VDM Fam-Trip Lofoten and Tromsø

Beginning of November we invited our biggest French client on a FAM(iliarisation) trip, i.e. a study tour to the north of Norway to show them what the Lofoten Islands and Tromsø all have to offer from a tourism perspective.

Sunday, 03 November:

I started the tour together with my colleague Stéphanie. We flew together from Oslo with a rather bigger plane to Bodø airport.

In Bodø we changed to a little prop plane which flew us via a little stopover on the island of Røst (below picture) to take 3 more people on board. As an isolated island municipality there are no road connections to Røst; it can only be reached by boat or by one of those little planes we were now sitting in.

The flight offers magnificent views over the Lofoten Islands.

Arrival on Lofoten, at Leknes airport.

Since our clients were only arriving later on in the evening, Stéphanie and I already started a little tour with our rental car at the discovery of two beautiful beaches in the area:
First: Haukland Beach.

Then: the beach of Utakleiv.

Then we check in at Statles Rorbusenter in Mortsund, pick up our clients at Leknes airport at 7.30 p.m. and enjoyed some wine in the evening together.

Monday, 04 November:

As the amount of daylight in this period is already pretty limited up in the North (approx. 6,5-7 hours), we needed to get up early in order to squeeze in as many things to see as possible while there is still light.
Shortly after our departure from Mortsund we passed Buksnes Church.

Our way led us further on to Vikten beach.

Along the road towards Nusfjord.

Nusfjord, one of Norway's oldest and best preserved fishing villages.

Flakstad church and its beach.

From Flakstad it's just a couple of minutes to Ramberg and its beach.

We continued southwards.

And half an hour later we reached Tind, located nearly at the southern most point of the Lofoten Islands where our company owns a typical fishermen's cabin called "rorbu".

Our boss has charmingly decorated the rorbu over the past years since the acquisition for tourists to have a nice and authentic experience when staying at our rorbu.

Only 1 km away from Tind lies the village of Å (yes, it's a name of just one letter), the southernmost road-connected point of the Lofoten archipelago. Until the 1990s, Å was mainly a small fishing village (which is why we find also here many of the fishermen typical "rorbu" housing) specializing in stockfish, but since then tourism has taken over as the main economic activity. The place now features the Lofoten Stockfish Museum and the Norwegian Fishing Village Museum as two big tourist attractions.

In the western part of Lofoten, at the mouth of Reinefjord, lies the fishing village of Reine, where the majestic Lofoten peaks and the Artic Ocean is next door. And this is the place where you find 22 newly restored rorbuer creating the atmosphere of their old use as fishermen's dwellings. Simply a super nice place!

A cosy little café near by.

Just a couple of kilometres away from Reine Rorbuer we visited the rorbuer of Eliassen.

Lunch time.

It is early afternoon and the sun had already set. Time for us to return to our accommodation at Statles Rorbusenter. We got dinner prepared and delivered to our rorbu to enjoy it during a nice evening together in our own fishermen's cabin.

Tuesday, 05 November:

Also that morning started with an early wake-up call. Again short day, full programme. Already at 8 a.m. we were visiting the various rorbuer that Statles Rorbusenter offers.

An hour and a half later we left Mortsund and headed north-eastwards on the Lofoten archipelago.

Next stop: Aaland Gård farm in Bøstad - for a really unique experience. The farm produces its own cheese (mainly goat cheese from their own animals) which are also on sale in their little shop, tourists can wander freely in the farm's own large organic herb garden and for those who want the hosts serve you a yummy meal of local, fresh products.

When we arrived we were so warmly welcomed by the whole family - waiting in the door, including their dog :-) After a little tour around the place we were served a lunch which was simply delicious.
All in all simply a lovely place - which I can only recommended!

An hour drive after leaving the farm we reached Svolvær, the capital of the Lofoten. Here we were taken on a one-hour RIB boat tour out into the sea with RIB-Lofoten.

Half an hour after our return to the quay in Svolvær it already started becoming dark again - and it was merely 3:30 p.m.

During our stroll through Svolvær, we suddenly passed this little café called "Hjerterommet" (which translates to heart room). From the first moment I had a glimpse through the window into the café I fell in love with this place!!!

I couldn't do else then simply dragging everyone in for a coffee.

 

Sorry for posting that many pictures, but it's simply too cool this place and every corner looks so totally different.

I had a hard time leaving this place again!

And for those of you that pass Svolvær one day and can't resist popping in there as well, the address is Vestfjordgata 5 :-) I'm sure you'll like it as well!

However, we had to go on. It was time for dinner - at Børsen Spiseri, an old quayside warehouse been turned into one of Svolvær's most renowned restaurants. And in fact we ate fantastically.

After dinner we paid the "Magic Ice" ice bar a visit, admiring the various sculptures made out of ice and snow.

Later on we checked in for yet another night in a typical Lofoten rorbu: tonight at Svinøya Rorbuer whose reception is located in an old, restored shop from former times.

Even though it was already late we met up to play "Time's up" which is quite a fun game where teams play against each other guessing (within a limited time frame) famous characters - in the first round by getting them verbally fully described, in the second round by getting just one word as a hint to this character and in the third and last round by miming the specific character. Quite fun :-)


Wednesday, 06 November:

After this long evening playing it was hard getting up that morning. But we had no choice: after a little stroll at 8 a.m. around the cabins of Svinøya Rorbuer we had another activity on our programme for this morning.

At 9 a.m. we were taken out on a Trollfjord Sea Eagle safari. In the right period of the year there are chances to spot some (killer) whales on this trip, but this was unfortunately not the case during our trip beginning of November. Nevertheless it allowed us to fish on board, to enter and see the narrow Trollfjord and to spot a hand full of huge sea eagles and dozens of sea gulls.

During the tour we got the chance to fish.

And even I was lucky to catch a little fish (don't ask me what kind!) :-)

But the poor one: I awfully hooked it up :-(

Into the Trollfjord, a 2 km long and very narrow sidearm of the Raftsund between the archipelagos of Lofoten and Vesterålen. On their northwards journey the Hurtigruten boats take a little detour into this place and turn the big boats in this narrow fjord leaving only a couple of metres between the boat and the steep-sided mountains... Quite an attraction this manoeuvre!

The sea eagles - they were at least four of them.

And (uncountable) amounts of sea gulls which came so close to the boat.

Some four hours later we finally returned to Svolvær where we had arrange a site inspection and lunch at the Rica Hotel Svolvær.

Svinøya the second - after lunch it was time to visit the various rorbu cabins and apartments of Svinøya Rorbuer, i.e. now from the inside. Like Reine Rorbuer they are a fantastic and charming accommodation place. Unfortunately this high standard and charm is also reflected in their prices :-(

Afterwards we continued with the visits - at Thon Hotel Lofoten.

Straight after that site inspection we left Svolvær, heading southwards again on the Lofoten, as we had to catch the Hurtigruten boat in Stamsund at 7:00 p.m.

On the way we passed the villages of Kabelvåg and Henningsvær to quickly have a look from the outside at Nyvågar Rorbuer and Henningsvær Hotel. Unfortunately it was already pretty dark so we weren't able to see much. Especially in Henningsvær it was just too dark to see anything or to take any pictures.

With a little advance we arrived in Stamsund at the Hurtigruten quay where we were waiting for the boat to come and to embark for an overnight journey northwards to Tromsø.

After some "Time's Up" playing (with only French characters - I hated it as I naturally hadn't a clue of who were 95% of the searched characters!), 3-courses dinner and jakuzzi on deck: good night - in this outward cabin.


Thursday, 07 November:

Good morning - on board!

2:06 p.m. - not much sun, just this reddish sky behind the snow topped mountains.

Shortly after, at 2.30 p.m., arrival at 350km north of the Arctic Circle, in Tromsø, the seventh largest city in Norway and the largest in Northern Norway.

Upon arrival we quickly checked in to our hotel - Thon Hotel Tromsø. Just to leave our luggage. Shortly after we already met the manager of the Clarion Hotel Bryggen for yet another site inspection during this tour.

Followed by a visit of the next door hotel, Clarion Collection Hotel With.

After this visit we separated for a short time: I still needed to buy a bottle of wine as gift for a supplier and the others wanted to have some time on their own to stroll around or get prepared for the evening programme. The wine bottle was procured quickly so I actually had still 30 spare minutes for a very spontaneous meeting with my cousin Florian who had just moved back to Tromsø a few days before. (He had already been living there before for some five years I'd say, then temporarily moved to Belgium and now back north again.) That was nice :-)

At 6.15 p.m. pick-up in front of the Radisson Blu Hotel for our evening activity: husky sledding under some (weak) Northern Lights with Tromsø Villmarkssenter.

For clients that wish to stay overnight in the camp for an even more special experience.

Traditional sami dinner (bidos) at their lavvo.

Return to Tromsø by 10:30 p.m.

Friday, 08 November:

This morning I didn't have breakfast together with the others. Very early I had already left the hotel and went just one street further where Florian had found a (at least temporary) flat to live. Since we hadn't had much time the evening before, we had spontaneously decided to have breakfast together. What a nice idea :-) Not that we had that much more time that morning - he had to bring his kids to school soon - but at least we saw each other again.

Before the programme of the day officially started we all (except Olivier, the guy) had a special kind of appointment - with Natalia who was on tour with us as our client. She is originally from Russia - where it is apparently pretty common for the girls to do all sorts of hair braiding. Natalia has two girls to experiment with and combined with her phantasy she creates the coolest hair styles.

On the left she braided Stéphanie's hair and on the right Natalia's creation on my head.  

The summary of Natalia's morning work: Cornélie, Marie-Laure, me, Stéphanie :-)

Prefectly (hair) styled we could now leave the hotel to start the day with a short guided tour of Tromsø.

Ishavskatedralen - the Arctic Cathedral, a modern church from 1965 and probably the most famous landmark in Tromsø.

And well, at 1.15 p.m. we already sat again in the plane from Tromsø back to Oslo (and for our clients further on to France).

This trip was pretty great! Also for me there were quite a few new things to see and discover. I hope also for our clients it was a successful and informative trip - as this was the purpose to get them familiar with at least a selection of the many tourism services up in the North.