A Norwegian Roadtrip - Day 10 - A Bird Day in Paradise

From Tromso, the next day took us south through several ports ending up in Stamsund.

 

Tina and I were up early to do a bus tour leaving from the town of Harstad.  We'd later catch up with the ship down in Sortland.

The Harbour at Harstad

Stone Church Dating Back from 1200

German Statues Inside the Church

 Ok ... so two churches inside 12 hours.  Somebodies probably rolling over.  :)

The tour continued on through several small towns with several stops for pictures and local offerings.

A Unique Mountain Top

Meeting back up with the ship gave us the opportunity to watch it dock.  Turning around so quickly at most ports, these ships are extremely efficient on getting docked.  The front passenger hatch and back car ramp hatch are being opened before the ship has fully reached the dock.

The car ramp itself is lowered in a matter of a minute.

In Stokmarknes, Hurtigruten has the museum of it's history.  The company has been operating since 1893 and had pictures of all the ship types that have been used throughout the years.  Most interesting to us was a ship built in 1912 that was dry docked at the museum.  We really didn't know how old the ship was until we were done walking through it and honestly we both thought it probably was from the 40's or 50's when we were walking through it.

Outside Deck

Dining Room

Lounge Room

But the highlight of the day (and really of the cruise as a whole) was the second tour of the day.  A 35 foot boat pulled up along side the ship and we transferred over to it.  The smaller boat went up a gorgeous fjord with 1000 foot cliffs on either side.  But the boat also specialized  in attracting sea-eagles along with a slew of sea gulls that follow anywhere anything is being fed.

Our First Sighting of a Sea Eagle Following Behind a Sea Gull

Tina and I aren't typically big fans of sea gulls, but they were pretty cool in this environment.  And the fjord itself was amazing.

The Most Beautiful Thing on the Fjord

The only real way to give an appreciation to the fjord is to try to present it in living motion.

Following us into the fjord, we got to watch our relatively HUGE ship turn around behind us.

The fjord was approximately 400m across and 80m deep.  Got to love some good side thrusters on a ship of this size.

The boat took us on to Stramsund where we met back up with the ship.  It was an amazing tour with even more Sea Eagles as we got closer.  I also learned it's nearly impossible to catch a good closeup pic of a feeding Sea Eagle with a simple point and shoot.  :(

Yayyyyy ... He Caught Him a Dead Fish!!!

Long post .... busy day ... hope you enjoyed it.  We sure did.