And just like that we are home again.

The last three days of our trip flew past. As we sailed south the weather became milder, snow disappeared from all but the highest peaks and we saw more and more picturesque villages along the shoreline.

We crossed back over the Arctic Circle, going south there is no free schnapps, just a teaspoon of cod liver oil. We skipped that ceremony but our new friend on the crew, Jan Erik saved us each a commemorative spoon which he gave us later.

Conditions were good enough for the captain to take a second trip into the very narrow Trollfjord, this time in daylight. I’m not sure which was scarier going in at night when we couldn’t see anything, or in daylight when we could see everything. The cliffs were so close you felt you could touch them and they towered 500m above us. Spectacular.

We returned to Trondheim early in the morning, too early to go ashore again but we were in the restaurant eating breakfast as we cast off to continue the journey south. To our amazement, as we sailed through the harbour we saw the Princess Cruises ship Island Princess moored nearby. We first met Terry and Jenny in August 2016 when we were cruising in Alaska, on… the Island Princess! It’s a small world.

We called in at the little port of Bronnoysund where we took the opportunity to stretch our legs for an hour. Bronnoysund is the entry port for the Vega Islands, an archipelago of over 6000 islands and reefs famous for the harvesting of eider down from ducks that have been bred on the islands for 1500 years. The area is UNESCO listed for the same reason. Signs along the quayside in Bronnoysund recommended touring the islands by bike or Kayak.

Finally we turned our thoughts to packing and also to deciding what to do with the considerable onboard credit we still had to spend. I had had my eye on the beautiful Norwegian knitwear we had seen throughout the trip and was pleased to find I had enough credit to buy myself a sweater. After picking up a few presents and souvenirs in the ship shop were were surprised to discover that we could claim back the tax we had paid even though we hadn’t spent any ‘actual’ money!!

Hurtigruten had one more treat in store for us. 2023 is the 130 anniversary of the first coastal voyage, to mark the occasion they are hosting a five course meal on each roundtrip highlighting the best of the local produce available along the route. We had a wonderful meal which topped off the excellent food we had enjoyed while onboard.

On Sunday, our last day on board, we left our cases for collection at 10am and went up to the main lounge to enjoy the last few miles of coastline. While we were sailing through the reefs and islands the crew played music by Grieg and other Norwegian composers and musicians over the pa system, what a nice touch.

After lunch we arrived back in Bergen at 14.40, by 15.00 we had disembarked, collected our cases, said goodbye to Terry and Jenny and were on the bus heading towards the airport. Terry and Jenny were spending a night in Bergen then flying to Paris to check out another European capital city. By all accounts the weather has been kinder to them in Paris, see the picture below received from Terry.

Bergen airport was calm and efficient. Our flight left on time and arrived at Gatwick 20 minutes ahead of schedule, we breezed through customs and baggage claim in no time then ground to a halt in the station. It was dark, grubby, the trains were running late but no one could tell us how late and when we finally got on a train it was standing room only at 21.30 on a Sunday. Welcome home!!

Nonetheless we got to Paddington in good time to catch the sleeper back to Penzance. We pulled in at 7.50 and Yvette and Carl were waiting on the platform to meet us.

Well, that was the end of our long awaited Norwegian adventure…or was it? Over the course of our 12 day cruise the Northern Lights failed to appear (too much cloud cover), under the Hurtigruten Northern Lights Promise we can claim a free one way trip next winter, Terry is in touch with the agents in Australia to see how that works. Who knows we may still have another chapter to write.