BERGEN – KIRKENES – BERGEN 25/11 – 6/12
It was time to finally board the cruise! Going backwards a bit, there were a few things that determined which cruise and when I would select along with how would I best enjoy it. As I was travelling solo, I wanted to go on one of the expedition cruises which are only operated on select Hurtigruten ships, with MS Polarlys being one of them. Next, I wanted one of the ships that had recently been refurbished in the last 2 years so that I could really enjoy my Hurtigruten experience in modern facilities. Lastly, this had to somehow fit in between my Iceland tour and following trips to the UK and Germany. All this combined, the 12 day cruise commencing on 25th November was decided upon! I also wanted to have a little bit of space and comfort in my room, not knowing how much time I would spent in there so opted for the Arctic Superior room category on Level 5 of the ship. The rooms above this category were the Mini Suite and Suite (both of which I got to see).
More about the MS Polarlys ship here:
MS Polarlys
After boarding, it was straight to the room when they were available from 6pm to sort everything out, and then off to the buffet dinner to meet my fellow passengers for the journey and later the exploring of the ship to see where everything was!
The ship was no-where near as big as your typical cruise liner that docks in Sydney Harbour, hence why the vessel can get into all the small ports of Norway – making the journey even more spectacular.
The original Departure of 10:30pm was amended to a 01:30am departure ex Bergen, so in late evening I decided that I wasn’t going to wait up that long and headed off to bed.
In the morning following breakfast, I took in the scenery passing by. Following Bergen, there were 3 small stops before the first ‘major’ stop in Ålesund where we could all get off the boat to have a look around. Being a Sunday afternoon about 3pm, not much was open apart from your typical Souvenir stores etc!