On Saturday morning I shall make my way to Southampton to Join P&O Cruises, Oriana, for a 12-night Northern Lights itinerary and having just finalised the details, I am excited to give you a pre-cruise blog on what we are hoping to do ashore during the trip.
First of all we have Stavanger and to be honest we don’t have a lot planned for this port, just a stroll and a chance to warm up (maybe not literally) to what Norway has to offer. I suppose you could say we will take it easy here because our next two ports are absolutely jam packed!
Our second stop is Alta and where do I even begin? First of all we start the day with a Best of Alta tour which covers many of the top attractions and the Sami culture. This is roughly a 5-hour excursion so plenty of time to really soak everything up. Next we visit the Ice Hotel where we will also have dinner. I know, this sounds amazing, right? I am quite excited about this experience, not every day you dine in an Ice Hotel! We will end our first evening in Alta with a night time adventure that will take us in search of the Northern Lights. I hope we see them! Please keep your fingers and toes crossed for us! 🙂
There is lots to see and do on day two in Alta also! We shall be up bright and early for a trip to the
Husky Farm, we will learn about the animals before enjoying a husky ride later in the day. We will also have a Sami experience, where we will learn about the history and culture of these indigenous people. I love the idea of this and must say it is one of the things I am most looking forward too. To end the evening we shall go out in search of the Northern Lights again, if we didn’t manage to catch a glimpse the evening before. If we did then I guess we hit the bar for a well-earned cocktail!
Tromso is another day full to bursting with activities and again will include some rather adorable dogs along with a dog sleigh ride. Next we will head to camp Tamok where we shall once more be introduced to the Sami people and this time meet some reindeer too! A hot meal is also served at the camp which is good as we will need our energy for our snow mobile adventure! SNOW MOBILE!!! I always wanted to take a jet-ski out on the open water and I fulfilled that wish in Cozumel last year, I guess Tromso will let me fulfill my dream to go wild on a snow mobile! OK, maybe not wild but you know what I mean!
Last but not least we visit Bergen, again we don’t have a great deal planned here but we are hoping to head to the top of Fløyen where we are told the views across Bergen are spectacular! Where Stavanger was our pre-adventure gentle stroll port, Bergen is our post adventure come down from cloud nine port.
I am incredibly excited, like a child at Christmas excited! It should be a fantastic trip! Some of the above really are once in a lifetime opportunities and I am going to make the most of each and every second of them! I just hope my camera can cope.
I will check-in with you all once I am onboard. Don’t miss me too much! 😉
Author: Danielle
CruiseMiss.com 
Was also on this cruise. Engine failure (twice), norovirus on board. Arrived in Stavenger, but everything is closed oin Monday, not that the tour guides told us this. Pulpit rock tour, no-one did a head count so set off without 2 passengers.
2 broken arms and a brokken shoulder amongst the sled dog riders.
Northern lights showed once (overcast all the rest of the time) Most pasengers missed them – several told me they were making a formal complaint because no shipboard announcement took place.
Missed Bergen, between engine failures and bad weather.
Thank you for your comment, Geoffrey! I actually went into Stavanger and found many places open. Restaurants. coffee shops, clothing stores there was also a small mall that was open along with other stores.
I imagine a shipboard announcement didn’t happen because many people may have been sleeping, ashore or at that time of night it could have caused a disturbance to those living near the port.
I don’t recall engine failure only a problem with the cooling system.
I am sorry it seems you did not enjoy your cruise 😦
Most of the cruise WAS enjoyable.
As to Stavenger, I’m afraid I have little interest in paying a lot of money to go to a coffee shop or a mall – we have those in the UK. The museums advertised in the shore guide were all closed, with the exception of the oil museum, or if you were part of a paid excursion from the ship. Since this information a;so wasn’t communicated by incompetent staff, I didn’t book one.
It was the engine cooling system that broke down, not passenger – hence it was an engine failure. The ship has suffered further engine failures on subsequent trips, and had curtailed it’s voyage before ours by three days because of – engine problems. I also couldn’t help noticing the copious rust on the hull and around the windows, not treated but (sometimes) just covered with paint.
The lights came out at about 10pm, and there were regular ship board announcements about such rivetting details as how many miles we’d travelled, so I think something which was the whole point of the trip should have merited something, don’t you?
The scenery was spectacular, food was great and the cabin, bar and restaurant staff were wonderful. The rest struck me as P & O trying to squeeze the last pennies out of a ship that looked like it should be retired, or scrapped.
So Jealous!!! Will be following along on your trip!
Cant wait for your blog on your trip. the cruise sounds fantastic. Hopefully there will be some reception wherever you are, as in the Fjords there isnt any.