DAY 5 - BERGEN AND RICHARD WITH

DAY 5 – BERGEN AND RICHARD WITH

Today, we had the morning and early after noon to walk around Bergen before the 4pm boarding of Hurtigruten’s Richard With (pronounce REEKARD FVIT, I believe – preventing you from living in ignorance is my life’s goal).

Before starting I would like to say that where the room in the Comfort Hotel at the Oslo Train Station was tiny and spartan, the room at the Grand Terminus at the Train Station in Bergen was... Grand.

as was the breakfast.

In our limited meanderings around Bergen we determined that there were many parks, statues and pedestrian streets.  I just took this photo to document a facial hair look that would bring out my inner Viking.

Looking across a small bay we see the cute, old and touristy part of town.  The set of 8 or so colorful houses are what you see in hundreds of postcards.  The very incredibly steep and tall hill behind them is covered with houses.  It is served by a funicular (I know this doesn’t sound right, but I think it is) like Angels Flight in Los Angeles, only much longer.  It was too far for us this morning, but “Veal be bach”, as Arnold would say.  The tourist supported funicular cannot serve the cliff-dwelling denizens of Bergen Heights.  It must be a pain in the butt to live there.

Back to the cute buildings.  A couple are under major repair, so major that the façades are covered with a cloth painted to show the result.  The first floors of these buildings, I am sad to report, are souvenir shops selling “My Gramma Went to Bergen and All I Got Was this Lousy Shirt” shirts.  We bought five.

Between the buildings were alleys that were probably not too pleasant before the advent of the city sewer system, but are now filled with more up scale shops and cafes.  We stopped for tea, coffee and a goody.  She did actually like it -- I know this because this is the same look she always gives me and she likes me (?).

Francie bids a fond adieu to her new best tea shop.

Back to the hotel to liberate our luggage, grab a cab (no UBER here) and head to the docks.  Signing in was nothing like the Carnival or Holland America cattle call (our only other cruise experiences).  But, come to find out, there were only a little over 200 of us cruising.  Hurtigruten has a contract with Norway and so they make 32 stops during the 6-day trip north.  They transport locals (some with cars) and freight/supplies.  Still and all, the accommodations are nice.

We head out of Bergen.