I woke up about 5 and went to get a coffee and walked straight into an amazing view and predawn glow. During the night the ship had entered the fjord system on the way to Olden. I left it an hour before deciding to wake Lyn as I thought she’d be a bit miffed to miss it. As Lyn lay in the bed with a fresh cup of tea, watching the beautiful scenery pass by so close you could almost touch it she said ‘We shouldn’t be here. I can see why they want to ban cruise ships.’ Ever practical she added ‘In fact they can do it now that we’ve been’.
She’s right, I was getting the same feeling of disquiet as I watched the unfolding panorama. I don’t know what the answer is but I do know having a floating tower block chugging down these fjords is not right either for the landscape or the people that live here. I think the best way to see this is by Viking long boat. If you want to see it in future you’ll have to wait for the wind… or row.
One thing I have noticed is the huge amount of waterfalls but that’s fjords for you. We were quite excited by the first few but I think I’m done now. It’ll have to be very spectacular for me to get my phone out and take a picture.
When we finally got off the ship we went straight to the local tour office. We were torn between doing the skylift or the glacier. In the end we went for the glacier as we figured that while the lift will be there for some time the glacier won’t. The cost for this was £75 for both of us. Waay cheaper than what P&O wanted. The reality is you are paying £37pp for a 30 minute return coach ride as the glacier itself is free… so it’s still very expensive. Despite not pre-booking we literally got off the ship paid for the ticket and jumped straight on the coach.
The coach ride to the glacier was very picturesque, quite frankly everything is. When we got there we could see that there was an option to ride most of the way in modified golf cart called a troll trolley. This would have been another £30 and as it was only 2.5km we thought we’d walk. After the first half a kilometre Lyn said she wasn’t sure she could make it but being the trooper she is she kept going. Later with about 600 meters to go we saw a bloke who had had a stroke and could barely walk so our difficulties didn’t seem so bad. At this point Lyn insisted that I explain he had got the Troll Trolley to this point so it doesn't make us look really bad. Despite the effort we were glad we walked because you got see so much more.
The trek was worth it just see what was left of the glacier and question what we are doing to the planet. It should give anyone seeing it a bit more perspective even if it just makes you recycle a bit more. Well maybe not that. Everybody knows that’s just a con and a job creation scheme for pedants who look for any excuse not to take your recycling.
We had planned to go back on the ship for lunch when we got back to Olden but it seemed everybody had the same idea and queue was horrendous so we decided to see what local shops had to offer. The answer to that was nothing, just a few souvenir shops and a couple of supermarkets. Olden itself has a population of less than 500 people so if anything that’s probably overkill. We were fairly knackered from all the walking so spent the afternoon watching a film in our cabin until it was time for dinner.
At dinner we had a conversation for almost the entire meal with an elderly couple on the next table. His name was Bob. I know this because during one of her story’s the lady said ‘… and Bob was at the back end with the camera’. This was a story about dolphins… I think. As he was called Bob she could be either Rita or Sue? She also thought Lyn had Italian heritage which Lyn was quite pleased about. Anyway apparently they have been cruising with P&O for 30 years and they told us not to take this ship and cruise as the normal for P&O standards. They said the service and food quality is so poor because they still haven’t been able to recruit properly since covid. I know a lot of cruise companies are in the same boat.
Tomorrow we are in Flam and still haven’t decided what to do so we’ll just wing it.
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