Braemar North Cape - Flam and Gudvangen

[Louise47]

We are doing this cruise on 15th August and see that we are visiting both ports on the same day. The excursions are really expensive (£140 for the Flam railway and £120 for the Norway in a Nutshell tour). Both are full day excursions though we are only in Flam for 4 and a half hours.

 

Has anyone attempted to do the Flam railway on their own as there appears to be a serious shortage of time?

 

We have booked the excursion to the North Cape but any advice about other ports would be much appreciated. I have read the comments on Bergen and Flam but the majority of our other ports are not mentioned. If anyone has any information about excursions/sightsee independently for Olden, Lofoten Islands or Tromso I would be very grateful.

[Kez100]

Hopefully someone will come up with help for you but, if they do not, I would recommend an excursion at Lofoten. We didn't and the shuttle took us into town which was not the most exciting place on earth! In fact, we made ourselves explore some so we didn't take the next shuttle back. In the end, we found nothing and took the second one back!

 

At Tromso we took the shuttle into town and then walked to and visted the Polaria centre. There appeared to be a cable car and the arctic cathedral on the other side of the river but it looked a long way away and we couldn't see any way of getting there (town was extraordinarliy quiet on a sunday). If others recommend going there do try and sort the public transport to use at the same time.

 

We didn't go to Olden or Flam.

 

In Honningsvag (our favourite stop) we did a ships excursion to the fishing villages (because we live in one ourselves and the children wanted to see those in Norway) and also went to the Ice Bar - walking distance from the ship - which was a fun distraction.

 

We had a fantastic time. The North Cape on a smaller boat is brilliant (we were on Balmoral) because you cruise the coast which makes sea days just like full day free excursions.

[MrsTW]

You can do the Flam railway for 330 Krone return - about £33. The round trip takes just over 2 hours. That is an hour to the top Myrdal, 10 mins there and same train back. So plenty of time to do it if you're in Flam for 4 and a half hours BUT you need to be at the station as soon as possible to secure a ticket for the first 2 trains! :D

 

I've done Olden. The ship berths next to some souvenir shops and the Tourist Information centre. When we were there, there were offers of helicopter sightseeing rides (much cheaper than the ship's tours) and a tourist train which I believe took you to a glacier. The town centre is a 10 minute walk away and has a very old church. ;) We walked around this and then up the road to another church.