Ah, the long-awaited blog about our weekend...here it goes! And by the way, it will be a two-part series for you die-hard readers! I want to include as many pictures as possible! It's a beautiful city with amazing sights and views!
So, we headed out Thursday morning about 10:30 and the sun was shining! We made it to the first of the 2 ferry rides and only had to wait about 20 minutes for the ferry. Not bad! We continued on and arrived just in time to catch the 2nd ferry with almost no wait at all. Now mind you, these are HUGE ferries! On one of the rides, I think there were 4 big trucks and a couple buses, not to mention all the cars! The ferry has two levels for vehicles and then a inside deck. You are also required to leave your vehicle and can buy food and snacks at the cafe. Of course, ferry rides are not complete without snacks...we put them off for the first one, but splurged for snacks on the second.
The drive to Bergen is only about 4 1/2 - 5 hours even if you have to wait a bit for a ferry. It is not a bad drive and the scenery is beautiful. I would have to say (and I am sure Spencer would agree) the worst part is the speed limits...pretty slow here, and since we have NO desire to get a ticket (which costs a small fortune) we always ended up with a line of cars behind us. Some finally gave up and would pass us, but that is not easy to do on the curvy roads! There are also numerous tunnels to go through, some as long a 7-8km! And get this, there are cameras inside the tunnels to snap your picture if you are speeding. Now once we got into the Bergen area, it was much more confusing to navigate, but with Spencer behind the wheel, we got to our destination with only a few wrong turns.
We were staying in a hotel called Det Hanseatiske Hotel and it was right by the harbor and Bryggen area. The hotel is tucked in between several restaurants and is small and quaint. It is 4 stories tall (we were on the 4th floor), but the first is the lobby and the second floor is where breakfast is served and had entrances for several restaurants. The room was really quite big and plenty of room for all of us. Obviously updated, the bathroom sported a big walk-in shower (which we loved since ours here is so tiny!) and a claw-foot tub too! They brought in two cots for the kids and there was still plenty of space!
Once we got the car safely parked in a nearby garage and dropped off our bags, we headed out to look around a bit. We headed down past the shops of Bryggen and were excited to find Bergenhus Fortress! It is a beautiful medieval castle of sorts with many buildings and lovely grounds to walk around, almost like a park. Parts of it are being renovated as well. We managed to find a map and Brendan was in heaven - off in his own little world exploring and looking for the various buildings, like the church and the bunkers, and the guard gate, etc.! I am also including a picture of it!
After we walked around a bit, we took off in search of a restaurant for dinner. And let me just say, Bergen is full of restaurants! We finally decided on a Mexican food at a place right under our hotel called Casa Del Toro and boy did we score with that choice! It was delicious! Tex-Mex at its best and I even had a margarita (not frozen, but it was yummy!) We then went up to chill in the hotel and rest up - I think we were all a bit tired and turned in early!
Friday morning dawned with the promise of a sun-filled day and we were so glad! We enjoyed breakfast in the hotel and then set off in search of amazing views and Bergen's best sites! Our first stop was Mount Floyen and ride up the funicular! We went early and with the exception of riding up with about 50 high school kids who were apparently out on a field trip...it was a great ride up - about 7 minutes from start to finish! We basically had the whole lookout area to ourselves! When you arrive at the top, WOW! You could see for miles (or kilometers, hahaha!) We did some exploring at the top and took in the views from the lookout area. There are numerous trails to explore at the top as well as a playground and the troll forest. Brendan and Kyla had so much fun looking for all the trolls and climbing around! I have a ton of pictures from troll forest as you can imagine! I will have to do a whole page in the scrapbooks of just pictures of the kids with the various troll statues! I did see the history of the troll in Norway and it is basically one of their main fairy tales dating back to the Viking times.
We decided to take the walk down rather than riding and it was a nice walk as well with great views all along the way! After that adventure, we took in more of the sights around town including the Fish Market! Spencer and I enjoyed fish and chips and then treated the kids to pizza at Peppe's Pizza. After lunch, we purchased a Bergen 2-way ticket that included rides on a special bus to both Mount Ulriken and the Aquarium plus the tickets for those attractions. We decided that since the weather was so good, we would go ahead and take the cable car ride up Mount Ulriken. I am so glad we did! This is another of the "7 hills" that surround Bergen and the view was spectacular! We hiked around up at the top for a while and then decided to go ahead and take the cable car back down, mainly because of two kids that were not thrilled with the option of walking... We met the bus back down at the bottom and headed back into town. After that, it was time for dinner! We stopped at a place right by the harbor and found a table outside on the sidewalk so we could "people-watch." It turns out, we were sitting next to some people with a little girl about Kyla's age named Serena. They heard us talking and asked where we were from and that set the stage for a friendly and lively chat with them! Serena and her mom had lived in Florida for a few years and the kids hit it off visiting with each other. By the end of the conversation we were a phone call away from being invited to a crab boil at their house then next day! LOL! We exchanged numbers, but didn't end up hearing from them (not that we really expected to, but...)
By then, it was time to turn in for the night! I am including pictures from these couple days and then I will do part 2 with the rest of the trip!
