Flying in to Bergen

 Saturday

21 September 

Day 83

13 to go

On the move again today. We were awake by 7am, happy for a slight lay in, before we got ourselves busy. We had the packing all done by 9.30am and saw no reason to hang tight in the apartment, so we made our way to the train station. It was a pretty easy run, being Saturday morning, the streets were quiet both on the road and the path. 

We arrived at the station to catch the 10am train to the airport, 40min earlier than we had planned.  The train was an easy 20min trip to Oslo airport. We didn’t see a lot of the landscape as the journey was mostly in a tunnel. When we did get a view, it was veiled in fog and we were concerned this may impact our flight. 

Once at the terminal, we made our way to the bag tag area. I had received am email from SAS stating we could add cabin bags to the hold, as the plane was full. We opted to put one of them through, to free up some space and give us some extra freedom. 

With tags added, we then completed the luggage drop. All of our our bags were under the weight limits, which was good. We then passed through security and made our way into the departures hall, all by 10.45am. 

Our flight was not scheduled to depart until 1.05pm, so we had plenty of time to kill. We walked the terminal and checked out the various food offerings  electing to stop for a pastry and hot chocolate. We sat in one of the gates, enjoying our choices and surfing the net. Once our gate was posted we made our way there and waited out our time. 

I got a text message at 12pm, to say the flight had been delayed, but no further info, we just had to wait. In the end we had to head to a different gate and we were only delayed by 20 minutes. We boarded our Bergen bound plane, it was a tiny jet with two seats on either side of the aisle. We stowed our bags and sat back, waiting for taxi. Turns out the flight was full, as an earlier flight was cancelled due to fog. I am grateful we were getting off the ground. 

At 1.35am, we began push back and we were in the air shortly after. We very quickly lifted above the cloud cover and soon left it behind, as we tracked to the western coastline. Below were so many mountains and lakes formed within the valleys. There was even remnants of snow and ice on some peaks. Cloud banks filled some of the valleys, snaking through like a white, foaming river. It was a pretty rugged landscape. 

By 2.05pm, we were being told to prepare for our landing. We were out of the plane just after 2.25pm, waited a short time for our bags to arrive and then jumped in a taxi to get us to our next apartment. We were so glad that we made that decision, despite that fact that it cost more than $100. The driver was great and offered plenty of advice and information about Bergen. He got us through the busy centre and then almost at the door, but daren’t take us the last part, as the road narrowed considerably. When we saw what we would have had to navigate with our bags, the ride was worth it. 

Once in the downstairs apartment, we unloaded our things and did a scout of what we had for the next five days. We then went out exploring. Our main concern was checking where we needed to meet tomorrow morning for our tour. We made for the tourist information, a 10 minute walk. Here we were able to have all of our questions answered. We left feeling much better about what was to come. 

We then beelined for the funicular railway station, mindful their were three cruise ships in and that meant plenty of tourists. We bought tickets for a round trip and then joined the queue. The system was very efficient and while we didn’t get on the first carriage, we did make it on the second and it arrived pretty quick. 

Once on board, we were whisked up Mount Floyd to the viewing station. The views over Bergen were spectacular and very clear. The fog had lifted and the sun was burning bright. We made the decision to get up here today, as we know that the weather is going to change over the next few days. 

We did a wander around the top, checking the view from different angles. We found the friendly goats and walked the edge of a green carpeted forest. With more time, we could have completed more of the forest walk, but we wanted to see some more of the town, while the sun was out in full, so we returned to the funicular and descended to the town below.

From the station, we walked to Bryggen the Unesco Heritage site. This is a number of wooden buildings along narrow alleys, now housing tourist trinkets and handicrafts. Signs saying no smoking were in abundance, due to the high amount of kindling we were walking around. 

Once out on the street, we needed to navigate the tourists, who were clogging the sidewalks. Our walk lead us to Bergenhus Fortress. There is a medieval festival on this weekend, so there were stalls and people dressed up. Unfortunately, we didn’t get there til almost 5pm, so most things were closing up for the night. We checked out what we could and the fortress itself. It all seemed very interesting. 

Happy with our wander, we made our way back, stopping at a supermarket for all of our food supplies. We walked back to our home, admiring the lovely old wooden buildings and the interesting cobbled streets, that we will explore later in the week. 

Once in, it was straight into cooking duties and with dinner eaten, we were happy to settle in for an early evening, so we would be ready for tomorrow.