Our last stop was Bergen, which was definitely the largest city that we visited, and situated on a bay between several mountains. The whole city worked its way from sea level up the sides of the mountains, which created a lovely stacked look. Unfortunately, we didn't realize that we only had about a half a day to spend in Bergen, and the majority of that was spent doing our excursion.
Our excursion was a guided tour through the old city, ending at an ice bar across the bay. Our tour guide was actually Norwegian, as opposed to French or German, and seemed reasonably knowledgeable (except that as a renter, he did not know the property tax rate, or any of the other increasingly complex economic questions that one of our group members asked).
Bergen has always been one of Norway's biggest ports, with dried cod being a major export, due to it's longevity as a foodstuff and its significant protein. When the black death hit in the 12th century, the city was more or less decimated, and Norway's international trade fell to basically nothing. Eventually, some German investors came and reinvigorated the trade, and we were able to see Norway's original stock market on our tour. Also, the monument to Bob, a dried cod (see right).
We continued through the fresh fish market (interesting, but not really something that can be taken advantage of in a cruise cabin), and made our way over to the ice bar. Real talk - I expected that the ice bar would be touristy and kind of stupid, because why would Norwegians need this thing? Isn't the whole country an ice bar for half the year? While I never got that question answered, it was cooler (haha!) than I thought that it would be, and we had a great time sipping our Norwegian liquor from our ice glasses in our thermal clothing in an ice cave. Most of the walls had sculptures built into them, which were lit by different colored lights for kind of a cool effect.
Bergen was actually our shortest port of call, and we only had about six hours total in port, so I only had a few minutes to walk around and souvenir shop. Ultimately, I only got one gift, for #babyboynoyes.
Shout out to Princess - Troy let the ship know that it was our anniversary, and they gave us a $50 gift certificate to the spa, which I used to book a massage. So after the day in Bergen, we got lunch, read for a little bit, and I headed off for hot stones. Definitely an awesome way to spend an afternoon :)
Our excursion was a guided tour through the old city, ending at an ice bar across the bay. Our tour guide was actually Norwegian, as opposed to French or German, and seemed reasonably knowledgeable (except that as a renter, he did not know the property tax rate, or any of the other increasingly complex economic questions that one of our group members asked).
Bergen has always been one of Norway's biggest ports, with dried cod being a major export, due to it's longevity as a foodstuff and its significant protein. When the black death hit in the 12th century, the city was more or less decimated, and Norway's international trade fell to basically nothing. Eventually, some German investors came and reinvigorated the trade, and we were able to see Norway's original stock market on our tour. Also, the monument to Bob, a dried cod (see right).We continued through the fresh fish market (interesting, but not really something that can be taken advantage of in a cruise cabin), and made our way over to the ice bar. Real talk - I expected that the ice bar would be touristy and kind of stupid, because why would Norwegians need this thing? Isn't the whole country an ice bar for half the year? While I never got that question answered, it was cooler (haha!) than I thought that it would be, and we had a great time sipping our Norwegian liquor from our ice glasses in our thermal clothing in an ice cave. Most of the walls had sculptures built into them, which were lit by different colored lights for kind of a cool effect.
Bergen was actually our shortest port of call, and we only had about six hours total in port, so I only had a few minutes to walk around and souvenir shop. Ultimately, I only got one gift, for #babyboynoyes.
Shout out to Princess - Troy let the ship know that it was our anniversary, and they gave us a $50 gift certificate to the spa, which I used to book a massage. So after the day in Bergen, we got lunch, read for a little bit, and I headed off for hot stones. Definitely an awesome way to spend an afternoon :)
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