Tromsø (Norway) - June 2008

Photos

Monday 9th June: We arrived at the airport an hour late, and along with a bunch of fellow visitors I missed the airport bus to town as they'd moved the bus stop but not told anyone. Luckily there were a bunch of people attending a powder coating conference (?) and they organised a minibus taxi and invited me along. Their hotel was only a couple of blocks from mine - it was easy to find and quite comfortable albeit not much of a step up from a hostel - as expected things were expensive and it cost perhaps double what you'd expect in more typical destinations, but that's OK.

I was in the Arctic in the first place because I wanted to see the midnight sun - probably since I built my own sundial I was fascinated by how some places can have 24 hour sunlight or darkness. Tromsø's latitude is about 69½° North, so around 3° inside the Arctic circle - meaning the sun should be nearly 3° above the horizon at midnight when I would be there about 10 days before the summer solstice. 3° doesn't sound much but it is 6 times the diameter of the sun (with my arm outstretched I could fit two fingers between the horizon and the sun- another finger obscured the sun).

While getting my bearings, I saw a poster for the Soweto Gospel Choir, which struck me as quite incongruous; I saw that they were performing that night at Tromsø Domkirke; I had no idea where that was... but then I noticed some African-looking people sitting on the steps of the cathedral across the road, looking like they were doing singing warmups. My interest sufficiently piqued, I went to the door and asked the ticket price - it was Kr400 (around $80) which was exactly what I had in my pocket. Ticket in hand, I explored the town centre for a little longer; on returning a big and excited crowd had built up inside the cathedral; in fact I was struggling to find a seat - then I spied a staircase. Upstairs, the pews with views had been filled but I saw the balcony opposite the alter didn't have any seating, although there were chairs stacked nearby. I took one, looked around to see whether anyone minded, then took up my front-row-balcony seat. About 20 others immediately copied this tactic, so I figured I was on a good thing (as long as the balcony stayed up!).

The show started with the local gospel choir - about 40-strong (all with handheld mics), supported by a gospelly band. They were fantastic! The singing was great and they were very dynamic on stage. During intermission we were addressed by the chairman of the Nobel Peace Prize committee, who told us how the concert was a benefit for Nelson Mandela's work and how there has been an ongoing connection between Mandela and Tromsø - he has visited the city several times. Then we had the Soweto Gospel Choir themselves - amazing singing and songs, numerous standing ovations, and they had lots of the audience in tears during songs such as 'One' (by U2). All the encores were so uplifting we could have floated out at the end. The show finished at 11:30pm - and the sun was still comfortably above the horizon! I knew that you couldn't see the midnight sun from the town centre as it was obscured by a hill so I headed to the bridge that connects Tromsø island to the mainland, arriving at the peak just before midnight.

It was spectacular! The backdrop of snow-capped mountains and fjords was perfectly dramatic, the sun and moon both shone brightly, and down below in the town there were just a few cars and pedestrians along with the normal middle-of-the-night industries - garbage collectors and roadworks. It gave it a slightly post-apocalyptic feel - daylight, big city, hardly anyone around. Back at the hotel it was hard to consider going to sleep - the sun is still up! - but I finally slipped on the eyemask at 2am.

Tuesday: I visited the tourist information but it was full of grey nomads asking annoying questions, and I was feeling quite seedy so I gave up trying to find a daytrip and instead headed back for a bit more sleep after the late night (night? hah!). I made it back around lunchtime; this time my fake 'Tourist English' (to say "I can't speak Norweigan - sorry - but I will try to be as clear as I can") only succeeded in confusing the Tourism guy, who was a Kiwi. He suggested the Roundtrip - a daytrip that starts at 4pm, giving me still plenty of time to get the bus to the Cable car to enjoy the spectacular views over the city and even have hike for an hour or so up above the cable station - occasionally crossing through snow patches. (It was maybe around 10°C.) The suburban bus back to town didn't eventuate but the following bus did, but only with a few minutes to spare.

The Roundtrip involves a 3 and 3/4 hour journey by intercity coach (and a couple of car ferries) to Skjervøy, returning with a 4-hour cruise on the historic Hurtigruten coastal steamer. The Hurtigruten travels daily in each direction on a 7?-day voyage, so in fact there are quite a number of Hurtigrutens steaming up and down the Norweigan coast at any time. The sights were as amazing as ever; I was also interested in the engineering effort that had gone into building tunnels and bridges across 2km-wide fjords (admittedly the tunnels were rough-hewn but quite serviceable) to service what really looked like quite minor towns. It transpired that while the bus was full, there were only 5 of us 'Roundtrippers' - the rest were normal commuters; of the other people on my tour the rest were two Swedish retiree couples.

The bus deposited us at Skjervøy but the ferry was half an hour late, and a biting wind started to cut through my layers. When the ferry did arrive, it loaded up some cargo and then let us aboard. There were a large contingent of tourists (mostly grey nomads again) and I settled in with a bunch of Swedes to watch their team play in Euro2008 - we sometimes lost the signal while passing some of the mountains. After the game I wandered around the boat enjoying the scenery outside. Many of the passengers had gone to bed. We steamed into Tromsø a bit after midnight - again I was very fortunate to have clear skies and enjoy the spectacle of watching the sun circle the horizon without ever dropping below it.

Wednesday: I took a suburban bus to the Norsk Telemuseum - there was very little in English and though I was getting good at making intelligent guesses while reading Norwegian, much in the displays escaped me - the curator was an elderly technician I think and spoke no English at all; it was still an interesting place though. Back in town I visited Polaria a slightly dinky 'Polar Experience' full of schoolkids, but the seal show was actually pretty good. I then went to the Mack Brewery tour at Ølhallen Pub, not that I was particularly interested in the tour; but I'm glad I did. Firstly, I have discovered that brewery/winery/distillery tours are a great way to learn a lot about the country's society (eg interesting drinking laws, driving considerations, festivals etc), and secondly, the tour group consisted of 3 Norweigan sisters - the youngest my age - and the youngest one's partner. All but the eldest sister live in the USA and they were in town for a family reunion; and they were constantly bumping into old friends of theirs. They invited me to a late lunch at "Emma's Dream Kitchen", where the manager was an old family friend. She showed us her upstairs restaurant and her renovation plans and told us how the Queen of Norway loves dining there - she's brought the King along on one occasion as well.

I polished off my stay with a walk around the harbourfront and across the bridge to the Arctic Cathedral, but I didn't go in - it looked overly touristy and had an admission charge. Instead I went back to the hotel and watched the football (I was really starting to get into the tournament!) and was talked at by a rather drunk Swedish guy who claimed to be a minor rock star from the 80s.

Thursday: Up at 5am for the 6:50 flight - I shared a taxi with a lady who was also staying at the hotel, whose employer graciously paid for the ride. The airport not only had check-in kiosks but also self-bag labelling stations - when I printed off the bag label the machine seized up leaving me at the front of a long queue with a machine flashing error messages at me in foreign languages. It turned out to be just that the label spool had run out halfway through my label; as he reloaded the spool the attendant assured me that my half-printed label would still work fine even though it just had some barcodes and no "OSL-EDI" or whatever. In the plane I sat next to a big African guy who saw my ukulele and asked whether I was a muso - he turned out to be one of the Bala Brothers from South Africa who seem to be sort of an African 'Human Nature' topping the charts doing soul songs (although after a show the previous night he was looking very seedy and more like a rapper from the hood), they had performed with Tasha Baxter - an English/South African who was on both my Tromsø flights as well. I didn't speak to her but she had been notable in the departure lounges working the crowd. There had been a big concert the previous night that I hadn't known about - it would have been good to go to (if it had have been nearby) but as it was the early night came in handy.

Next time: I have to go back in winter, maybe to see 24 sunless hours, I'd love to go dog-sledding and I would love to see the aurora. I found that I could understand enough written Norweigan to get by using a bit of imagination; I have a fair way to go with spoken Norweigan though!

Next: Scotland