Day 9-Bergen Bryggenn Walking Tour

We got to sleep in a bit today. We had breakfast in the apartment and headed out around 10:15 to sign up for the 11:00 Bryggen Walking Tour. The tour was highly recommended in the guide book and it said that sometimes the 11:00 tour sells out so we wanted to sign up early. We didn't need to get there as early as we did, but better to be early than late.

We signed up and got little stickers to indicate we were on the tour. We had about 30 minutes before the tour started so we wandered around the nearby buildings. We found a bakery and decided to have a snack before the tour. I took the opportunity to try a skillingsbolle. A skillingsbolle is like a cinnamon roll but not quite as gooey. I really enjoyed the treat especially since I'd skipped breakfast!

Skillingsbolle

The tour started promptly at 11:00 am. There are two Engligh tours a day, one at 11:00 and one at 12:00, it is a 90 minute guided tour of two musuems and historic Bryggen. The tour is approximately $20 for adults and the kids are free, it includes admission to the Bryggen Museum and the Hanseatic Museum. The tour was excellent! It was well worth what we paid, our guide was excellent and we learned far more than we would have without his explanations.

The tour started at the Bryggen museum where we learned about the early years of Bergen. They have uncovered remains of some of the earliest buildings along the wharf. We also learned that the wharf has had many fires during the last 900 years and has been rebuilt many times.

We walked through the old buildings in Bryggen and our guide told us about some of the buildings. We learned about the history of the area. The buildings mostly house shops and art galleries but the buildings are still very interesting!

We had a little "surprise" on the tour, we were able to see the remains of the first city hall in Bergen. It is inside a parking garage! The remains were found and the parking garage was built around them. The tour we were on is the only tour allowed to visit them and they just started allowing visitors last month.

Ruins from the original Bergen city hall

Our final stop was the Hanseatic Museum. This building has original interiors from the 18th and 19th centuries. The Hanseatic League was a group of German merchants who basically controlled the wharf in Bergen from 1360 to 1754. The Hanseatics were all men and they had to be single. The Hanseatic museum is an example of what one of the trade houses would have looked like.

Hanseatic Merchant Office

After the tour we headed back up the hill to the apartment and had lunch. My parents headed out to do a little shopping and my family just stayed at the apartment. Dan and I napped and the kids spent some time reading. Later Dan, Ali, and I went out to do a bit of shopping. Ali had seen a few things she wanted to get from the souvenir shops.

We had dinner at the apartment and had a quite night. I started packing up stuff in anticipation of heading home soon. Tomorrow will be our last full day. We are hoping for good weather!

 

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Day 8- Moving day to Bergen

Today was moving day so we were up early again! We needed to catch the 7:50 boat to Bergen. We went to breakfast right when it opened at 7:15 and ate a bit before heading to the boat dock. Our friend that we'd met at the hostel was also on the boat so we chatted with her while we waited, she was heading to Vik so she'd be getting off at the first stop. We were all a bit sad to be leaving Balestrand, it was so relaxing and beautiful. If we return there we'd like to spend more time hiking and maybe rent bikes to do some exploring.

It was a beautiful morning so we had great views on our 4 hour boat ride. The boat was more crowded than the boat we took to Balestrand, I guess Monday morning is a popular time. About 3 stops into our ride we had to switch to a different boat, there wasn't anything wrong with the boat but apparently this was standard procedure. The kid tried some yummy waffles on the boat, they were happy with the snack!

Hanging out on the boat

Lovely scenery

We arrived in Bergen at 11:50. We had a problem getting a taxi big enough for 6 people so we ended up taking two smaller taxis. I had rented an apartment in Bergen through airbnb, the apartment was only a 15 minute walk from the boat dock but it was 15 minutes up hill and we didn't want to do that with all our luggage. Monica (the owner of the house) had sent us great instructions for how to find the house. We followed her instructions and got dropped off about 1 minute from the house on a larger street. I had to laugh because the place we asked to be dropped off at is called the Witchy Bitchy Beauty Spot, it is a tatoo and piercings place. I wonder if the cab driver thought we were crazy! We quickly found the apartment, it is located in the old part of town above Bryggen. Monica had told us that even though the apartment wouldn't be ready when we arrived we could store our luggage until it was ready.

The Witchy Bitchy

The cleaning lady was there to meet us at the apartment, she was very nice and showed us where to put our luggage. The apartment looked great! It was small but quite a bit bigger than the apartment we rented in Paris two years ago! Renting apartments in Europe is a great option for families as it is difficult to find hotel rooms for 4 people. This was the first time we used airbnb for a rental but it definitely won't be the last. It was a very easy process. We were so happy with the neighborhood the apartment was in, it was a 3 minute walk to Bryggen and the harbor, less than a 5 minute walk to the Floibanen funicular, and close to grocery stores and restaurants.

Our cute apartment rental

Little alley that leads to the apartment

Looking up the hill to our street

After dropping our bags we went to get lunch, we actually split up for lunch. My parents ate a restaurant near the Fish Market and my family ate at Subway. We try not to go to American restaurant chains when we travel abroad but eveyone was hungry and Subway sounded good. After our lunch we wandered around the shops near the harbour. It was a beautiful sunny day so we sat and had ice cream by the water. We met up with my parents at about 3:00 and did some grocery shopping. We had a full kitchen at the apartment so we planned to eat meals there. It was not too fun carrying the groceries up the hill and we later discovered that there were much closer grocery stores!

We got settled in the apartment and I did a few loads of laundry. We made pasta for dinner and Dan and I took another quick trip to the grocery store. The apartment had a Playstation 3 and Connor was thrilled to get some video game time! He's read two books on this trip so we didn't feel bad about letting him play.

Happy boy!

The apartment has two bedrooms with the third bed in a room off the hallway. Dan and I took that bed, it was pretty small! It was bigger than a twin bed but smaller than a double. We tried squeezing in but it was really hot and after about an hour Dan moved to the couch. We later figured out that we'd accidently turned on the infloor heating, we definitely didn't need that on with 70 degree temps!

 

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Day 4-Travel Day-Stockholm to Bergen to Balestrand

We woke up early because we had a plane to catch! I'd asked the front desk to call a cab for us and the cab (for 6 people) arrived promptly at 7 am. We took a cab ride to Central Station where we would get on the train to the airport. The ride for all 6 of us was 220 Krona, this just reinforced how much we got taken by the cab driver on the first day! The lines at the airport went quickly and we had plenty of time at the gate. Near our gate there was a play area for children. Ali thought it was cute and spent some time peeking in the little houses.

Play area at the airport

Our plane left on time and the flight to Bergen was just over an hour. When we arrived in Bergen it was kind of gray and misty outside, Bergen gets more than 80 inches of rain a year so I guess you can call the weather typical. Our bags came quickly and we took the airport bus into town. We got off at the bus stop near the fish market and headed to the boat terminal where our boat would leave from later in the afternoon. The boat terminal had luggage lockers that we used, they were kind of pricey but it was definitely worth not hauling our luggage around with us for the next 3 hours! From the boat terminal we could look across the harbor and see Bryggen.

Bryggen

We left the boat terminal to find a place for lunch, I had a plan and we walked to the restaurant I chose only to find it closed until August 4th. We walked by a TGIFriday and Dan thought it sounded good, that was until I told him that a hamburger was $30. He decided to wait until he got home to eat there. We ended up eating at a pizza place and it was good. Everyone was happy after their meal!

After lunch we split up from my parents, they went to look in some shops and we walked to see if we could find the apartment we'd be staying in when we return to Bergen. We walked up the hill behind Bryggen and I think we were very close to the apartment but I'm not sure we actually saw it (I didn't have the directions with me). We also spent some time looking in shops and we stopped to get the kids some ice cream.

She had to try it on

Fish market

We met my parents back at the boat terminal and retrieved our bags from the luggage lockers. Our boat left at 4:30, it was a much nicer boat than I'd expected. We sat upstairs at a large table for 6 people. The boat was not even 1/2 full. There was an outside deck where you could go out to take pictures, it was pretty cold and drizzly so we spent most of our time inside.

Dan and Ali on the boat

The boat ride was almost 4 hours. We stopped at several towns along the way and people got off the boat and new people got on. The ride was beautiful despite the cloudy weather. The kids were good on the ride, they kept busy and spent a little time enjoying the scenery. We got them sandwiches from the snack bar part way through the ride.

Scenes from the ride

We arrived in Balestrand around 8:30, it was still light out as the sun doesn't set until around 10:00. We walked up the hill and found our hostel. On our way we passed the grocery store and some small shops and restaurants. The man working at check in at the hostel was very nice, he showed us to our rooms and showed us the guest kitchen and some other amenities on the way. When we got to our room it reminded me a bit of summer camp. The kids were thrilled because there were two bunk beds, I was a little freaked out by the fact that the shower was basically a drain in the corner of the bathroom. This was our first time staying in a hostel, it got good reviews online and was the only accomodation I could find with beds for 4 people in the same room. If we would have stayed in a hotel we would have needed 2 rooms and we'd be paying more than double what we are paying at the hostel. We got settled and decided to go to bed, we figured things would probably seem better in the morning!

The view from our room

Our room

The bunk beds

The tiny bathroom

 

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