We arrived in Tromsø on the Sunday after our pretty exciting trip in (see the last blog for whirlpool fun), and parked up next to the sauna. We had burgers at the local burger joint which is done up (to my delight) in a Nintendo 64 Mario Bros theme.

A view of the local church rom the marina. It catches the light in so many different ways.
Letsa go!
Green pipes and everything! My brother asked me if I ate a mushroom and grew any taller? I said no, that I’d eaten a burger and grown wider.

The next day was Monday, so the shops were open and we explored town a little bit. We also packed our bags! We’re going on a little holiday! We are hoping for sunshine!

This was the Gestapo headquarters. There is a memorial outside to those who died under their violence.

Sometimes its nice to have a little break from sailboat life, and so we had booked the Hurtigruten from Tromsø to Honningsvåg, which is a little further north on the island of Magerøya. Magerøya is connected to the mainland, and to the north of the island is Nordkapp, or North Cape, the northernmost point of Europe accessible by car.

Boarding time came (17:30), and we hopped on the boat with Bernie, and settled into our cabin. The trip was overnight, and the boat was excellent. Breakfast and lunch buffet, and dinner at your leisure at one of their establishments on board. They also have hot tubs, and a sauna so we enjoyed the hot tub on the back of the boat after dinner and watched as the snow capped mountains went past, and enjoyed not being responsible for the trip.

Bernie was pretty pumped! Until he remembered he gets stuck in the room on ferries.
This was about the moment he realised that this was a ferry. He hid under the bed.
Can you see Away there in the middle?
Honestly, I didn’t think they’d go under this bridge. But they do, with a few metres clearance on either side and on the top.
You might remember we witnessed 2 Hurtigrutens passing each other and beeping their horns when we were sailing further south. Yes they do this every time they pass another one, and announce it on the loudspeaker.
Yeah spa!

The next morning we arrive in Honningsvåg at about 11am, drop our bags at the hotel and explore town. Honningsvåg is a nice town, fishing as usual is one of the main industries and has been for a long time. The North Cape is about a 35 minute drive, so we source a car for the following day.

Quite a pretty town with the BEST bakery and food we’ve had in Norway.
Norwegian jumper out for my Norwegian holiday!

After a bit of a chill out in our hotel once we got the room keys, we ventured to the restaurant downstairs and enjoyed one of the best meals we’ve had in Norway. I had the cod, and Adrian had reindeer cutlets.

The following day we had a couple of hours before we were picking up our car for our road adventure, so we took the opportunity for a hike up into the hills behind the town. There is a large lake and this is where the drinking water is sourced.

Beautiful views from the hills behind town.
Looking back towards town from the hills, we saw this Hurtigruten expedition boat come into port. It will be going to Svalbard.

Around lunchtime we pick up our car, throw Bernie in the back and we were off to North Cape, arriving in time for lunch and to take Bernie up to the North Cape monument – the most northerly part of mainland Europe that you can reach by car. We can’t believe we’ve managed to take him from Sydney, to Paris, through the Netherlands, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, the Aland Islands, around to Norway and then all the way to North Cape. And backwards and forwards to the UK in between.

Can you see the reindeer? The white spot in the middle. Don’t worry, we see a lot more!
Bernie’s first look out to see from the top of mainland Europe.
The North Cape monument.
Bernie and I have come a long way from our first meeting in Dural, NSW Australia almost 10 years ago!

We also take the opportunity to quickly visit a couple of the other towns on the island, before dropping the car back, and heading out for another meal.

Yup more reindeer. These ones are mowing the local football pitch.
These ones are mowing the verge.

This far north, the Sami people herd reindeer (amongst other things). They live across northern Europe including Sweden, Finland, Russia as well as Norway. They are different to the Scandinavian’s who primarily inhabited the southern parts of this area until they realised the north was rich in fishing (and now oil and gas resources). They speak a different dialect and rely on the land, fishing and animal herding to live.

No trees this far north.
Dog walking country.

The next morning, at some horrible time of the morning, we were back on the Hurtigruten, and back in our same cabin heading south towards Tromsø. We arrive in Tromsø at midnight, pack up our gear and the dog and we are back on Away. We don’t necessarily feel rested after our little trip, but we had a great time and we enjoyed the break from being the skippers.

The boat stopped in Hammerfest and we look at this little ball that somehow managed to contribute to measuring the size of the globe. Like the globe we live on. There was a lot of maths involved.
The sun is still trying to set. Give it another 6-8 weeks or so.

Don’t worry. In our next blog we do actually see the sun and top up the vitamin D levels.