Having fun with Havila

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Day 6
Only a couple of stops during the night and was fairly rough ride for long stints during the night and I fell out of bed on more than one occasion. Fist port at daylight was Havoysund

 

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Honningsvag was our big stop for the day and included our excursion to Nordkapp (North Cape) which is the Northernmost tip of Europe. During the night we had warnings go out on the ships PA that there were numerous landslides in the region and that the weather could possibly force the abandonment of the excursion. When we arrived in Honningsvag we were then told that the excursion would still go ahead but would be condensed to going straight up there and back and that visibility would be poor. We could cancel and get full money back but we had desperately wanted to see it so went ahead anyway. Was a scary drive up there as we couldn’t see 2ft in front of us but we got there and back!


Back in town we had about 90 minutes to go for a wander. Beautiful little town but was -14 and snowing

 

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This translates to “Norway’s Summer City”

 

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Before boarding the ship we stopped in at a cafe for some local treats

 

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Kjollefjord was the last port we would see in light this evening. This was our final evening onboard

 

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Day 7 and the final day of our trip. Had to be up early for breakfast as we would be arriving in our final destination of Kirkenes at 0900.
First port after sunrise was Vadso

 

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Arrival in Kirkenes port and a few last photos from the deck before disembarking and heading to our buses

 

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So that was the cruise part of the trip concluded and a few thoughts before I move on. Firstly I absolutely enjoyed my time onboard and it was just so relaxing sitting around watching the beautiful scenery and we met some excellent people who we still maintain contact with. The comfort and food onboard was excellent and the ship was very quiet as no children and no real entertainment as such. There were lots of groups of friends onboard who had travelled together especially Australians and they played various card games in the evening whilst in the lounge and bar area. The negatives to me was that we simply didn’t stay in places long enough and so whilst I enjoyed the cruise I’d probably rather self drive and I hate being on a schedule for meals so the whole routine and timings is quite foreign to me and not something I could get acclimatised to. We had a couple of really rough days and one of those days I even felt seasick but Mrs Jase fared much worse despite doing everything possible and trying every remedy known to man. She has vowed not to stet foot on a ocean ship again
All up though I did enjoy it and thoroughly recommend Havila if you want to cruise Norway

 

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The process was fairly smooth from the port to our hotel. There are really only 2 hotels to stay in whilst in Kirkenes and your options are the Scandic or Thon Hotels, both are in abundance across Norway and these 2 in Kirkenes were clearly geared up for the cruise industry. We chose the Thon due to its location jutting out into the water whereas the Scandic was in town. We signed up to the Thon program and they were pleasant to deal with. Most of the passengers from the ship headed to the hotels whilst a small group went straight to the airport as there are few daily flights out of town. We arrived at the hotel at around 11am and wasn’t expecting our room to be ready but the girl at checkin had said we received an upgrade and that our room would be ready in about an hour. As we arrived a large group were leaving the hotel to jump on the ship we had just disembarked and head back down the coast. The hotel was situated in a great spot with stunning views out to the harbour. The rooms were basic but clean and comfortable and we were upgraded to a Seaview room. They had a restaurant that offered a fairly simple menu of local produce and I had a great meal there. Breakfast was a very good sized buffet with plenty of different foods on offer. Enjoyable stay and I’d definitely stay here again if we return

View from our room

Dinner at the restaurant
Mains was a gnocchi accompanied with lamb sausages and reindeer. Was superb

Desert was Cloudberry tart. Cloudberries are a very acquired taste. I enjoyed it though

 

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Whilst we were awaiting our room to be readied we left our luggage and went for a wander around town. Was -8 but not too bad to try and shake off the sea legs. Found Kirkenes interesting and as it’s close to the border with Russia a lot of workers in town cross the border daily but there has been tensions in town and the advice was to not go out at night into some parts of town.

 

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Many of the signs in town are in Russian and a large part of the population have Russian background

 

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For our last night in Norway I had managed to book a Northern Lights viewing.
We had so far failed to see them on this trip due to weather but the tour operator in town assured us that his guides would find them for us and had several locations that they would drive us to in the hope of catching a glimpse.
It was fairly cloudy in town that evening and when our guide picked us up he said he would take us on a scenic drive to where he felt would be clearer.
First couple of locations weren’t great and we were starting to lose hope. We then went to the Russian border checkpoint and he knew an area nearby that he had success with on the previous two nights and again nothing. Just as we were thinking we would never see them this trip his mobile rang and one of the other guides had found them but said the weather was closing in so wouldn’t get to see them for long. We made our way over there and just WOW. It was like the sky had just parted to reveal this incredible painting. We had a window of about 10 minutes but it was worth it

 

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The next morning I decided to go for a walk around town and check out some of the historic WW2 sights. It was still about -13 but hardly a cloud in the sky and a great day for walking around town

 

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Kirkenes was used as a German base so they could attack Murmansk and there are numerous bunkers around town

When the Germans retreated they torched most of Kirkenes to the ground. The Soviet Army liberated the town and there is a monument in the centre of town to commemorate liberation

The Russians own a couple of ports in town and use these for their fishing vessels

 

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The drive out to the airport was quite nice

 

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Kirkenes Airport
No lounge here!

Time to board our flight

 

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KKN-OSL SK4473 A320N 1125-1340
Seat 1B

There are not a lot of options out of Kirkenes at that time of the year. When I was looking to book the only flight to Oslo for the day was this flight but we really needed to be in London that evening and unfortunately this flight landed at OSL about 5 minutes after the last OSL-LHR flight departs for the day so we were going to need to spend another night in Oslo which wasn’t ideal. I started to look at other options and found that there was a late BA flight from Billund to LHR and that I could get a connecting flight from Oslo to Billund that would make it with plenty of time to spare. Price for KKN-OSL was €220 for a base fare or €285 for SAS Plus but KKN-OSL-BLL was only €146 in Plus so added bonus. SAS Plus comes with added luggage and priority boarding plus a meal and drink but the middle seat isn’t blocked and no lounge at KKN.
Seats were uncomfortable and the meal was a snack and pretty ordinary plus they had no alcohol on the flight so a pretty average experience but it went fast enough
Some views out of the window whilst taxiing

The “Meal” and the uncomfortable seats

 

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We had just on 2hrs at OSL, very easy to get around and I stopped at the tax refund counter to get my taxes reimbursed. When you purchase souvenirs or anything tourist related including luggage make sure you ask for not only the receipt but a tax receipt. Only took about 5 minutes to hand over all tax receipts and sign some papers and money was in bank with 24hrs.
Next stop was the SAS lounge

Gold lounge was on the left but as no status plebs we turned right

 

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OSL-BLL SK1905 Bombardier CRJ900 1530-1640
Seat 1C

Great flight, seats were comfortable enough and a couple of beers for the short 1hr flight. Was most impressed at how smooth the flight was, nice little aircraft.

Arrival into Billund