A day in Bergen

 Monday

23 September 

Day 85

11 to go

We slept well after a big day out yesterday. We were glad for a  more leisurely day today. I didn’t get out of bed until 9am, though I was working on photos and watching TV for an hour before. Paul was up and about, getting himself organised, while I was being lazy. Once we were both set, we set off for the morning.

We made our way down the nearest lane, towards the water. We passed by the United Sardines Factory, walked its perimeter and then made for the colourful wooden houses, sitting beside cobbled lanes. There were plenty of others doing the same thing. We walked towards town, travelling down new roads. We found plenty of street art to admire and an old leprosarium we could wander around. 

We then made for the lake. We sat on a bench and I phoned home to fill them in on how things are going here. With that complete, we continued our walk around the lake, crossing the road to check out the beautiful garden and gazebo. We followed up through the centre to the National theatre, before we made our way back towards the wharf. We did a wander through the fish market and then decided to stop in at a supermarket to buy lunch and return to the apartment for 12.30pm.

We had a couple of hours of down time. We ate lunch, I went through photos and we rested. I checked up on tomorrow’s excursion and not long after got a phone call from the operators to let me know they had to cancel as there had been a fire on board one of the boats! They were giving us a full refund, but were allowing us to still use the ferry service. I wasn’t sure what that meant, so we gathered our things and went off to the tourist information centre to find out. 

We were told that we could still catch the Norled ferry at 8am and get off in Balestrand at midday. The ferry would cruise up a section of the Sojnefjord and then we could spend a few hours checking out the town, before returning on the 4.30pm boat. We figured this could still be a go. 

With all of the information we needed, we then made our way around to the old town again, wandering the small alleys and checking out the little stores. We stopped at a cafe for hot chocolate and waffles. Paul had strawberry jam and sour cream, while I went with the brown cheese option. Both were delicious.

We finished our walk through and went over to Zacharias brewery, but it didn’t seem to be open. In the end, we walked some other streets, we hadn’t seen before, including a very French lane, with lots of places French themed and there were a couple of Citroen vans. We found pride crossing and a piece of ceramic like sculpture that appeared to be steaming from small spouts. 

We finished off our wander, returning for an oven baked pizza and a little TV time. 

We did complete an after dinner stroll, heading to Nordenesparken. This was a lovely spot, enjoyed by many locals. It offered a great panoramic view across the water. We watched a man fishing and saw a sauna boat heading for the wharf. The paths were lined with trees, their leaves showing signs of autumn. We then walked into the suburbs, passing the Children’s church, where sounds of music were emanating. We located a street heading back towards our area, so we hiked up the hill, and then returned to our abode, ready to finish up for the night.