Hammerfest

Now that we have 24 hours of daylight, we woke up way too early again at 5am because, even though we’re using eye masks, our bodies and brains are still telling us to get up. Whilst having breakfast in the buffet restaurant with Keith and Wee, we admired the amazing, mountainous scenery which is reminiscent of the scenery we saw in Alaska.

Unlike Geiranger, our cruise ship is located a short distance from town so after disembarking, we needed to find a way in rather than doing a 40 minute walk. Since our main priority was going up the cable car, we found a ticket seller which offered this option which included the shuttle bus to and from the cruise port. Since it was around the same price as a regular cable car ticket, it seemed like a good option.

After boarding the bus, we departed about 10 minutes later, much to the dismay of an elderly Asian gentleman who was still waiting for his wife to board. It was sad to see because the gentleman didn’t understand that he needed to disembark, whilst watching his wife trying to chase the bus as it was leaving.

The cable car ride wasn’t very long and was fortunately very frequent. It was an amazing view from the top, which we shared with groups of school students and even a handful of dogs. Since the last shuttle was returning to the ship at 1:30pm, we decided to forego that idea as it would’ve meant that we wouldn’t have time to see the city. Our cable car driver told us about the local bus service from town back to the cruise port which sounded like a better idea.

We walked towards the Arctic Cathedral for some photos before crossing the Tromsø Bridge towards the city. Earlier, Ted and I had mentioned how amazing the weather had been, since it was almost Summer-like and not cold at all. All that changed as we crossed the bridge, as the sun disappeared behind the clouds and a cold breeze picked up. Our beautiful weather had seemingly disappeared!

We wandered around the town of Tromsø which, at best, was quaint but not much else. One worthwhile stop though was at the Smørtorget cafe which, whilst expensive, offered the best coffee we’ve had so far since starting this holiday! We purchased the bus tickets through an online app and, nine stops later, we were back at the cruise port for a much cheaper price.

Whilst waiting to board the boat it started to rain, which drew attention to the holes I didn’t know I had in my shoes. We went for lunch in the buffet restaurant before heading to movie theme trivia with Charlie, which we’d already missed most of!

Our afternoon was mostly a relaxing one, as I read in the solarium before going to dinner with the guys from Reno. This 24 hour daylight is still hard to get used to! I ended up going to bed at 10pm after hanging out with Blaine and Charlie, but the bright light was telling me it was too early to sleep! Tomorrow we head to Honningsvåg, the northernmost point in mainland Europe.En savoir plus