My First Trip to Norway - Summer 2020

Summer 2020
Kristi Rohtsalu
September 2020
My First Trip to Norway

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Table of Contents
Introduction ..................................................................................................................................................3
Getting to Norway.........................................................................................................................................5
Two days in capital of Norway......................................................................................................................7
Monday, 10 August 2020: Where did I land? ...........................................................................................8
Tuesday, 11 August 2020: Vigeland Sculpture Park and Viking Ship Museum.......................................12
Wednesday,12 August 2020: Morning in Oslo .......................................................................................16
Trip to North: Fauske ..................................................................................................................................18
Train trip and arrival to Fauske...............................................................................................................18
Friday, 14 August: In Fauske and around................................................................................................22
Trip to North: Narvik...................................................................................................................................30
Saturday,15 August: Bus trip from Fauske to Narvik..............................................................................30
Sunday, 16 August: Walking in Narvik & Ofoten Railway with Arctic Train............................................34
Monday, 17 August: Climbing Narvikfjellet ............................................................................................40
Tuesday,18 August: Hiking day...............................................................................................................44
Wednesday, 19 August: Morning in Narvik ............................................................................................52
Trip to North: Tromsø.................................................................................................................................53
Wednesday, 19 August: Bus trip from Narvik to Tromsø .......................................................................53
Thursday, 20 August: Arctic-Alpine Botanic Garden and walk in Varden...............................................56
Friday, 21 August: Day above Tromsø plus Arctic Cathedral..................................................................61
Saturday, 22 August: Polaria, southern part of Tromsøya and Prestvannet..........................................69
Sunday, 23 August: Going to Tromsøbadet............................................................................................77
Monday, 24 August: Last day in Tromsø before moving on...................................................................80
Brief visit to Western Norway.....................................................................................................................85
Getting from Tromsø to Molde...............................................................................................................85
Wednesday, 26 August: Walk in Molde & Atlantic Ocean Road ............................................................90
Thursday, 27 August: From Molde to Åndalsnes plus first look to Åndalsnes and surroundings ..........97
Friday, 28 August: Hiking up to Rampestreken (537 m.a.s.) and Høgaksla (981 m.a.s.) ......................104
Saturday, 29 August: Walk to Troll Wall...............................................................................................112
Way back home.........................................................................................................................................116
Night of 29/30 August: From Åndalsnes to Oslo Airport......................................................................116

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Sunday, 30 August: Walking near Oslo-Gardermoen Airport...............................................................118
In Airport & flight to Tallinn..................................................................................................................121
Conclusion.................................................................................................................................................124

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Introduction
Summer 2020 will go down in history as the Corona Summer1
-- the summer when COVID-19 raged
through the World. Among others, the coronavirus changed the travel and messed up people’s travel
plans. My trip to Norway was a last-minute purchase rather than something long planned and well
prepared.
It was 26th
of July and I was chilling in the Estonia’s summer capital Pärnu when I decided that my carefully
planned next trip to Georgia, scheduled to take off on 4th
of August, had effectively been made impossible
due to the changed corona situation. Georgia would have welcomed visitors from Baltics, but not when
they arrived with a flight via Poland which would have been my case... Based on the new terms, I would
have faced a 14 days quarantine period when going there and yet another 14 days quarantine period
when coming back home; this simply did not make any sense. During the preceding couple of days
(afternoons), I had explored alternative options for making the trip to Georgia feasible; the remaining
tickets of the direct airBaltic flights to Georgia were just insanely expensive for my dates; even COVID-19
testing upon the arrival to Georgia would not have saved me from the quarantine when flying via Poland…
There was no sensible way around the 14 days quarantine period for me, at least not at this short notice.
Thus, even if feeling regretful (I so much wanted to go to Georgia!), I cancelled everything and anything
that I had booked.
Gradually (yet rather fast timewise!), I got over my distress and started looking for the places I COULD go
at this short notice and for a reasonable price, given the circumstances.
“Flight from Tallinn to anywhere in Europe… Flight from Riga to anywhere in Europe… Free entrance…
Schengen… Direct flight,” I entered keywords into the search engine.
One key consideration was existence/non-existence of the government-imposed quarantine period, both
in the destination country and in my home country Estonia; the second criterion related to the availability
of direct flights; last but not least… I had only the Estonian ID-card with me for flights departing from the
Latvian capital Riga.
I was lucky – and happy. I was more than happy to find and book my solution, that is the flight from Riga
to Oslo on 9th
of August. I had got it! I had always wanted to visit Norway, but till date had deemed the
country way too expensive. Now it all fitted just perfectly: prices in Norway were down due to the
coronavirus and general absence of tourists from richer countries, flight from Riga on 9th
of August suited
very well into my calendar, Estonian ID-card was enough to enter Norway, there were no quarantine
requirements… I further found another flight from Oslo back to my hometown Tallinn for the night of 30th
August.
After reserving a hotel for the first three nights in Oslo, I forgot about Norway till just a couple of days
before actually departing from Riga. No, I did not forget about my upcoming trip, how could I? I simply
1
I hope, the summer 2020 will NOT go down in history as the First Corona Summer, i.e. I hope that there will NOT
be any more summers like this one!

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had other things to do and see in the meantime. More importantly though, I was now hesitant to invest
my time into travel planning: maybe next Friday2
the situation is different again and this trip has to be
cancelled as well? Be that as it may, at the end I only had a couple of afternoons to figure out where I
want to go and what I want to do in Norway, make the necessary accommodation reservations and learn
about practicalities such as transportation in the country. Fortunately, Visit Norway website proved very
helpful to start with.
The red dots on the added map summarise the places which I intended to visit in Norway, and ultimately
ended up visiting as well. My agenda was this:
• First, spend a couple of days in Oslo;
• Secondly, take a train & bus trip to the
North; I intended to make three stops: a
brief one in Fauske for acclimatization,
the next one in Narvik for hiking and
finally a longer one in Tromsø (the main
and most northern destination of my
holiday) for… aah, let’s figure it out once
there;
• After having had holidays in North, fly to
Molde in western part of Norway;
namely, Molde was the departure point
of the ‘travel like the locals’ tour to the
famous Atlantic Ocean Road;
• Last but not least, take a bus trip back to
the Oslo-Gardermoen Airport, thereby
stopping in Åndalsnes as this was the
place to change the bus.
The route turned out as planned. At the
same time, the trip offered much more than
I initially had expected. During my journey, I
kept making travel notes. These, after
formulating them as a story, are in front of
you now.
Kristi Rohtsalu
Tallinn, September 2020
2
Governments of Estonia and Latvia updated the travel restrictions concerning COVID-19 situation on Fridays.
My visited places in Norway in August 2020

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Getting to Norway
In the Riga International Airport, while waiting for my flight to Oslo3
, I understood how much I had
underestimated what a torture wearing a mask can be, especially if one also happens to wear glasses as I
do… Every time I exhaled the glasses were covered with vapour. Furthermore, they kept slipping off all
the time. Yet masks were mandatory in the Riga International Airport. Everyone got to put one on already
outside the building; at the entrance, presence of the mask was checked alongside with presence of a
boarding pass / confirmed flight reservation.
“I used to like spending time in the airports, but not in this way,” I thought regretfully, recalling the times
before the coronavirus outbreak.
I felt myself helpless, miserable, unwilling to say I word. Finally, unable to be with the mask any longer, I
found myself an empty hall, sat with my laptop, back to the rest of the room, and quietly put the mask
aside.
Later, when it was time to go to the plane, I curiously observed fellow people from the corner of my eye.
I noticed that even the airport employees had difficult times wearing the mask properly.
“Based on this experience, I am most definitely against making masks mandatory!” I thought angrily.
After all, how much would masks help against the coronavirus, if we are only pretending wearing them?
Somehow, I still survived the mask during the two or three hours that was absolutely necessary while
queuing for getting into the plane, flying and getting off the plane in Oslo. My selfie sitting in the plane
(see the pic below) clearly betrays my feelings… Removing glasses made my life a bit easier, though.
Me sitting in the plane, not exactly happy about the mask-thing
3
This trip is Part Two of my summer holiday 2020; Part One had already brought me from Tallinn to Riga, walking.

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On the positive note, the sky was nearly cloudless and the view from my window-seat excellent. That’s
how I arrived to Norway, on Sunday evening 9 August 2020.
First look to Norway / Oslo and surroundings
From the Oslo-Gardermoen Airport it was a fast and easy train ride to the Oslo Central Station or Oslo S
as the central station is referred to. The ticket cost me 10.23 euros and the trip took about 23 minutes,
from 19:43 to 20:06. Keeping social distance in the almost fully packed train was hardly possible, yet
virtually nobody was wearing a mask. Nor did I.
Having got out of the station building, I looked a bit strangely at the crowds of youngsters, sitting on the
square in front of it. They seemed not to be concerned about the corona-thing at all.
“Hopefully this world will return rather soon,” the thought crossed my mind.
It took me just a few more minutes, to arrive to my reserved accommodation, the Citybox Oslo. Moving
in was a full self-service experience indeed! Check-in, payment, getting the door card… The traveller could
do it all by him or herself, by using the machines shown in the photo below. Still, there was an 24/7 Citibox
Host Office as well – just for the case one needed assistance. I bet they saved from the staff costs anyways.

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Check-in desk at the Citybox Oslo: enter your booking reference, review the data for the stay and pay
for it, print the door card and an A4 paper with all the necessary information
Building A, floor 4, room #401 – that’s the room the machine gave me. A youngster who had forgotten his
door card upstairs (at least that’s what he said) jumped into the elevator together with me, pushing floor
#2 right after I had pushed floor #4. Given these confusing inputs, the elevator did not move at all.
“Sometimes technology sucks, sorry,” the guy sort of excused himself, “let’s use stairs instead!”
That’s what we ended up doing.
My Citibox room looked basic, yet it did have everything for my needs: the comfy bed, the ensuite
bathroom, the free WiFi, a trash can… Soon I fell into the bed, letting the day fade.
Two days in capital of Norway
I started my discovery of Norway from the capital city Oslo where I spent the first two days of my stay.

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Monday, 10 August 2020: Where did I land?
I got a relatively late start according to my standards: it was almost 10 AM when I left the hotel for a
circular walk in the city. The weather was cloudy, yet rather warm. Altogether the tour, depicted on the
map below, was nearly 20 kilometres long and gave me a nice overview of my neighbourhood.
10 August 2020: Walk in Oslo (18.63 km)
The very first point of interest was the Ekebergparken (on the right side on the map above). I was chasing
for ‘a wonderful view towards the fjord and city’, as was promised in a travel website. Once there, I took
a few pics from near the Ekeberg restaurant. The restaurant itself seemed empty and closed at half past
ten in Monday morning, however.
Views to Oslo from near the Ekeberg restaurant

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“Norwegians apparently love sculptures, but what a sculpture is this?!” I thought while continuing my walk
now in the Ekebergparken Sculpture Park.
The sculpture of an alien that I was looking at, is in the pic below. Art doesn’t have boundaries except the
imagination of the artist, perhaps…
A sculpture from the Ekebergparken Sculpture Park.
Smoothly, right after the Ekebergparken, I reached the Harbour Promenade. What I saw first, was the
industrial landscape.
“I started from the wrong end,” I concluded.
My first pics from the Harbour Promenade walk (Maybe I just started the walk from the wrong end…)

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‘Normal people’ would perhaps begin the walk from the Opera House. This on building looks ‘appetizing’
indeed, especially for skateboarders, I could imagine (except the end in cold water, perhaps )!
The Opera House with its dramatic architectural features (enforced by the threatening sky!)
At every step, love of sculptures was obvious. Sculptures seemed to be everywhere… The one depicted
below is my definite favourite of the day! It is rough and cute at the same time, like one would imagine
the baby of a dinosaur to be .

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My favourite sculpture in downtown Oslo
The following walk in the middle part of the Harbour Promenade pathway was truly enjoyable, enabling
views to the major tourist attractions in Oslo. The ones who seemed to be largely missing, were the
tourists, however. Accordingly, many of the harbour restaurants and cafés were empty or closed
altogether.

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Pics from my walk on the Harbour Promenade of Oslo (from left to right): the bell of the city hall of
Oslo ringing the midday, high-end homes on waterfront, going to the peninsula of Bygdøy
Way back to my Citybox hotel room from the peninsula of Bygdøy was rather quick and straightforward
one for I had seen quite a bit already. Still, I dropped into the Royal Palace Gardens to take a look to the
Royal Palace. Further, I passed the building of Norwegian Parliament. By afternoon, the streets had filled
with people.
The Royal Palace and the Parliament Building of Norway
Tuesday, 11 August 2020: Vigeland Sculpture Park and Viking Ship Museum
I started my day two in Oslo with a visit to the Central Station, the Oslo S. Namely, I needed to find out
about the train tickets for my planned trip to Fauske in the next day. For my liking, I was assured that I
could simply show the e-ticket purchased via Entur website from my phone – no need to worry about
finding a printer.
Following plans revolved around the two things that I simply did not manage to on Monday – or more
precisely, wasn’t in the mood after the Harbour Promenade walk. Namely, I intended to look up the
Vigeland Sculpture Park and visit the Viking Ship Museum.

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The first thing was going and seeing the Vigeland Sculpture Park. On the way there, I yet once again passed
the Royal Palace and happened to witness something that very much resembled a mini version of change
of the guards. I glanced at my watch. It showed 9:56, a strange time for the change of the guards... Maybe
it was something else. Anyways, I counted six guards and clearly, the guy standing there in front of the
house was changed. There were a couple of other tourists watching this as well, but otherwise it was very
quiet. It actually felt a bit unusual that I could pass the palace from this close. (My point of comparison
was the Buckingham Palace in London!)
Pretty soon I reached the Frogner Park. As can be seen from my walking map in the end of this section, I
did not go directly to the Sculpture park in the Frogner Park. Well, I was looking for a public toilet and
found one. Can you believe it: the visit cost two euros! Apparently, some things are expensive in Norway,
especially in popular locations.
Entrance to the sculpture park (see the following photo) looked grandiose as was the park itself.
Entrance to Vigeland Sculpture Park
That guy, the sculptor Gustav Vigeland (1869–1943), seemed to have been obsessed about imaging naked
people in very different positions and compositions, with and without trees, often treelike themselves.

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One could spend days and days by first trying to grasp the big picture and then digging into the details,
that is exploring each sculpture separately, and then individuals and elements in that sculpture – in any
sculpture. The area with all the blossoming flowers around was picturesque, especially with the warm and
sunny weather as it was this day.
A couple of pics from the Vigeland Sculpture Park
From there on, I walked to the Bygdøy Peninsula for the second time, now with the clear direction towards
the Viking Ship Museum.
The pamphlet of the museum says:
“See the richest treasures of the Viking era up close. The Viking Ship Museum houses the world’s best-
preserved Viking ships, found in burial mounds around the Oslo fjord. They crossed the seas before
becoming the final resting places of their wealthy owners….”
That’s a good introduction to the museum and description of its main exhibits. Below are a couple of my
pics of the ships, built in years 800 plus something and 900 plus something.
A couple of Viking ships preserved in the Viking Ship Museum

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I did not know that these Viking ships, after years of use, had become burial sites. Anyways, thanks to the
fact we now know about the Vikings as much as we do. They, the Vikings, believed into the afterlife; that’s
why they equipped their deceased fellows with whatever the fellows may need in their lives after life.
Afterlife may not be true in the sense that our ancestors once believed, but sure, it exists in some form,
in we finding the legacies and re-learning about the past.
Some objects found alongside with the ships: a) the skeletons of the two wealthy women of the time,
and b) the wooden cart implying that there used to be roads in the Viking villages
From the museum store I finally found what I needed for my planned continuation trip well north of the
Arctic Circle: an ultralight down jacket which could be folded into a truly small package! I ‘tortured’ the
sales persons to show me how the seemingly big jacket fits into the accompanying small pouch . It did
fit nicely. Frankly, there have been not many purchases that have made me as happy as the purchase of
this one down jacket that afternoon!
The day’s mission completed, I walked back to my already familiar Citibox room – with quite a few
deviations from the most straightforward way. I was just SO happy about my new purchase…
My wanderings are depicted on the map below. When comparing the map of this day with the map of
previous day, it is obvious: even if the circle looks similar to the day before, I tried to find at least a bit
different angles by choosing other roads and/or pathways.

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11 August 2020: Walk in Oslo, day two (15.86 km)
Wednesday,12 August 2020: Morning in Oslo
At around ten o’clock in the morning I checked out from the hotel. I could have stayed till noon, but no…
Namely, I had noticed that together with my Viking Ship Museum ticket I had got, as a bonus, free entrance
to the Historical Museum (Museum of Cultural History) in downtown Oslo. That one could not be wasted!
The walk to the museum was short, about 950 metres. At the entrance, an older lady pointed towards my
backpack: not with this one!
“Can I store it somewhere?” I asked.
She friendly showed me a box where I could deposit my bag – for free.
The museum was pretty big and included a wide range of exhibitions:
• Collapse — people in an unpredictable world;
• Transformation – faith and sacred objects in the Middle Ages;
• Norwegian Middle Ages;
• Vikingr;
• Ancient Egypt;
• America – present – past – identity;
• Arctic and subarctic;

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• Good as gold - coins are history – the Norway’s largest coin collection containing gold coins spanning
2,600 years;
• A temporary exhibition, themed ‘Decay – The start of something new’
The more detailed and up-to-date information can, of course, be found from the museum’s website:
https://www.khm.uio.no/english/visit-us/historical-museum/.
Selected pics from my visit to the Historical Museum, from left to right: a) the world’s best-preserved
Viking helmet, b) quartz, rock crystal and smoky quartz, c) many me-s
After the visit to the museum and some more walking in the downtown, I simply could not resist climbing
the Oslo Opera House – nor did I dry. Everybody seemed to climb it, it is a ‘must do’ in Oslo!
From the roof of the Oslo Opera House

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Then I went to the railway station to continue my journey.
Trip to North: Fauske
Train trip and arrival to Fauske
Something happened with the train. At 16:02, which was the scheduled departure time of the first train
from Oslo to Trondheim, people were waiting but the train was missing. Instead, the information board
displayed the message:
“Train was disrupted.”
“What the heck?” I thought, “Does this mean that the train is cancelled?”
Fortunately, this wasn’t the case. With another message, the passengers were let know:
“We are preparing the train.”
With a delay of about a quarter of hour the train arrived. In my head, I was doing the math:
“The connecting train from Trondheim to Fauske is scheduled to depart 24 minutes after the arrival of the
first train to Trondheim; it should still be all fine.”
Appropriately to the COVID-19 situation, the seats in the train were filled sparsely. Every passenger had
at least two seats. Opposite to me, over the table was sitting a Norwegian woman in her sixties. On the
other side of the aisle there was an older Norwegian couple. For my liking, I found that there were WiFi
and sockets readily available at my seat.
We could have been on the way for an hour or so when the train stopped (at least seemingly) in the middle
of nowhere. Soon it was announced that yet another disruption had occurred. We stood there stuck well
over twenty minutes, perhaps half an hour.
I started thinking about the ‘what if’ scenarios: what if I miss the connecting train from Trondheim at
23:12? That I’d catch it, seemed much less likely now… I found out that another train from Trondheim to
Fauske would be in the next morning.
“That would be fine as well, given that I can change the ticket,” I thought.
Then I learned that the Trondheim Central Station was closed at nights…
Once we got moving again, a lady from the train’s café came with a stroller: does anyone want anything?
I had already got my food before boarding the train, so I didn’t buy anything. The lady opposite to me
bought a dinner and a bottle of wine. She ordered two glasses – and simply shared her wine with me!
“Those Norwegians are kind people indeed!” I thought.
She wasn’t particularly fluent in English, but from our brief conversation it turned out that she was also
headed to Fauske. She had already managed to ask about the connecting train from the man checking
tickets.

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“The next train would probably be waiting for us,” was the rather reassuring message.
I had secretly hoped so, too .
With the newly gained piece of mind, I ate my dinner, read my e-book and slept an hour or so. Soon we
were Trondheim. Somehow, by making shorter stops, we arrived even five minutes before the scheduled
departure of the next train. The trip from Trondheim to Fauske continued according to the plan.
12/13 August 2020: Train trip from Oslo S to Fauske stasjon (ca. 1,200 km, 16 h and 21 min)

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Sleeping in the train feels like sleeping in the train, you know. I had purchased the cheapest ticket available
and of course, this only included very ordinary seats with no sleeping equipment. I slept a couple of hours,
then woke up, followed by another hour of sleeping and waking up again. Meanwhile, during the waking
hours, I entertained myself with taking pics from the passing landscapes.
An early morning pic from the Trondheim-Fauske trip while approaching Fauske
The train arrived to the Town of Fauske at 8:23 AM, precisely as scheduled. I stepped into the train station
to see what it looks like, then took a short walk in the town.
The town of Fauske is not big; it has a population of less than 10,000 people. I think I saw most of its points
of interest in this very same morning: the church (Fauske Kirke), the Nordlandsmuseet with its
visually/aesthetically/ecologically enjoyable lawn roofs, the beautiful but short walk on the shores of the
Skjerstad Fjord.

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Pics from my getting-know-Fauske walk: Fauke Kirke, Nordlandsmuseet (from the outside), a view
from the walk on the shores of Skjerstad Fjord
Right away, I started to like Fauske town as a stop-over place for adventures continuing their way to North.
Fauske is the transportation hub for the region. It has supermarkets and AMFI Fauske shopping center.
One can find necessities such as accommodation, eating places and ATMs. As for the later, Norway is
mainly cashless; still, one might want to have some cash for an extra layer of security.
Needless to say, I took the full advantage of it all, especially from the accommodation option. Since I had
not slept much in the night before, I was there behind the door of the Brygga Motell already at 10:38 AM,
this despite knowing that check-in only started from 14:00. ‘Sold out’, a sticker on the door said.
Fortunately, I had my reservation confirmed. Another sticker instructed ringing the doorbell as the door
was locked.
A good-looking young man, judging from the dark hair not a native Norwegian, came to open the door.
To my question about the possibility to check in early, he first replied:
“Your room is not ready yet, the check-in starts from 2 PM.”
“I know; I’m just so tired,” I explained.
He offered me a cup of coffee and went to arrange cleaning my room asap.
Until he was away, I looked at the map of Fauske which I had just grabbed from the reception desk. Then
I tried the WiFi connection. A basket with the pieces of paper, each having a WiFi password on it, was also
readily available.
Soon the guy was back, saying that my room is ready now and handing me the door key.
“If you need something, just let me know,” he added.
I thanked and went to upstairs.
Yeah, sometimes shit happens. We all make mistakes. He had accidentally given me the key of a wrong
room… When I opened the door, I saw a terrible mess and somebody lying fast asleep in the bed, back
towards me. Quietly I closed the door again and went back to the reception.
“Well, that wasn’t the room that was ready for me,” I said.

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With ‘oh, sorry’, I got another key for another room. This one looked much better with its freshly made
bed .
Freshly made bed waiting for me in Brygga Motell in Fauske
For the rest of the day I did not do anything useful but resting well.
Friday, 14 August: In Fauske and around
In the evening before, I had fallen asleep very early, not even noticing it myself before waking up 1:40 in
the middle of the night. Followed a couple of hours awake, during which I even managed to do some
personal accounting stuff. Then I slept yet another three hours or so till it was time to get started with the
new day. Ooh, I felt that now I was really rested!
At 8:56 AM, I was out on the street and ready to get moving. The sky was grey, but it wasn’t raining. No
rain was forecasted for the day till late in the evening, either. The outside temperature stayed into the
modest range of 13-15 degrees Celsius. I did not have any other plan, but to head towards what looked

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like big white spheres in the mountain top. Later in the evening I searched about the spheres and found
confirmation to my initial guess: it was an observatory there.4
On the way along the Fauske’s short coastal path just at one edge of the Nordlandsmuseet’s territory I
found a piece of art – or rather two pieces forming one work of art (see the pic below). The nearby
information board read: ‘Per Barclays skulptur i Fauske’. From there on, the path ended. I tried a couple
of tracks through the grass, before reaching the street through what seemed someone’s backyard.
“People here do not have fences around their houses,” I noticed.
Work of art in Fauske town
Quest for the ‘big white spheres’ led me to the Erikstad and then to the peninsula next to Fauske which
seemed to have no name. Right where the town ended, I found a paradise: raspberries, red currants, black
currants… seemingly belonging to nobody! Maybe there used to be a house sometime in the past, but at
the very moment, the berries were there for everyone to pick. These raspberries, they were so big and so
sweet!
4
The NSA-installation and the Norwegian Intelligence (NIS) Space Collection Site, Lundveien 230, 8200 Fauske,
Norway [67°14'10.6"N 15°17'59.8"E]

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A small bit of my raspberry paradise
Further, after having walked uphill for a while, I passed the Lundhøgda Camping and Motel. Regardless of
the fact that it wasn’t exactly a warm summer weather, the parking lot was full of camping cars. I looked
back. It was a nice view to the Fauske town behind, with mountains in the background.

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A distant look to the Fauske town
Then I continued my walk. I progressed nicely and approached to the ‘white spheres’ until… there was no
way forward.
“Forbudt,” the yellow sign said in a way that wasn’t negotiable.5
Another smaller gravel road continued at a 90-degree angle. While unable to get to the white spheres, I
followed that other road.
5
‘Forbidden’ in Norvegian.

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‘The white spheres’ in sight; from this point on, the road was closed for random passers-by
Very soon, I reached what seemed yet another point of interest. Given the information board (in
Norwegian) and the following narrow wooden boardwalk I – mistakenly – thought that it was a circular
hiking trail.
I turned left to what I thought was a circular hiking trail
(While not understanding Norwegian, I first assumed that the green line on the map indicated the
hiking trail – which it did not!)

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The initial wetland was followed by a climb, leading to an improvised viewing platform. Right there was a
green letterbox, tied to a tree. Seeing the box, I was regretting a bit:
“Had I known this, I would have taken a piece of paper and a pen with me, and left a mail to be delivered
to home!”
It would have been interesting to see if mails are actually delivered from this letterbox in the middle of
nowhere!6
The viewing platform, the view and a green letterbox
At some points, while following the path, I got confused:
“It doesn’t seem to lead where the map showed!”
“Which way should I turn now, given that the path is branching?”
“What the heck: am I supposed to walk on these slippery rocks leading directly to the fjord water??!”
Confusion: “Is this supposed to be a trail?”
6
Strangely, it did not occur to me to check if there was a guestbook inside.

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Fortunately, instead of trying to climb on the slippery rocks, I had just enough common sense to turn back
from the above depicted point of confusion. Only then it finally ‘hit’ me:
“The green line on the map was NOT a hiking trail; it showed the boundaries of the Veten nature reserve!”
Climbing back up the hill along the narrow path turned out to be more challenging than coming down had
been.
“Good exercise,” I felt optimistic.
For sure, exercising like this was way more interesting than a gym workout. Getting back to civilisation
was a good motivation, after all .
Now I started to see mushroom, berries and what else the nature had to offer at that time of the year.
No, I did not feel lost, definitely not; I remembered all the crucial turning points and sign posts perfectly
well. I was simply moving more slowly. Still, soon I was back on the road.
“I’m sorry, I do not know how to attach mushrooms to Skype messages… This feature may even not yet be
developed,” was the only pity that I had.
OK, it wasn’t a real pity. It was a random curious thought of a feature that Skype had not yet invented:
attaching physical things to the messages.
Back on the main road, I walked till the end of it – or to be precise, until the sign ‘private road’ stopped
me. Then I turned around and went all the way back. The map that I had grabbed from the reception of
my accommodation the day before, helped me planning a slight round trip (see my walk below).
14 August 2020: Walk on the peninsula next to Fauske town (19.73 km)

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After walking close to 20 kilometres, incl. a supermarket visit, I found the front door of the Brygga Motell
closed, locked.
“It’s three o’clock in the afternoon, check-in ought to be open,” I thought, looking at my watch.
Yet nobody came to open, even not after me ringing the doorbell for the third time. I walked around the
house, hoping to find an open backdoor. All doors were locked. I did not see anybody through the
windows, either. I dried ringing the doorbell for the fourth time, unsuccessfully.
Then it occurred to me:
“There was a second code on the little piece of paper with the WiFi password that I yesterday grabbed
from the front desk! It may be the door code!”
I did not have that piece of paper with me anymore; I had thrown it away as soon as I had gained the WiFi
access. However – just for the case – I had made a photo of it. Sure enough, the second code worked as
the door code; I got in! A little bit of prudence had saved my afternoon . Of course, the guy in the
reception was supposed to tell me about the door code, yet he probably simply forgot this little detail…
My prudent pic of the piece of paper that saved my afternoon

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Trip to North: Narvik
Saturday,15 August: Bus trip from Fauske to Narvik
At 8:30 in the morning, I was ready in the Fauske Station to board the bus from Fauske to Narvik. There
was only one problem: I did not have the ticket. I had searched but not found where to buy that ticket
online. The Entur ticket machine in the station building did not give out any bus tickets either. I wasn’t too
concerned as I had read from a (random) travel blog that tickets can be bought directly from the driver.
“Can I buy the ticket from you?” I asked the driver when the bus arrived.
“Only from the app,” he replied.
“What app?” I asked, confused.
At that point, I had not yet figured out how the ticket system works in Norway; I did not have any clue
what app he was talking about.
“Billett Nordland,” the driver replied as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
Every transportation company seemed to have its own app… By then, together with this one new app, I
had already installed four of them into my smartphone: Entur app, Billet Nordland app, Troms Billett app,
Vy app… I further had to install the Norwegian app and the FRAM app.
“That App Economy is getting annoying! Can’t there be just one reliable app for all of those tickets?” I
thought.
Anyways, I got my ticket and could board the bus. It appeared that even for a trip as long as four and half
hours and about 250 kilometres, one had to buy tickets like for the public transportation in cities. Basically,
my ticket was valid for certain zones and for certain period of time, until I reached my destination in
Narvik. By the way, nobody checked if I actually had got the ticket! There were no seat numbers, no name
asked, nothing.
The bus itself was pretty empty; there were only a few fellow passengers. Keeping safe social distance
(because of the COVID-19) while in the bus wasn’t difficult.
At the beginning of my first bus trip in Norway, I felt a bit uneasy: all the information provided was in
Norwegian and Norwegian only. I did not understand a word. I did not even know if I had to change the
bus somewhere; I vaguely recalled something like this from a travel blog. Only in the second half of the
journey when the driver changed and/or because one more foreigner jumped to the board, English was
added to the mix of languages. Then I truly started to enjoy the scenery. I did not have to change the bus,
either; it was the same bus all the way long.
The following map shows my journey by bus and for a small part, by a ferry as well.

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15 August 2020: Bus trip from Fauske to Narvik (ca. 250 km, 4 h and 35 min)
Despite of greyish weather, the landscapes were impressive. There were this many waterfalls on the way
that locals apparently did not care about those anymore! For them (and most of the people in this bus
were locals), waterfalls are a normal thing. I tried to imagine the life of people on these rugged lands and
what it might have been before the modern civilization… I also thought that the land-water-land
transportation was well organised.
Namely, part of the road was covered by ferry; in fact, the ferry was a moving bit of the highway E6! Barely
had we reached the Bognes ferjekai when the ferry arrived. The passage to Skarberget ferjekai took about
half an hour. Meanwhile, I got out of the bus to check out the onboard café and the lounge.

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Bus trip combined with the short ferry trip
Following the ferry trip, a traveller could enjoy views to the majestic mountains. I captured a few of them
through the bus window (see the pics below). Pure rock… Yet once again, this apparently was nothing
special for the locals; the bus did not slow down for the views. Well, maybe it used to do so before the
COVID-19 hit… while being full of tourists, eager to take pictures…
Majestic mountains on the way (as captured through the bus window)
The Narvik bus terminal was located next to the AMFI Narvik, a big shopping centre. The natural thing for
me to do right after arrival was stepping into the shopping centre, the more so that it was very windy
outside. In fact, I had to purchase food for this day as well as for the next one, which just happened to be
Sunday. I had already learned that in Norway, most of the shops and shopping centres were closed on
Sundays; I wasn’t sure if I would find anything open in the next day.
The shopping centre was full of people; they were having lunch, chatting, just hanging around.
“That’s what locals do with such a wind outside!” I made an observation.

33
Hardly anyone was following the rule of social distancing… It just would not have been feasible in a
shopping centre this tightly packed.
My hotel for the next four nights, Enter Hotell Narvik, was in a short walking distance from the bus
terminal and the AMFI Narvik. It apparently had adjusted its operations to the coronavirus situation. Well
ahead of my booked stay, they had sent me a text message with all the check-in information. They also
had let me know that no breakfast was going to be served in the hotel for the safety of the visitors.
Receiving this information beforehand was very helpful: I knew what to expect and what not to expect,
and plan my visit to the supermarket accordingly. The room was simple yet practical, with an ensuite
bathroom. Only the TV I did not need .
My simple yet practical hotel room in Enter Hotell Narvik
Narvik… Where did I land? The town of Narvik has a population of about 14,000 people yet it has a feel of
a city, at least as far as shopping centres and hotels are concerned. Its GPS coordinates are 68.4363°N
17.3983°E, that is, Narvik is located comfortably beyond the Arctic Circle.7
The city sits along the southern
shore of the Ofot Fjord, and is the centre of the Ofoten district.
7
The position of the Arctic Circle is not fixed and currently runs 66°33′48.2″ north of the Equator.
Source: Wikipedia, [WWW] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arctic_Circle (accessed 20 September 2020)

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Sunday, 16 August: Walking in Narvik & Ofoten Railway with Arctic Train
I slept so very well that night! Blame – or thank – the rather chilly room for this . Only later in the
afternoon I noticed that there actually was a heater as well; I simply had to turn it on. Among others, the
heater later proved to be useful for trying clothes. Anyways…
After my usual morning routines and breakfast – which consisted of a local product, a very tasty version
of the barley porridge8
, of an apple and of some Norwegian cheese – I set myself going by putting on my
new down jacket. It was rather cold outside, this despite that the strong wind of the day before had given
way to a more modest one. I felt warm in my clothing, warm and ready to explore the area.
The map below shows my almost circular walk from my hotel to the Narvik Station (Narvik stasjon),
followed by a short extra round trip as I still had some time left till the Arctic Train was scheduled to
depart. Yes, for the second part of my day I had purchased the Arctic Train roundtrip ticket, 30% off the
usual price! By the way, I had found out about the Arctic Train only the day before when searching about
things to do in Narvik.
16 August 2020: Morning walk around Narvik (11.02 km)
8
’Fjordland Byggrynslunsj’

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„Only tourists and optimists get out with such a weather on Sunday morning at 9 AM,” I thought while
starting my walk.
For half an hour or so, I did not see any other human being on the streets. Apparently, there were very
few tourists in Narvik at that point. At one place I still almost run into a man in his fifties, ‘running around’
with a map in his hand and asking for somebody local who could help him in finding the way. Optimists,
on the other hand, turned out to be predominately middle-aged women walking their dogs; as the day
progressed, I met several of such optimists.
I headed towards the ‘bottom’ of the town, that is the lowest part of Narvik in terms of altitudes. This
seemed to be sort of park or recreation area for the locals for there were no houses but a thicket with
walking/running/cycling trails. My Suunto app showed multiple records of people posting their sporting
activities in this area. I also encountered one woman doing her morning walk. Right in this… ee-mmm…
park there were raspberries and red currants, all on their own. Yes, to my surprise, even on this latitude
raspberries and red currants were starting to get ready for picking; this, I assume, thanks to the warm Gulf
Stream which also keeps port of Narvik ice-free all year around.
From the ‘very bottom’ of the town, I took a ‘bottom-up’ picture in the direction of Narvikfjellet (see the
upper left pic below). Yes, that’s quite a hint; given suitable weather conditions, my intention was to climb
that mountain the very next day. There were cable cars too but I did not see them going neither up nor
down; I did not know if they were running at all, given lack of tourists.
Followed the walk along the coastline. For some part of it, there was even paved light traffic road. I took
a couple of pics from the port for the Narvik Boating Association (Narvik Båtforening) and the pier of that
association.
Soon I was in the local beach called Slåttvikstrand. It was a nice green field with the children playground
and picnic area. I found even a tower meant for swimmers to jump into the water. Well, at least I think
jumping into the water was the purpose of that tower for there was a sign prohibiting use of the tower as
observation tower. For obvious reasons, on August 16 there were no swimmers. By the way, the sea
temperature here hardly ever gets higher than 14-15 degrees!
After the beach, I headed towards the train station. Yes, I know, I still had plenty of time… On the other
hand, I did not know the way – and I did not want to be late either. Given the landscape, one has to take
into account that it’s often not possible to just get through; one literally may face a rock going straight up,
and end up doing a rather long round trip.

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Some pics from my walk, clockwise: a view from the ‘bottom’ of Narvik to the top (the Narvikfjellet);
boats of the Narvik Boating Association (Narvik Båtforening); a view to the town from the pier of
Narvik Båtforening; chair for the giants in the Narvik beach (Slåttvikstrand)
This time, there were no long round trips, though. When I arrived to the station, well ahead of time, it was
completely empty. I walked around, took a couple of pics and then went to another small ‘just wandering
around’ tour.
Half an hour later, while returning to the railway station, I found a group of people who looked like
Norwegians discovering their own country. The Arctic Train Café was now open too. The good news was
that, among others, I was able to re-charge my phone with the camera which I was going to need in the
next section of the day .
Soon the blue train appeared, seemingly from nowhere. This was The Arctic Train! I stepped out of the
station building and took a pic of it – of it and the yellow station building, both bringing some colour into
this grey August day.

37
The Arctic Train in front of the Narvik Station (Narvik stasjon), ready to depart
Here is a quote from the website of the Arctic Train:
“The 42-kilometre train ride along Norway’s northernmost railway line, the legendary Ofoten Railway,
takes you from Narvik by the fjord to the barren mountain plateau by the Swedish border.”
Broadly speaking, it’s just where the train ride takes you. I recorded the full journey, shown on the map
below, with my Suunto watch (as cycling activity with nothing better prepared ) and got 36.69
kilometres. Colours indicate the speed of the train: the more there is red in shade, the faster we moved.

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16 August 2020: Travelling Ofoten Railway with the Arctic Train
(Recorded with my Suunto watch, pretending that I am a bicycle )
Yeah, as the story goes, Ofoten Railway is not just another railway; it’s the Norway’s northernmost railway
with stunning views and a true bit of history. As for the views, I followed the advice from a YouTube travel
video: sit on the left side of the train while getting started from Narvik. This definitely proved to be a good
bit of advice! Well, with only me, the small group of domestic tourists and just a few other people in the
train that afternoon, I could freely choose whatever side I wanted. (It is not all bad about the times of
coronavirus and travel restrictions, at least until the restrictions do not concern you personally!) Below
are a few pics from my seat on the left side.
Pics from the Arctic Train trip on the Ofoten Railway on 16 August 2020
The endpoint of the journey, that is point of return for the train was the Bjørnfjell Station in the village of
Bjørnfjell, located close to the Swedish border. While approaching the red wooden station building, I felt

39
fascinated about the houses on this rugged land. There were several (rather practical) questions coming
to my mind all at once:
“Who are the people living in these houses? Why do they have their houses here? What are they doing for
living? How are they getting their food and essentials? What are their ways of connecting with the rest of
the world?”
Well, the pic below is ought to invoke this kind of questions…
Bjørnfjell; I was fascinated about the houses on this rugged land
That’s what I learned when entering the word ‘Bjørnfjell’ into the Wikipedia search later in the evening:
„Bjørnfjell (Northern Sami: Bonjovárri) is a mountain and village of holiday cottages in Narvik Municipality
in Nordland county, Norway.“
Holiday cottages… Who the heck wants to have a holiday cottage right here?! Let me think… It’s definitely
a good getaway place if one just needs to get away… I further learned that in addition to the railway there
is a connecting highway (European route E10) as well, so going to a supermarket should not be such an
issue for anyone driving a car… Yet a human settlement on this place is still pretty amazing!

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Monday, 17 August: Climbing Narvikfjellet
Ooh, yet once again I slept just perfectly well! The dreams were sweet and full of colours! This is one of
the reasons why I like travelling: my dreams become much more interesting! In other words, I got a good
start for the day. During the previous couple of days, I had photographed this mountain called Narvikfjellet
from different angles; now I really wanted to climb it!
In the morning, I wasn’t in hurry but got a rather late start: at 9:25 AM. OK, in fact it was a bit earlier as I
simply forgot to start recording my walk/climbing in my watch from the very beginning. The weather was
cloudy and it was drizzling as well. In other words, it was what I imagined as a typical weather in this part
of the world at this time of the year.
Going uphill began pretty much from behind of my hotel. After I had left the town behind, I encountered
some roadblocks which made me wonder: is the mountain still open today? On the other hand, there
were no direct warnings. Thus, I went on.
Is the mountain still open today?
Soon I saw close below the lower station of the cable cars to Fjellheisrestauranten (Gondolen i
Narvikfjellet). As in the day before, nothing seemed to move there.
“Going up to the restaurant by foot seems to the only option today,” I thought.
As it turned out, it wasn’t. Cable cars were moving on demand; at the moment there simply was nobody
willing to go up or down.
Not far from the cable car station the paved road ended with what looked like the turning point for cars.
I was just wondering where to turn next when a young man appeared.
“Are you planning to go up?” he asked.
I nodded and added a bit hesitantly, having just taken out my phone with the map:
“I wonder, which way…”
“You can go there, pay them and get a ride!” he tried to be helpful by pointing towards the cable car
station.
“I specifically want to go on foot,” I stubbornly replied.
He seemed to have the same intention for he now produced a hiking map and said a bit hesitantly:

41
“Maybe this helps… The weather today is not the best… It may start raining.”
“I will see how far I can get,” I replied.
“Yeah, you have more suitable clothes…”
I looked at his jeans and jacket, and then at my waterproof, hiking pants and -shoes. My clothing was
indeed more suitable for the weather than his.
While he continued hesitating, I, after having figured out the right way, went on. A bit later, when looking
back, I saw him following me. Due to the corona situation I did not wait for him – just for the case, you
know. The other reason was that I simply did not want any company at this time.
Soon I passed the Narvik Mountain Lodge. Sure, they had good views for their guests! On the other hand,
I imagined what it would be to climb up with a shopping bag if I were to stay there… Sure, having good
views assumed certain compromises.
On the way up, I took pics from higher and higher points of view. The town below got smaller and smaller.
Encouragingly, I saw a local woman in sportswear coming down.
“It means, the road is open!” I concluded.
Pics from the way up, taken while I was getting higher and higher
It did not take long until the upper cable car station appeared in the clouds. Soon I was there myself. The
electronic thermometer on the station’s wall showed just five degrees Celsius but after climbing I felt
warm, this despite of the rather light clothing.
The restaurant called Fjellheisrestauranten has good views indeed, even on a grey day like this one! The
town of Narvik was like on my palm!
“One could only imagine the same view on a sunny day – or perhaps in the darkness of a winter night when
the lights are on in the town and everything is covered with snow! Adding northern lights would most
certainly not do any harm, either,” I thought of coming back one day to see a different view from the same
place...

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Restaurant ‘Fjellheisrestauranten’ and a view to Narvik from its balcony
Fjellheisrestauranten is only the starting point for serious hikers. From there on, there are narrow paths
for going higher, much higher. It wasn’t in my agenda this day, but I still made some attempts of moving
on. For the very least, I could touch the snow in the middle of August . Well, it did not feel like snow –
it felt more like ice.
As captured in the second pic below, all of a sudden it got really foggy. First, I could barely see the town
at the foot of the mountain; in the next moment I was in a cloud myself, trying to protect my camera from
getting wet. I looked at the virtually non-existent wet and slippery path ahead, and concluded that
continuing the way up would not have been such a good idea, not in these weather conditions and with
no special equipment. So, I trusted my common sense and turned around, first climbing back to the
restaurant still not that far away.
At the highest point of my walk this day: touching the snow (left) and Narvik town below in fog (right)
The guy I had talked earlier this morning, had just arrived to the upper cable car station. Purposefully, not
even noticing me, he was now heading towards the restaurant. I observed him trying to get in from the

43
first door. That door was closed. Then he run to search for another door. It had started to rain in earnest.
My impression was that the restaurant was closed; yet I knew that there was somebody in the building,
for I had seen an inviting electric light inside earlier, on the way up.
As far as I was concerned, I still had that one sure goal in mind: go down on my own feet. No other option
(cable car) did interest me at that very moment; I was sure that I could do it myself. Thus, I ran in the other
direction, towards the road down.
While having already descended for a few minutes, I finally saw the cable cars moving – the first time
during my stay in Narvik. My guess was that the fellow in (wet) jeans had woken them up! Most probably,
the employees of the cable car station had picked him up; sure, he was more than happy to pay for the
service this time. I put on my down jacket and felt like I was cheating: with this one jacket it was (almost)
too easy, too warm, too comfortable…
My walk is shown in the following map, incl. a round trip to the shopping centre near railway station at
the end.
17 August 2020: Climbing Narvikfjellet, from hotel to Fjellheisrestauranten and a bit further (11.21
km, incl. total ascent of 724 m)

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Tuesday,18 August: Hiking day
In the previous evening, I had thought of another hiking day. When waking up in the morning, however, I
looked out of the window and saw that the weather wasn’t all that promising. The sky was very grey, to
start with. I almost regretted that I had not prepared for a rainy day. Still, I found a weather forecast which
– differently from what my phone ‘said’ – looked pretty much OK. I wanted to believe in it; I tried to make
the rain go away just by wishing very hard. It apparently worked : the day turned out to be an almost
perfect hiking day, except that there could have been just a bit more sun.
First, I wanted to go and see from close the waterfall which was clearly visible from near the railway
station. I had been looking at it from distance a couple of days already. From Google Maps I knew that it
was located next to the Taraldsvik Power Station. Next point of interest was a lake named Førstevannet.
Here there was a camera sign on the map. Logical continuation was going to the FUNNhytta. From there
on, I did not do any specific plans.
“Let’s see, how far I can get,” I thought.
The end point of this path turned out to be a place called Tøttarota.
I progressed more or less in accordance with the plan. The following map illustrates my day’s hike.
18 August 2020: Hiking from hotel to Taraldsvik Power Station to Førstevannet to FUNNhytta to
Tøttarota – and almost the same way back (15.35 km, incl. total ascent of 665 m)

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From hotel to Taraldsvik Power Station
The beginning was familiar already: going behind the REMA 1000 Skistua Narvik which seems to be kind
of starting point for many hikes.
Soon the paved road ended and I was looking for a trail. In one website, the trail had been described as
‘well established’. What I found, however, was a narrow grassy path.
“Well established!” I thought somewhat bitterly and imagined all the trail being like this.
Later, on the way back, I learned that there was a much better road. That’s why this part of the trail was
narrow and grassy: it was rarely used.
The GPS in my smartphone indicated that I was moving in the right direction, even if I had messed up a
bit with the trail. According to the map, I was supposed to end up on a paved road pretty soon. This bit of
information was correct: soon I saw bigger road behind the trees. It took a little of rock climbing to get up
there.
Soon I was there next to the Taraldsvik Power Station. There was a picnic place and an information board;
one could enjoy views to the town of Narvik below. The waterfall I had had in mind, wasn’t too much to
see, however; it had looked way greater from below.
At the Taraldsvik Power Station
From Taraldsvik Power Station to Førstevannet
Right after the Taraldsvik Power Station actual hiking trails started. It looked like usually people drove up,
parked their cars in the Power Station’s parking lot, and then went on hiking from there. At that time – I
think, it might have been half past ten – there were only a couple of cars, however.

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Signpost and hiking map next to the Taraldsvik Power Station
At the beginning, choosing the road was easy: all arrows pointed in the same direction. The road was good
too: kind of gravel path which felt good for the feet. Views to the town of Narvik were just excellent. In
one place, there were picnic tables right on the edge of the cliff. Førstevannet itself turned out to be a
busy place when I arrived: there was a group of local school children having their outing or something of
the sort.
Pics from the walk to Førstevannet

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From Førstevannet to FUNNhytta
Right after Førstevannet, the path narrowed considerably, yet it still was a fairly good walking path even
if a bit muddy. After all, it had been raining in the days before! Ahead was a view to yet another majestic
rocky mountain top, covered with clouds. It was the peak of Rombakstøtta. Walking on the edge of a
plateau higher up felt cool and a bit scary too.
From the walk between Førstevannet and the FUNNhytta
The endpoint of this section of the trail was something breathtakingly beautiful and cosy at the same time:
the lake, the views, the hut (the FUNNhytta) with its picnic place… I tried the door of the hut – and it was
open. I went in. The little building looked more spacious from inside than one would believe, given the
outside appearance.
There were two tables to come with a group of people and have a lunch together, for example (when a
solution has been found to the corona situation). There was also a table with a book for record-keeping. I
wrote the date, my name and the time of arrival (11:11) into it; ‘from Estonia’ I proudly added with the
reference to my home country. The thermometer on the wall showed 10.1 degrees Celsius – not too bad
of a weather, especially given that the sun gradually started showing up .

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Arriving to FUNNhytta
From FUNNhytta to Tøttarota
From there on, the path narrowed considerably. It became more of climbing, going through the streams
of water etc. Yet my effort for going on was paid off generously. The views were stunning – but that wasn’t
all. I was particularly happy about finding lots and lots of cloudberries up there. That’s where the walk
became truly enjoyable .

49
Cloudberries and the way forward
The for me unknown habit of putting letterboxes into seemingly random places turned out to be a
common practice in Norway. The endpoint of the trail to Tøttarota was marked yet by another letterbox.
Further, there was a thermometer as well. The later showed a temperature of eight degrees Celsius. It felt
really warm after climbing…
Signs marking the end of the trail

50
Back to the hotel
When I turned around to walk back… Well, there was something special about one single rock on wet cliff
that made me taking a photo of it.
A pic from the point of return at Tøttarota
All the way up following the Førstevannet, I had not seen any other human being. However, just a few
hundred meters after turning around, I met a fellow hiker, a middle-aged man very obviously intending
to reach the Tøttarota. We greeted each other and went on in opposite directions, one coming, the other
going.
Greeting another human being is something universal when ‘running into each other’ in wilderness. By
the way, Norwegians say ‘Hei’ or ‘Hei, hei’— pretty much the same as we, Estonians, do. ‘Hei’ or ‘Hi’ seems
to be a ‘noise’ that is widely understood as friendly greeting, even if there are slight differences in spelling
and pronunciation.

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Next, I met a man who was probably retired yet still appeared to have the energy of a rather young person.
He had a bucket in his hand and when we passed each other (exchanging a greeting!), I noticed that the
bucket was half-full of those tasty but rare cloudberries!
I did not take many pics on the way back. Rather, I was looking for the berries, you know. Still, there was
one view that I particularly liked...
The one view on the way back that I particularly liked
To summarise, it was such a beautiful day that later in the evening I even posted a short video (photo-
summary) in YouTube, https://youtu.be/433eOxdwXeU. I tried to pass on the peace of mind that I had
just gained myself.

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Wednesday, 19 August: Morning in Narvik
Yet once again, it was the day of packing my stuff and moving on. There have been this many of such days
in my adult life already, that I have stopped counting them – in good sense. It’s not that I have had to
move; it’s that I have always enjoyed travelling.
Between 10:00 and 10:30 AM I checked out of the hotel. I had stayed in Enter Hotell Narvik for four days
without seeing anybody in this house, neither other travellers nor anybody from the staff. Somebody had
meanwhile emptied the trash bin in my room and I had heard my neighbour behind the wall, though.
Anyway, checking out was as easy as checking in had been: I simply left the key to the table as I had found
it by messaging my invisible host about my check-out.
“Thank you so much! Have a nice day! Enter Hotell Narvik,” came the quick reply.
My bus to Tromsø was scheduled to depart from the bus terminal at 1:10 PM. Till then I did not have any
specific plans but to simply walk a bit in the town. Namely, in previous days I had looked at the town from
very different angles but not really taken a closer look to the lower part of it. My rather spontaneous
circular walk of slightly more than four kilometres is shown on the map below.
19 August 2020: Morning walk in Narvik (4.34 km)
First, I headed in the direction of the Narvik Church. Going inside wasn’t in my agenda this time, however.
Instead, I moved on. A big building on top of a hill caught my attention. I thought, it was the municipality
building or something, yet it turned out to be University Hospital of North Norway Narvik. I climbed up to
the hill and had a good view to the houses. After a glance to the Narvik Stadion (guarded with gates!)

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followed wandering on the streets of the residential area. People here in North seem to love wooden
houses; such houses create a feeling of warmth, especially if in bright colours! Then I already arrived to
the familiar main street. A signpost indicated the distance to the various places that somehow seemed
relevant; most importantly, I learned that the distance between Narvik and Northern Pole was 2,407
kilometres which is still a long way.
Pics from my morning walk in Narvik Downtown
With that my visit to Narvik was pretty much over. I walked to the bus terminal, first dropping into the
AMFI Narvik for a quick lunch.
Trip to North: Tromsø
Wednesday, 19 August: Bus trip from Narvik to Tromsø
This time, I had done it all right: I had downloaded the right app (Troms Billett) and got the ticket well in
advance. At some point it seemed that the app was falling off a bit, though: when updating the ticket

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status, it showed an error message. I noticed that if offline, the ticket was displayed correctly. So, I got
into the bus without any problems. In this bus, by the way, it was possible to buy the ticket from the driver
as well (using bank card / no cash accepted!); I saw a guy doing just that, buying the ticket from the driver.
We two, me and the guy mentioned, we wanted to get to the board before the others who were still
loading their bags into the luggage room. There was a funny moment when we simply stood at the middle
door not sure what to do: the door did not open even though the driver had given a permission to enter
the bus from there. Then it dawned to me:
“There is something that looks like a button, just press it!”
I pressed the button, winking to the guy standing beside me – and voilà, the door opened as if I had done
a bit of magic! The guy replied with a silent wink and we, two rare travellers in the area in these uncertain
‘corona times’, got in.
The bus trip took place as planned, as depicted on the following map from the Entur website.
19 August 2020: Bus trip from Narvik to Tromsø (ca. 230 km, 4 h and 12 min)

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The bus was a comfy two-decker and the journey itself spectacular, even if difficult to capture with my
smartphone camera through the bus window. There were all of these: mountains and mountain lakes,
occasional snowy areas and countless waterfalls, nice little towns and colourful wooden houses.
A pic through the bus window on the way from Narvik to Tromsø
At one point, a black guy appeared next to me, showing his certificate of employment.
“Ticket control,” was my first thought.
Yet it wasn’t a ticket control. The guy explained that he is doing some kind of survey among the
passengers: are the passengers happy with the bus service and if there are any problems? I managed to
skip the part of answering questions by simply replying that I’m not the right person to ask; it was my very
first time with this particular bus company, after all. Then the guy went from one passenger to another
and spoke with everyone something in Norwegian.
With a delay of five minutes or so the bus arrived to the Tromsø Prostneset station on the island of
Tromsøya which is where I had to get out. Apparently, it was a port there; I could see several ships that
looked like passenger chips or even cruise ships. The walk to my hotel for the next five nights, the Comfort

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Hotel Xpress Tromsø, was about 750 meters from the dropped-off point. My new location was right in the
Tromsø city centre.
Once again, check-in to the hotel was full self-service, even though there was a 24/7 customer service
desk for the case one needed it. I printed my key card and entered the room #529 on the fifth floor. It all
worked just fine. Immediately I felt happy that I had booked precisely this one hotel; I so much liked my
new room .
Thursday, 20 August: Arctic-Alpine Botanic Garden and walk in Varden
On this day, after a good night sleep and my morning routines, I intended to explore the island of
Tromsøya. I had a preliminary idea of the day’s route in mind – and that’s what I pretty much did. My
wanderings, almost 19 kilometres, are shown on the map below.
20 August 2020: Walk on the island of Tromsøya (18.85 km)

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My first point of interest was the Arctic-Alpine Botanic Garden, that is the world’s northernmost botanic
garden and arguably (at least according to the Visit Tromsø! website) one of the world’s ten most beautiful
gardens. From my hotel, reaching the garden was a rather short four-kilometres walk. I am not a botanist,
even not a hobby gardener, yet even I recognised a rather remarkable collection from the Arctic,
Himalaya, southern parts of South-America… In short: there was a collection of flowers and plants that
can tolerate the climate at this latitude (69.6492° N, 350 kilometres north of the Arctic Circle). A special
section was dedicated to the plants from Northern Norwegian gardens (green cultural heritage!).
A couple of pics from the world’s northernmost botanic garden
(Apparently, I am most fascinated about the landscapes & overall impressions .)
Before I reached the world’s northernmost university, I just happened to a lesson of geology and rocks. I
learned that there are three types of rocks: sedimentary rocks, igneous rocks and metamorphic rocks. My
question, of course, was this: what kind of rocks form the basis of the mountains all around me? ‘Granitt,
Narvik kommune’ was the closest example bit of rock that I noticed, thus granite, an igneous rock.

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A lesson of three different types of rocks, from left to right: sedimentary rocks, igneous rocks and
metamorphic rocks
Interestingly, I further learned that 450 million years ago, what we know as Norway, was located in
southern hemisphere! 420 million years ago, it was positioned near the equator. Currently, the country is
apparently in the northern hemisphere. How short is the human history of about 200,000 years as
compared to these bigger geological changes, creation and destruction of the entire continents!
Then I walked on the territories of the UiT The Arctic University of Norway. Sure, one could have made
better pics, but the ‘sculpture’ below was what attracted my attention… The university looked pretty big,
by the way.

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A sculpture on the territory of UiT The Arctic University of Norway
From there on, I proceeded to the territory of the island of Tromsøya that I – based on the tourist
information – labelled as ‘Varden’. In other words, I walked on the northern side of the island. This was
kind of ‘civilized hike’, I mean hike in the midst of civilization. The views were as promised, not very high
yet still good. On the way, I saw several groups of school children getting their lessons there, right in
nature.

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Walking the muddier ways of Varden on the island of Tromsøya.
After having circled the northern part of the island, and enjoyed blueberries and cloudberries on the way,
I reached a perfect picnic place called Turbohuken. Of course, a lazy person’s walk from the city centre to
Turbohuken would have been much more straightforward, but didn’t I need some extra kilometres for my
on-going walking challenge ?
Picnic place called Turbohuken – and the view from there

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After the picnic my destination was the Comfort Hotel Xpress Tromsø, of course. I chose a slightly different
and more beautiful way. Pretty much at the end of my wanderings, I happened to an inspiring text on a
colourful wooden house’s wall: “It’s never too late to be a rock star”.
A bit of inspiration: Who was the first one to say this? For me, it doesn’t really matter; it’s a good
quote anyways.
Friday, 21 August: Day above Tromsø plus Arctic Cathedral
For me, 21 August 2020 was another great day in Norther Norway – perhaps the greatest day there till
date.
When waking up after a good night sleep and looking out of the window, the first thing that I saw, was
the blue sky. It was almost eight o’clock in the morning so I got up rather quickly. At 9:30 AM, after my
morning routines, I was out and ready to get going. My plan was climbing the Sherpatrappa, and going to
Storsteinen and Fløya mountain.

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For the starters, I walked over the 1,036-metre-long Tromsø Bridge which is a point of interest on its own.
“One really cannot commit suicide from this bridge,” crossed my mind when looking at the fences on both
sides of the bridge.
As I later found out from Wikipedia, protecting people for themselves / helping to prevent suicide is
indeed the main purpose of these fences.
After passing the highest point of the bridge, the Tromsdalen Church, also known as Ishavskatedralen (the
Arctic Cathedral), appeared awe-inspiringly. Still, I only went to explore it later in the afternoon. First, I
looked for the signs pointing towards the Sherpatrappa, a stone staircase of 1,203 steps up to the
Storsteinen. The staircase wasn’t difficult to find: right next to the Arctic Cathedral there was a sign
pointing in the right direction.
Sherpatrappa
I wasn’t by far the only one climbing those stairs that day. There were more than one group of school
children as well. Pretty soon, I got warm indeed! At last, it was very nice to see the welcoming Fjellstua
Café at the end of the stairs. By the way, by climbing the stairs instead of coming up and going down with
the cable car, I saved about 23 euros .
Here I was, on the viewing platform. Tourist information had been correct: the view to the island of
Tromsøya with the snowy mountain tops in the background was truly spectacular!

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Panorama view to the island of Tromsøya from next to the Fjellstua Café
When looking in the opposite direction, an ‘appetizing’ way ahead appeared. I simply wanted to run on
those fields towards what seemed endless freedom! It was as if I had heard the indescribable call of the
mountains, even if still far away... Many people were satisfied with the views from the café, but many
others went on. For sure, I belonged to the later camp and went on .
Road to freedom, that is the way from Storsteinen to Fløya

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When glancing left and right, further excellent views appeared, some just so ‘tasty’… I met a few athletes
running or cycling, coming back from somewhere. After quite a bit of climbing I, together with a bunch of
fellow hikers, reached the top of Fløya. There a guy from Germany took a pic of me.
I had just reached the top of Fløya mountain; the island of Tromsøya in the background
Reaching the top of the Fløya mountain, as great as it may sound, isn’t the end of the story. The way
forward, slowly but surely going up, still looked inviting. So, I went on even if I had not had such intention
at the beginning. I climbed the next top and then looked forward to the next one… On the way, I took pics
of the neighbouring mountain range which seemed equally inviting…

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Moving on, looking back and towards the plateau of the neighbouring mountain range
Then I saw them, the reason of me coming this far, the reason of me having left the fellow hikers behind:
reindeers farther away on a snowy spot!
“I will not disturb them – as they would not disturb me,” I thought while watching the animals from a
respectful distance.
They looked very peaceful on this amazing landscape. I wondered if they were wild or a Sami farmer had
let them go to the fields on their own, expecting them to return home at some point. In any case, they did
not seem to be bother about my presence farther away.

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Reindeers on sight!
After having observed the reindeers for a while, I continued my walk. A little while later I reached the
point where I could see only stones ahead.
“It’s time to turn around,” I decided and began my journey back.

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Only rocks ahead!
Initially it felt like an infamous ending: I had turned around pretty much in the middle of nowhere. Yet as
it turned out, the timing could hardly have been better. I was rewarded by a herd of reindeers running
past me! Indeed, the lead reindeer even decided to change the path of the herd because of me! (When I
first saw them, the herd was exactly on the same path as me, only headed in opposite direction.) I stopped
to watch them passing by and record the episode with the camera of my smartphone. It’s difficult to
describe the experience… I literally heard them breathing!
On the way back, I undertook a little sidewalk to the Steinbøhytta. It was just 200 metres away from the
main trail, after all! Well, after the FUNNhytta in Narvik, this one hut fell a bit short of expectations. Yet
on some other day, in more extreme weather conditions, it could well be of a great help for someone…

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The Steinbøhytta
The reminder of the walk back to the town was already familiar and with no surprises. For sure, going
down was easier and faster than coming up had been.
Now it was the time for me to step into the Arctic Cathedral. The visit cost me about five euros, yet was
well worth the money. I have never seen such a church! (See the pics below.)
The Arctic Cathedral, an architectural masterpiece, for sure… What the heck is the skull doing in the
mosaic? What is the meaning of the numbers on the wall?

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The day’s walk is depicted on the usual map below.
21 August 2020: Hotel – Sherpatrappa – Storsteinen – Fløya mountain – Steinbøhytta – Storsteinen –
Sherpatrappa – The Arctic Cathedral – Hotel (14.87 km, incl. total ascent of 817 m)
Saturday, 22 August: Polaria, southern part of Tromsøya and Prestvannet
As compared to the day before, this day was quieter, yet had its own highlights. My plan was to visit
Polaria, an arctic experience centre that, among others, has the most northern aquarium in the world.
Since Polaria was opened only from ten o’clock in the morning and was just 400 metres away from my
hotel, I got a long morning.

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I was there at about ten minutes after ten. Already from the outside, the building looked interesting (see
the first pic below). Right next to the Polaria building I found what I would describe as… sustainable seal.
It looked like a sculpture of seal (or maybe a fish), made from the parts of old tires and other re-used
materials.
Outside of the Polaria building
In the ticket office I was informed that at 10:30 AM there will be training and feeding of the seals. It was
almost the time so I made my way to the seal pool. Usually there have been hordes of people for this type
of attractions, but not this time; this time there was a lot of room to see the seals and the show and chat
with a seal trainer afterwards. (Blame or thank, depending on the vantage point, COVID-19 for this!)

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Feeding of the seals in Polaria
They had four seals there in Polaria, two big ones from the species Storkobbe (Erignathus barbatus), called
Bella and Mai San, and two smaller ones from the species Steinkobbe (Phocavitulina), called Lyra and
Loffen. According to their trainer, each of them had different character, but they all were very smart. The
bigger seals were born in May 2003 and the smaller ones in July 2010. The typical lifespan of a seal is 25-
30 years, so these ones are going to live a number of years to come unless something unexpected
happens.
“It’s like with the dogs: the smaller the species, the longer it lives,” the trainer added.
“How do they know who is going to feed them?” I wondered as I noticed that the smaller ones always
followed one trainer and the bigger ones the other.
“They know the sign on their bucket,” the trainer said.
Well, that was interesting: a seal always knew his or her bucket and would have noticed if another seal
would have stolen from it!
“But how do you teach the signs to the seals?” I asked further.
“That’s a good question,” the trainer began the explanation.

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Basically, there are several stages to it. First, a seal learns getting food from the hand which is
accompanied by a whistle. Then gradually, he or she is made familiar with the bucket and with the sign.
“Currently, we are trying to teach them multiple signs. That’s making them a bit confused,” the trainer
went on.
I further learned that each day is different for the seals and for their trainers. It very much depends on
how the seals are feeling in a given morning. If they are feeling full of energy, there are many training
sessions. If they are feeling unwell, there are very few sessions if any.
Soon after I heard an announcement: there is going to be "Northern Lights – A Wonderous Experience"
show in the panoramic cinema! That’s where I headed next. The film explained the phenomenon of
Northern Light (and how our planet Earth is protecting itself for the solar winds), and displayed various
perspectives of northern lights above Tromsø.
When the film ended, the people in the audience – there were just three of us this time – were smoothly
directed to a room dedicated to snow, ice and climate change. If these facts, big and bold on the walls of
this room, did not make one think about the issue then I don’t know… For the starters, there has been a
40.5% decrease in summertime arctic sea ice cover over the last 25 years; this is changing the climate for
worse and more unpredictable; it’s changing the lives of the polar animals in ways we cannot predict.
An impact of the climate change, written on a wall inside the Polaria building

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Having got out of the dark room, I explored the collection and watched/listened to a couple of educational
videos about the shellfish. How to read the age of a shellfish from its shell? How to read climate changes
through time from the remains of shellfishes? How to determine the seawater pollution based on the
opening of a shellfish’s shell? These are all pretty curious questions that got answered there. My favourites
from the collection were rather odd-looking animals, see the pic below.
My favourite piece of the collection in Polaria
By 11:47 AM I was out of the Polaria building and ready to continue my explorations in Tromsø. I turned
on the walking regime of my almost smart Suunto watch and got going.
“I still have my kilometres to do – at least ten,” I thought.
The walk took me to the southern part of the island of Tromsøya and then to the lake of Prestvannet
which I circled one and half times. The map of my ‘hiking day’ is shown below. After climbing the day
before, these kilometres felt fairly easy. The weather was good as well: it was cloudy, yet this warm that
a T-shirt was just enough.

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22 August 2020: Walk on the island of Tromsøya (11.61 km)
My first sight was the local beach. I touched the water. It was cold but not freezing cold – between 10 and
15 degrees Celsius, I’d guess. Some locals were actually going into the water on this latitude, on the 22nd
of August!

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Local beach of Tromsøyans, I mean people living on the island of Tromsøya
Further, a view to a (truly) open air museum caught my attention. ‘Perspektivet Museum’ I read from the
information board.

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A view to a museum in open air
My last but not least destination this day was the lake Prestvannet. It was a no brainer: circling the lake
Prestvannet is simply one of the ‘must do’ easy things in Tromsø. It’s a fairly short walk indeed, about 1.7
kilometres in length and with no notable ups and downs on the way.

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A pic from circling the lake Prestvannet
Then I headed back to the hotel to arrive just on time. Right when I had closed the door, it started raining.
“Perfect timing,” I thought.
It looked like I was on good terms with the Master of Weather .
Sunday, 23 August: Going to Tromsøbadet
After watching the seals in Polaria, I wanted to bathe and swim by myself. Thus, I googled for the
swimming pools and spas in Tromsø, and found Tromsøbadet. It turned out that I actually knew the
building already: I had passed it on my first walk in the city! Ticket prices also looked fairly reasonable:
less than 20 euros even on Sundays. Thus, the activity for the day was decided!
On the way to the pool, I walked through the Charlottenlund Recreational Park. Wow, that seemed a good
place to spend free time too, at least for the physically active people! There was a stadium, plenty of
options for climbing, skateboarding etc. Locals weren’t there yet in the morning, yet in the afternoon
when I returned, the park was full of people.

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23 August 2020: Walk from my hotel to Tromsøbadet and back (7.0 km)
After entering the building of Tromsøbadet and buying the ticket, I could take my first look through the
glass wall to a true swimming and bathing paradise.
First look to the Tromsø’s swimming and bathing paradise Tromsøbadet

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Soon I was there, among those people. There were plenty of facilities, just like there ought to be in a
proper swimming pool and wellness centre. I was the most impressed about the Olympic-size pool: while
being 50 metres in length, the pool was five meters deep in the deeper end and had ten swimming tracks.
For fun, there were things like water slides, wave pool, obstacle course… Just to relax, one could enjoy
Finnish sauna and steam bath, massage and bubble baths, the grotto, and the warm water channel which
led to the outdoor pool.
I wondered how skilful these Norwegian children were in water, how comfortable and fearless! They kept
making use of various diving boards from 1 to 10 meters. OK, the 10-meters board was closed that time,
but even five meters was impressive to me! I felt myself like total amateur by barely swimming from one
end of the pool to another and then needing a resting pause before swimming back. Initially, the depth of
the pool felt scary too, but soon I got used to it.
For me, the greatest pleasure was the outdoor pool. The water there was very warm, 34 degrees Celsius;
when combined with the outside temperature of about 15 degrees, it felt just right. Enjoying the views to
the mountain range on the neighbouring island of Kvaløya was something extra. Apparently, the outdoor
pool was the favourite of many. Still, there was enough room for everyone.
In the end of the wave pool I found a small climbing wall and tried it out as well – just a bit. Then I rather
chose the maelstrom to be carried away by the maelstrom's current. Water slides weren’t too scary; in
fact, one of them – preferred by children – was even really slow and long.
Saunas and bubble paths were good to rest and get warm. I kept switching between these and other
attractions.
A few hours later, satisfied but hungry – because pools and saunas tend to make you hungry – I got
going. Just on the way out I noticed another attraction for another time: a pretty impressive climbing wall
which did not quite fit into my camera (see the pic below).

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Climbing wall in the building of Tromsøbadet
The Master of Weather was yet once again generous. Despite of all the warning signs of unavoidable rain,
I got back to the hotel dry. By the way, close to my hotel I found a grocery store called Joker that was open
even on Sundays. Indeed, some stores in Norway are still open on Sundays.
“The more I experience this country, the more I start liking it,” I thought, feeling happy.
Monday, 24 August: Last day in Tromsø before moving on
Tromsø kept me busy also on my last day in this town (for this time), this despite of the grey weather.
By 10:30 AM, I was checked out from my comfy hotel and headed towards the public library. Indeed, on
the Visit Norway website, Tromsø Library and City Archives is marked as one of the six libraries one has to

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see in Norway. The walk from the hotel wasn’t long, but bare 350 metres. That was good: it had been
raining all night and it still kept drizzling.
From the outside, the building looked… quite interesting. (See the left pic below.) I learned that the
uniquely constructed ceiling dates back to the days when the building was home to Fokus Cinema, which
had opened in 1973. From inside, it all appeared very open. I just walked in and was right in the middle of
all the books and culture. Huge windows and views from there added a lot to the overall milieu. The most
I liked the basement floor which was designed for children , and the attic floor which was the quiet
area. Actually, it was very peaceful there on every floor for there were not many people on this day.
Tromsø Public Library and City Archive
After the brief visit to library, I headed towards the Northern Lights Planetarium. I had noticed this yet
another interesting building before, on my walk on August 20. At that time, I only did not know that it was
the Norway’s largest planetarium and that it was opened to the public.

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The building of the Northern Lights Planetarium
The entrance to the building was on the fourth floor, via the glass part that looks like multi-storey
greenhouse (see the pic above). The tickets were sold on the second floor; I paid about 12 euros for my
visit.
The secretary at the front desk mentioned something about the fourth floor and the exhibition, and that’s
where I headed. Indeed, there was an exhibition. I carefully browsed through everything that there was
to see: information about planets, stars and constellations, about Earth’s atmosphere… Still, for me it
seemed too little for 12 euros! There were still a couple of hours left till the “Extreme Auroras” movie; I
did not intend to simply sit and wait this long!

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Learning about the stars and constellations
I went back to the second floor and past the front desk. It turned out that the truly fun part was there
behind in two very large rooms! Our knowledge about the life on Earth, about energy and us, humans,
was broken down into playful pieces! That’s really a great introduction to the natural sciences for children
and for curious adults as well! I played there for the next two hours; the time just flew by! Then I heard
the announcement: the movie of extreme auroras would start in ten minutes.
Pics from the fun part of the Northern Lights Planetarium (from left to right): I am in TV with a polar
bear ; a human taken into puzzle-like pieces; just another random corner on the playground

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Just by the time when the movie was about to begin, I was back on the fourth floor. The door of the
cinema room was open now – and a group of people had appeared from almost nowhere. This cinema
was a bit unusual: there was no other screen than the sphere-like ceiling. To see the movie, one had to
look up like in nature when looking for the northern lights!
The movie “Extreme Auroras” is a documentary that features the aurora in science, history and arts. For
the introduction a ‘warning’ was provided: don’t expect something like in the pictures that you have seen
in the internet; camera tricks make the aurora look brighter/different; here the filmmaker and
photographer Ole Salomonsen (himself from Tromsø, by the way) aims to be truthful, show people what
they would see if experiencing auroras first hand in nature.
Now, after having seen the movie, I think that it was a very truthful representation of the northern lights.
Though, I haven’t seen the northern lights in real life myself, not yet…
Anyways, very happy with my day, I headed towards the Tromsø Airport. By that time, the rain had
stopped completely and I got a nice walk. My entire journey from the hotel to the airport is depicted on
the following map. In case you are wondering: no, I did not have to walk on the highway; there were light
traffic roads everywhere.
24 August 2020: From hotel to Tromsø public library to Northern Lights Planetarium to Tromsø Airport
(8.97 km)

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Brief visit to Western Norway
Getting from Tromsø to Molde
When it comes to getting from Tromsø to Molde, I had already decided for a shortcut way, that is for using
the services of Norwegian, the Norway's largest (low-cost) airline. The trip summary in my ticket
reservation included two flights (see also the map below):
• 24 Aug 21:10 Tromsø Airport – 24 Aug 23:05 Oslo-Gardermoen Airport
• 25 Aug 07:30 Oslo-Gardermoen Airport – 25 Aug 08:30 Molde Airport
Yep, that’s true: I had to spend the night in the Oslo-Gardermoen Airport. Due to the prevailing COVID-19
situation, I had searched for this piece of information beforehand: is the airport still open in the night (yes)
and can I NOT wear the mask in the airport (yes; masks were NOT mandatory in the airports in Norway,
but only when in the plane).
Flight from Tromsø to Molde (via Oslo)

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Tromsø Airport turned out bigger than I had expected this far in North – not exactly big, but bigger than
one might expect. This was good news for I spent several hours there, working with my laptop. There was
even a dedicated room with tables and plugs and WiFi. In normal times, this room would have been a
restaurant, but due to the coronavirus, the restaurant was closed.
The flight was on time, even slightly ahead of schedule. Just before eleven o’clock in the night I landed in
the Oslo-Gardermoen Airport. I wasn’t quite sure what to do next: can I stay in the airport lounge for the
night? This time in the night, the airport lounge appeared very quiet; I did not see any movements there.
I assumed that I had to exit the lounge and go to the departures area – and that’s what I did.
There were only a few people staying for the night in the airport. At least partially, this was explained by
the requirement that people arriving from the ‘red zone’ countries (in terms of the COVID-19) had to find
an overnight accommodation elsewhere. Everything was closed: all shops, all cafés, everything. Had I not
had my just-for-the-case apple, muesli bars and water with me, I would have felt very hungry that night…
Hence the moral: always bring your own ‘plan B’ food & water with you! The good thing of only a few
people staying for the night was the availability of the best sleeping places – if one can call four
consecutive chairs without armrests in between a ‘bed’, of course .
I slept till 3:44 AM. Assuming that at four o’clock the security zone would open for the early morning
flights, I got up. I wasn’t mistaken; the security zone opened at my expected time, even slightly earlier. As
far as I know, I was the first person to pass the controls that morning – with a plan to sleep a couple of
hours more in the airport lounge, hopefully in more comfortable conditions.
The relaxation area in the airport lounge looked really nice for a person in need of some more sleep (see
the pic below). To my surprise, I found two people there before me (who left rather soon for the very first
flights on this new day).
“Does this mean that I could have just stayed here and skipped that second time of the security controls?”
I asked myself.
Most probably, the answer was ‘yes’. I just had not known it… Anyways, I had a couple of sweet dreams
before waking up again, wondering if I had missed my flight to Molde…

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Relaxation area in the Oslo Airport lounge (One ‘bed’ is already occupied by me .)
I had not missed the flight. I was there to board just on time. In fact, I even had time to do some ‘shopping’
in the kiosk that had just been opened. The flight itself was yet again on schedule.
Molde Airport where I landed ten minutes past eight in the morning, turned out to be a really small one.
It was not the smallest airport where I had ever been, but it was a small one. I did not see any cafés. Yeah,
this morning I would have liked to sit a couple of hours in an airport café; it was still early, and it was
raining and windy and not-so-warm (10 degrees Celsius) outside.
Without having an option/excuse to stay, I got going. I had intended to walk from the airport to the hotel
– and I did it, despite of the weather. The fastest way according to the Google Maps would have been just
6.1 kilometres; for me, it turned out to be an eight kilometre walk as I had to hide my smartphone with
the map from the rain and, in search of a warm place under the roof, messed up a bit. In total, I got a walk
of about eight kilometres. My journey is shown on the map below.

88
25 August 2020: Journey from Molde Airport to Scandic Alexandra Molde (8.04 km)
I found my warm place under the roof of a building that, among others, housed the Eurospar Molde (that’s
where I got my food) and Akademiet Molde (that’s where I got my place to sit). In an hour or so, the rain
was almost over and I was almost dry again. I put on my down jacket – yet once again, it gave me the
warmth that I badly needed at this time – and got moving.
Entrance to the town of Molde was picturesque even with the given weather – or perhaps just because
of that weather. I found the mountains in the background, visible only partially behind the clouds, simply
fascinating. Perfect lawn in sight plus the perspective of a comfy hotel room with hot shower only added
to the impression…

89
Arrival to downtown Molde
Even if arriving to my booked hotel, the Scandic Alexandra Molde, two hours ahead of the indicated check-
in time, I found welcoming staff in the reception and my room ready for me to move in. The balcony and
the view were already more than I had expected… I spent my afternoon in this beautiful hotel, resting and
dreaming and planning for the next day.

My First Trip to Norway - Summer 2020

My First Trip to Norway - Summer 2020

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My First Trip to Norway - Summer 2020