tour and we were split into two groups. As soon as we started walking, we noticed that there was at least one of those "monster ships" (a British ship) already docked. Interaction with other human beings is fine. I’ve never had a problem with it, but once we started getting into town and particularly once we ended up on beautiful cobblestone shopping streets, there must’ve been hundreds of travelers from those monster ships. So today the population might be up to 60,000! We have truly been spoiled up until now because there haven’t been crowds at all.

I imagine one of the reasons why Alesund is so popular is that it is very picturesque (like many other Norwegian towns). There was a major fire in 1904, and after that there was a major rebuilding effort. This resulted in many Art Nouveau buildings which are really quite beautiful. One travel guide writes: "Ålesund's Art Nouveau style is distinctive and captivating. It features elaborate turrets, spires, and ornamental facades. Natural motifs like flowers and mythical creatures are common. These details are intricately carved into stone and plaster. Many buildings incorporate elements from Norwegian folklore. This blend creates a unique regional interpretation of Art Nouveau."

Here is a sampling.

No need to share all the stories as many of them were pick-ups from what we had heard before, but one new bit of Norwegian trivia we learned was that the Norwegian alphabet has three additional vowels from the English alphabet:

Æ sounds like a in “ache”.
Ø resembles the vowel in English “weird”. 
Å sounds like o in “old”. 

If only English were so logical!

We came back for lunch and ate in the outside dining area, which has become a favorite spot for us. Instead of indulging in the buffet, all three of us ordered from the menu. I ordered the softshell crab sandwich, which I thought would be delicious. It will certainly count toward my fish consumption, but it ended up being more bread than fish so then I also ordered a burger without bread to supplement my protein intake! LOL!!— really who am I kidding?

The programming for the rest of the day was jam packed, including, but not limited too: origami lesson , trivia game with airport codes, lecture about the Vikings, Scandinavian teatime, Captain's farewell dinner, and then some robust entertainment afterwards. We are having our farewell dinner tonight, though it is not farewell. We have afternoon excursions tomorrow so they orchestrated the farewell dinner tonight to allow folks more time for packing and chilling out after they return to the ship late in the day.

Even so, it will be no surprise to anyone who knows about my packing techniques that I have already packed and I’m ready to rock ‘n’ roll for my Friday morning departure from the hotel at 4 AM.

The farewell gala dinner, and trivia games were over the top. For dinner we had:

Cream of celeriac soup with basil oil and gougeres (French mini popovers)

Roasted shrimp Nicoise with eggplant

 John  Dory fish with spicy chickpeas and hummus (I think I’m growing scales from all the fish!)

Dessert was another fruit plate 

Wednesday is our last full day on the ship— visiting Eidfjord. We have a fun RIB safari planned. Don't know what that is? You'll find out in the next post!

Until then …..

Love,

wendy

Fjords Glorious Fjords

 Monday, June 29

If you’ve ever hung out with me at all, you know that I’m a Broadway musicals fan from way back and if you’re familiar with the musical Oliver, you probably know about the song “Food Glorious Food” so I struggled with whether to call this post “Food Glorious Food” (they are feeding us non-stop!), or “Fjords Glorious Fjords”. Based on what we’re seeing this morning, “Fjords Glorious Fjords” makes more sense.

And, if you’re on Facebook, a lot of this particular post will be redundant to what my dear friend and travel companion Mona is posting there (with me tagged). I say that because most of this post will be photos that speak for themselves. You don’t need a lot of narrative to appreciate how spectacular the sites are. And the water is much calmer. I spent a lot of time outside this morning in the observation area; there’s quite a pleasant breeze.

A moment of silliness in the fjords—
note our new (necessary) puffy vests.
Still sunny, but a little bit cooler on the water today. 

There are snow capped peaks…

Small hamlets….

 

Unbelievable vistas….

Scenic photos with friends, in particular Larry Abbott our guide from Japan in 2006!!!!!….

Before lunch, we played a state capitals trivia game; we were convinced that our team would take first place.  We got 11 1/2 points, but the winners had 13 points because they were correctly able to identify the capitals of Albania, Madagascar, Kazakhstan, and Croatia (which we could not)! That aside, we did demonstrate our competitive chops. It was really fun.

This afternoon, because we’re at the inner end of the Nordfjord and as a smaller ship we want to avoid the monster ships at all costs, we took the tenders to the port in Loen — a lovely little town of 300 people year-round. Its source of income is tourism. While there were several excursions offered, the three of us chose the "troll cars" and a hike to the Briksdalbreen Glacier — "one of the most visited glacier arms in Norway and part of the largest glacier system in continental Europe." According to my friends at Wikipedia, a glacier is a persistent body of natural ice, a form of rock, that is constantly moving under its own weight.

We packed the tender full and found out that are lovely cabin steward, Nikka, was on the boat with us because she had been given the afternoon off.

She is Filipino and is so excited to be going home this coming week after having been on the job on this boat for six months. She is sweet and excellent at what she does and readily agreed to taking a photo with us.

Once we got on the tender, it was literally a 3 minute ride to the dock! We then got on the bus for a 45 minute ride to the glacier. The scenery was spectacular. The glacial lake was a beautiful color of teal. Our guide told us that Lake Louise (in Alberta, Canada) is also a glacial lake and I remembered that—seeing the lake this afternoon. She also told us that she has been asked if the glacier lake water is safe to drink to which she replied only in small amounts because the particulates in the lake (that cause it to take on the teal color) are the equivalent of Pepto-Bismol— so not recommended.  

We saw countless waterfalls

...and there were several instances where the glacier came into view. Just wow.

 

When we arrived at the Briksdalbreen Center (with the obligatory gift shop), there were several troll cars lined up for our ride. 

As if choreographed to create the perfectly authentic Norwegian experience, the rain started coming down the minute we got out of the bus and walked toward the troll cars. And while it wasn’t exactly a downpour, it was steady. Good thing we were prepared. Everyone had their hoods up; otherwise, we would have been absolutely soaked.

We rode on the troll cars for about 15 minutes until we reached the landing space at which point we were sent in the direction of the glacier. It was actually a 15 minute rather rigorous walk, which was good because we’ve been mostly eating. And a little bit of cardio was totally worth it because the glacier up close and personal was stunning.

After the visit to the glacier, we were given the opportunity to walk back to the visitor center, and we jumped at that opportunity. It was a half hour walk— primarily because we had to keep stopping to take pictures.

We all gathered in the cafeteria area of the visitor center for a cake snack. We were told there would be small pieces of many types of cake and that this is a tradition to have with tea or coffee in the late afternoon. The pieces weren’t exactly what I would call small, but the cake was extremely delicious and we all indulged. I sampled the four types of cake. No Judgment, please. Gotta do as the natives do. 

We got back on the bus, got on the tender, went to our rooms and then of course, went down to the dining room for dinner. And what do you know? Tonight was the night of the big cheese spread. I’m not a cheese lover, but I’ve included the photos here because it was truly over the top.

We took out a regular seats in the dining room under the watchful eyes of our favorite waiter, Joe.

And proceeded to order more food. "How do we do it?", you may ask. I have no idea, although I do know that I will be proceeding with a juice diet as soon as I return home. This evening, the amuse bouche was a tiny lentil salad with hummus.

I ordered the crab remoulade which was in an unexpected presentation in a delicate pastry rollup— very delicious.

My next course was Ahi tuna (probably not locally caught, but I couldn’t resist) with pepper, shallot, marmalade, chermoula, carrots, and panisse. I have no idea what that is, but it was very tasty.

All three finished our meal with coconut Pavlova and tropical fruits. Unfortunately, this dessert was extremely delicious, but it was also extremely unnecessary as I truly overdosed on sugar today.

Tomorrow morning we go to Alesund for an art Nouveau architecture tour and Wednesday is our last full day on the ship. Time flies when you’re having fun!

Watch this space.

Love,

wendy

PS: In case there was any question about Norway being "the Land of the Midnight Sun", here is what it looks like through my cabin window at 10:17 pm: