Oslo to Bergen

Monday 11 December

The three of us are agreed that 2017 has seen us do two of the great rail journeys of the world - the Ghan and the train from Oslo to Bergen. It was 7 hours of the most magnificent scenery, truly a winter wonderland.

From the train

We left Oslo at 8.30 and arrived in Bergen at 2.50ish. Once we left the city the view was of mountains, rivers, forests and occasional villages. The higher we went, the thicker the snow and some houses were almost covered. There were places that are only accessible by skis or snowmobiles.

The only animals we saw were a few cold looking ponies. I assume that most animals were tucked up in the huge red barns that sat beside the farm houses.

Barn

There were frozen lakes and waterfalls as well as rivers both frozen and fast-running. At one stage we were above the tree line. We saw signs of past avalanches and those wooden barriers they erect to catch the avalanches. There were some mighty big rocky cliffs too.

One of many icy lakes

We had lunch in the cafe carriage and the attendant was a lovely fellow, keen to tell me about the jam he gave me, though he only knew the Norwegian word. We looked it up and it was lingonberry jam - very good too.

Lunch

On arrival in Bergen we caught a taxi to the ferry terminal and checked our luggage in. Then we went for a walk into the town. It was very icy and slippery so the pace was slow and extremely cautious. Don’t want any broken bones at the start of our voyage!

Bergen

Then it was back to the terminal for the safety talk before going aboard our ship, the Kong Harald. We have lovely warm cabins on different decks. The bathrooms are tiny but like my room in Oslo, they have heated floors to dry up all the splashes from the shower. I am having trouble remembering which deck is which so still confused about where the dining room is compared to the conference room, bar and so on. Rob has it all sorted of course.

My cabin

We had a terrific buffet dinner with all sorts of local delicacies including slices of the most delicious smoked duck. There was a talk about life aboard ship after dinner and then we finally set sail at about 11.00pm. We were a bit late as the ship was waiting for people who had been delayed by big storms in Europe, but we don’t think they made it.

Farewell Bergen