We are more than half way now – stick with it!

Day 7 At Sea

We cross the Arctic Circle without knowing it at 6am. It is cloudy, raining and forecast to be the same for the next four days; so much for the Northern Lights. We begin the day by watching a video about what to expect in Alta. Then another talk from the retired detective, talking about murder and forensics. This was followed by a video about Narvik, our final destination. There is a Blue Nose ‘crossing the Arctic Circle’ ceremony on the programme and we do consider this but it is eight hours after we’d actually crossed the Arctic Circle, it is held on a very breezy open deck, it is pouring with rain and we vaguely remember doing something similar when we were in Alaska, so we decide to give it a miss.

In the afternoon, Chris heads off to an Orca talk and I opt for more crafting with Pam. Today was tea-bag folding. Not actual tea-bags of course that would be silly. Not even tea bag sachets but ‘tiles’ of paper instead. This was basically origami and very effective. I am hoping that I can remember how to do it so that I can replicate it at home.

Day 8 Tromsǿ

We arrive at Tromsǿ at breakfast time. It looks larger than other ports that we’ve visited and it is the largest Norwegian township above the Arctic Circle. Tromsǿ was founded in 1794, when it had a population of just eighty and by the 1850s, was a centre for seal and walrus hunting. There is continual sunlight from May to July and from late November to late January, apart from a twilight between 10am and 2pm, Tromsǿ is in darkness. The ‘Arctic Cathedral’, opened in 1965, is not actually a cathedral but a church. Tromsǿ is home to the northernmost university, the northernmost professional football team, Burger King and bat colony. 

Our trip is not until the evening and there are not many onboard activities today, none of which appeal. We decide to spend the day in the cabin, conserving our energy for four consecutive days of excursions. This involves proofreading my biography, for me and watching BBC Earth or BBC Lifestyle on the cabin’s television. As our trip is due to leave too early for us to have an evening meal, we opt to have a main meal at lunchtime and a snack when the restaurant opens for afternoon tea. Having filled ourselves with roast chicken, we return to the cabin to find a note telling us that the restaurant will be opening early for evening meals and that late night nibbles will be provided when we get back at 11pm. I’m not sure I can envisage eating at 11pm, even supposing I could possibly squeeze in any more food. Fresh from tea bag folding yesterday, I now need tea-bag sachets, which we don’t have at home. Cue acquiring as many as we can whilst on board.

The first challenge is to find the gangplank, as arrows send us down to deck four, back up to deck five and back down to four again. There is some jeopardy tonight, as it is the first trip where our meeting point is off the ship but we have no difficulty in joining group 11. The prediction is that we only stand a 5-10% chance of seeing the Aurora and it is drizzling as we drive through Tromsǿ, which seems to be pronounced Tromsah. Apart from one chap, who left the ship in a t-shirt, others in the coach are well wrapped up in thick coats and hats. We have these with us but are not wearing them in the coach as otherwise, as our mothers would have said, we ‘won’t feel in benefit’. In any case, we’ve overdone the thermal layers as it is 6-7 degrees and we are sweltering.

Our guide on the hour’s drive to Breivikeidet and the Aurora Alps basecamp, is Alesini. He tells us about conditions during Tromsǿ’s five-and-a-half-month winter, when they have a minimum of two-and-a-half-metres of snow. When the roads are cleared, there might be piles of snow at the sides of the road that are more than three metres high. Tromsǿ is an island and the word means ‘stream island’. It was a Sami trading post. The bear is sacred to the Sami and although they hunted it, they buried the bones out of respect. An annual festival, that takes place in February, is reindeer skiing day, when tame and trained reindeer pull along someone on skis, a little like water skiing. This takes place along a 250-metre track on one of Tromsǿ’s streets and the record is fourteen seconds. 17 May is Constitution Day, commemorating Norway’s independence from Denmark. The population is now 80,000, a large number of whom are university students or staff.

On arrival, at Brevikeidet, I temporarily lose Chris, who has taken it upon himself to help everyone down the steep steps of the coach and on to the ice. We are treated to coffee or tea and cake while Gigi tells us about the 115 huskies who are trained and kept on site. This includes impersonations of the distinctive barks of some of the dogs. The breeding programme looks ahead to which dogs are likely to be retiring in two-year’s time and where the gaps in the team will be then. A combination of muscle and intelligence is required. Any dog that doesn’t take to sledding, or who is retired, is put up for adoption. The first six months’ training is about socialisation, then there is six months getting used to the harness, before they are put in the middle of a team to pull a sled. No more than two novices will be in an eight to ten dog team. Each dog is trained to run in at least two different positions.

We then move to a lavvu, a traditional Sami tent, where Hannah from New Zealand tells us about the Northern Lights. Ten percent of the Sami population are still nomadic. Following a period of attempted forced integration, Sami culture is now undergoing a revival. Here the beverage is Glogg, a lightly spiced mulled wine. One of the legends associated with the aurora is that it is the rainbow bridge to the afterlife. Then we go out to meet the huskies. Allegedly, people can see the Aurora. This is all a bit king’s new clothes. I can see nothing and neither my phone nor my camera reveals anything either, although some people’s phones are picking up a hazy light. It seems that my phone is too old and it lacks a night mode. I am obviously doing something wrong.

On returning to the ship at 11pm, one of us avails themselves of the nighttime nibbles; it wasn’t me.