Monday, 17 February 2025
At the mid-way point I forgot to record a few more interesting facts and figures. When I have not been at the iPad I keep thinking I should add these facts but then when I have been on the iPad I forget. Until now!
The Trollfjord has capacity for 822 passengers, but on the northbound journey there were only about 400 people on board. Tromsø is a major stop and people who have only booked the short northbound cruise disembark at Tromsø and others join the ship for the short cruise southbound. Bernie heard up in the bar that 100 passengers left the ship and only 28 boarded. This means the ship has gone from around 50% occupied to only 40% occupancy which is why there are so many good deals offered to take the cruise in winter! Many of the crew live in Tromsø so about one third of the crew changed over at this stop. Crew members live all along the coast so there are crew changes at many of the stops, but the biggest changeover occurs in Tromsø.
As scheduled we arrived in Ålesund at 10.00am this morning. Ålesund nestles below Mount Aksla and looks very different from our more northern ports of call with its distinctive Art Nouveau architecture. Merchants first established themselves along the sound in the 1500s but little of the old town survived the devastating fire of 1904. When the town was rebuilt it took on the Art Nouveau style that we see today.
We were only in Ålesund for four hours which is nowhere enough time to do the area justice. We decided to book the Saga Islands bus tour to Alnes so with that leaving at 10.00am and returning at 1.15pm there was going to be no time at all to wander around the gorgeous town.
We met the coach on the harbour and clambered aboard. If we don’t catch something on the ship, it’s going to be on the bus?? Anyhow, our guide Pierre welcomed us aboard, but the PA wasn’t working and we could barely hear him. He faffed around with the microphone for a-g-e-s before he finally had it going. He told us it’s a brand new bus with new-fangled audio technology that is still getting the better of everyone at the moment. Thank goodness they got it sorted out though as the tour would have been pretty frustrating with sub-par commentary.
With the PA sorted out Pierre re-introduced himself and our driver, Rune. He told us that Rune is a very old Viking name. Once underway we did a whistle stop circuit around the town centre with Pierre telling us more about the great fire and pointing out the extent of the damage that was caused. While much of the architecture is in very pretty Art Nouveau style the town has its share of brutalist monstrosities built after WWII. Their town hall in particular is a hideous blocky building in a prime waterfront location!
After our circuit around the town it was time to head towards Alnes. We knew that to reach Alnes that we would be travelling via a series of bridges and subsea tunnels that link the islands. We plunged into Ellingsøytunnelen and 3.4 kilometres later popped out on Ellingsøya Island before driving under the sea again for 4.2 kilometres via Valderøytunnelen to Valderøy Island. We were already astonished by this infrastructure and we weren’t even half way there yet!
The next section was over the water by way of Giskebrua (Giske Bridge) to Giske (pronounced Yis-ka) Island. Pierre told us that this is the island where he was born and we will stop on the island on our return journey. The final 3.8 kilometre leg was another subsea section using the single lane tunnel, Godøytunnelen, to the island of Godøya. Just, wow! What an incredible journey. This amazing infrastructure to link the Saga Islands (Giske and Godøy) to Ålesund on the mainland is impressive.
The end of our journey was at the small village of Alnes on Godøy Island, specifically Alnes Lighthouse that was built in 1852 to guide fishing boats safely into the harbour of this small fishing community. The bus with the German speaking passengers aboard arrived at the lighthouse first so they visited the beacon first while we were ushered into the Experience Centre for morning tea. Why do excursions always involve food?? Once again we had barely finished breakfast and we were eating chocolate cake for morning tea, ha, ha.
After cake it was our group’s turn to make our way to the lighthouse. Our tour included entry to the lighthouse and we were able to climb the steep steps to the viewing platform. With a cold wind blowing it was certainly brisk out on the platform! We were the last ones down from the platform and had to hurry back to the coach to make the deadline we had been given for departure from the lighthouse! Right on time we were!
It was time to start re-tracing our journey. We drove back through the single lane tunnel with Pierre telling us that this can be a very slow trip in the summer when there is significantly more traffic about. While the tunnel is only one lane it has a number of pull outs along its length for vehicles to pull into to allow oncoming traffic to pass. Pierre said that in summer it almost needs a traffic light system to manage the traffic but, to date, this has not been implemented.
Back on Giske Island Pierre told us that Rollo the Viking from this island went on to become the first ruler of Normandy, France. He was banished from Norway and moved to France where he terrorized the French along the Normandy Coast and along the Seine River all the way to Paris. Charles III came to an agreement with him that if Rollo stopped terrorizing the populace he would make him the Count of Rouen, the first ruler of Normandy. His grandson was the first Norman King of England, William the Conqueror.
We made a stop at the 12th-century Giske Kyrkje. The church is built of white marble, but the marble has been plastered over to protect it from the harsh weather. Pierre pointed out to us that there are only a few surnames represented in the graveyard because only a handful families lived on the island.
From the church we made our way back to Ålesund making one last stop at the Monument of the People going to England during WWII. Many Norwegians migrated to Britain during the Second World War. The emigrants sailed from Ålesund to the Shetland Islands and then made their way into Scotland and England. The monument, by artist Olav Stavseng, is dedicated to the 320 people who lost their lives attempting to flee the German occupation.
We were dropped back at the boat right on time at 1.15pm. We quickly walked towards the town centre to take at least a couple of photos of the picturesque buildings. Just another hour in port would have enabled us to complete the excursion AND see a little bit of Ålesund. It was frustrating that at this stop it was an either/or proposition with time only for the excursion to the Saga Isles OR free time to walk around admiring the outstanding Art Nouveau buildings.
We arrived back at the boat just after 1.30pm. We are not game to cut it any finer than that! They say you have to be back on board 10 minutes before departure time but we like to allow a bit more of a buffer than that. We raced to our cabin to shed all of our outdoor gear so that we could slip into the dining room before it was too much closer to 2.00pm. We managed to fit in a late lunch, finishing up pretty much as the ship left port right on 2.00pm.
We are now sailing for 13 hours arriving in Haugesund at 3.00pm tomorrow afternoon. On our way, from around 7.00am in the morning, we will be visiting Hardangerfjorden, the second longest fjord in Norway. As we were lucky enough to do a day trip along the Sognefjord in 2006, after tomorrow we will have visited Norway’s two longest fjords. The Sognefjord at 204 kilometres long and the Hardangerfjorden, just 21 kilometres shorter at 183 kilometres in length. I think we will only be sailing a few kilometres into the fjord in the morning though.
There was a bit of excitement not long out of Ålesund with a helicopter hovering over a boat on our starboard side. An orange item (life raft?) was lowered to the boat and then a person (some said two people?) were lowered to the boat. As this was all taking place not very far from civilisation we suspect that it was a training drill?
As we sailed this afternoon we had a short period of sunshine but, as I write this it is grey and gloomy again! The best part though, we have just rounded West Cape and it was pretty smooth sailing. During the 5.00pm briefing they just told us that the cape is notorious for stormy weather and dangerous conditions. So much so that the Vikings rarely sailed around it, they sailed to the narrowest point of the peninsula and dragged their boats over the mountain! For years now successive governments have been planning to build a tunnel for shipping through the neck of the peninsula but digging has not started yet. Apparently they have recently called for tenders though. One day it might become a reality and shipping will be able to avoid the treacherous waters around West Cape.
We ate dinner tonight with the girls while Mark and Claudia ate in Brasserie Árran. It was hard to choose a dessert so Kristos brought us multiple selections from the dessert menu so that we could sample more than one each. Have to say that I was surprised at how delicious the chia pudding was. I’ve always thought that chia pudding sounded a bit uninspiring but it was very good.
Steps: 8,550 (5.74km)
Such beautiful images! Good to see you are enjoying your adventure despite the adverse weather conditions. I read your summary of the Viking history with interest. I loved The Vikings series which eventually goes into the Paris/Normandy story. The series does take much artistic licence in the telling of Viking Sagas but does introduce some historical themes in the telling. Some historic characters are amalgamated to allow the flow of the story. Before watching that I had no idea that the Vikings had attempted an attack on Paris.