Trip 15 - Norwegian Fjord Cruise

 5th to 11th February 2023

Overview:

Here's a map of our route. To see it properly you'll need to click on the little square in the top right corner which will take it to full screen. It opens a new tab and you'll be able to browse round, zoom in and click on each marker to show more details

Key to place markers

After Christmas and New Year in the UK, we decided a short cruise of the Norwegian Fjords would be a nice thing for us and also Jackie's mum, Pauline to try. Other than the repositioning cruise we travelled on in order to return to Europe from Central America in 2017, we have not experienced one, Brian having always said cruising is not for him! Pauline was in need of a holiday and had also never cruised before so it seemed a good opportunity.

With almost zero knowledge of cruise companies and itineraries (the cruise company Pulmantur we travelled back from Central America on went out of business during the pandemic) we embarked on research. Our initial thoughts were to go somewhere warm and sunny, but we also wanted to travel from a UK port rather than flying somewhere. The two didn't seem to come together so we ended up with a Norwegian cruise as it sailed from a UK port (Southampton) and was a shorter, six day cruise, allowing us to dip our toes into it to see if we liked it. It's true that Norway in February would be neither warm nor sunny, but we had heard good reports of the spectacular scenery to be seen of the fjords from the water and concluded that inside the ship it would be warm.

After trawling the various companies we settled on Fred Olsen, a cruise company we had only vaguely heard of, but they get very good reviews and brag that if you choose them over another cruise line and don't like it they will fly you home and refund the cruise cost. Bold words! The other thing we liked was their use of smaller ships, The Bolette that we went on takes 1300 paying passengers and about 600 crew. We booked!

We were not disappointed, they are a very professional outfit, lots going on during the sea days, Brian went to several geology and geography lectures, Jackie to cookery demonstrations, Pauline to craft sessions, there was a show every night, ballroom dancing to a live band, trivia quizzes morning, afternoon and evening, discos, a piano bar, sports bar, a library, bars and cafes all over, two swimming pools, two jacuzzis, a gym with a full range of equipment along with many classes and a spa - enough for everyone. The food was superb and available at most times of the day from either the self service restaurant, where a vast array of dishes were available in any quantity you wanted, to the table service restaurants. We also had one formal night, not obligatory, where we could dress up in our finest.

We sailed from and back to the cruise port at Southampton, leaving on Sunday 5th February at about 5:00pm, returning on the morning of Saturday 11th 2023. We had a full day at sea on 6th, cruising up the North Sea before entering the Norwegian port of Bergen early on 7th for our first day ashore, heading overnight up to Flam, a port deep inside Norways longest and deepest Fjord, Sognefjord for our second shore day. The 9th February saw us heading south to our third shore day at Stavanger and, from there a trip south in the North Sea with a second full sea day, before returning to Southampton, where we had docked by the time we woke on Saturday 11th. 

Below is a link to the blog post we made, only one covering the whole trip. Click on the link below to read where we went, what we saw and what we did. Happy reading!

Our Journey:

5th to 11th February 2023 - https://brianandjackiecross.blogspot.com/2023/02/our-six-day-luxury-cruise-of-norwegian.html