White Christmas - Tromsø (Dec 23-27th) - Part 1

Our next trip had a dual purpose - to give us one last chance at seeing the Northern Lights (We'd had lights, but too many clouds to see in Iceland, and clear skies but no lights in Rovaniemi) and also to try to have our first ever white Christmas (despite sometimes getting snow in Malmö, it had only been cold and wet at Christmas).

So we decided to head up to Tromsø in northern Norway - this would be the furthest North we'd ever been, higher into the Arctic Circle than Rov or the top of Iceland.  We actually stayed in a small camp area called Svensby, on the an isthmus (narrow strip of land linking two bigger areas of land) near Lyngseidet.

Relative locations of Iceland, Rovaniemi and Svensby

Tromø and Svensby

But before we headed off, we had a few logistics to work out.  We needed to make sure that Santa could visit us in Tromsø, so Tom wrote him a letter to let him know we'd be there.  Next we needed to make sure that we could bring back all the presents he left - this was a little bit of a worry, as we also needed to take up toboggans, snow gear and camera equipment.  In the end it was only Kristine's superior packing skill (honed over many trips) and a massive zip-up bag from Gekås (that doubled as a giant suitcase) that gave us the ability to get everything there and pack everything.

However, we realised that we were never going to be able to also take up all of the presents that we had for each other, so we decided that we'd have our own early mini-Christmas on the 21st before we headed up.  Fortunately Kristine wasn't at work so she cooked up an awesome roasted ham and veggies and after dinner we opened our presents to and from each other:

Tomas got Roblox figures from Cameron

Kristine got a collection of Icelandic Trolls from me as well as a Walking Dead and Warcraft Cookbook

One of the books

Alana got a Harry Potter Shirt from us

Cameron got a soccer shirt from us

The shirt

I got a troll for my Blood Bowl game from the kids

and a Nintendo Switch from Kristine

The kids big presents

Each of the kids got a BIG present from us this year, a laptop.  When they first opened the boxes they thought they had gotten ice skates and were slightly disappointed.

Why do my ice skates have cables?

Happy faces

With our presents finished (and the laptops locked safely in the safe) we were free to head up to Tromsø.  Of course to make things easy on ourselves we went to our friend's house for Christmas Glögg (a warm Christmas wine with raisins and almonds), left packing and cleaning to the absolute last when we got home.

We had a pretty early start the next day and took our first flight from Copenhagen to Stockholm Arlanda airport.  We grabbed a lunch there and then took the next leg of the flight, landing in Tromsø around 3pm.  We were a little late as we'd had to circle for about 45 minutes while the airport was closed due to heavy snow.

After collecting our ridiculous amount of bags, we headed out to find our hire car.  The problem was we knew only the number plate and make/model, but all of the cars were just white blobs under the snow and there were two carparks that it could have been in.  Eventually, by clicking the unlock button we managed to see some indicators blinking dully under the coating of snow and located the car.

Our Car

We then had an hour drive to a ferry that took us over to Svensby.  Our cabin was a 5 minute drive from the ferry and by 5pm we were inside and warm.  Then we realised that we needed to head out again to by some food so we could eat breakfast.  The nearest grocery store was in Lyngseidet, a twenty minute drive away, so we headed out and got our shopping.

By the time we got back to the cabin we were exhausted.

The next day (23rd Dec) we decided to head over to Tromsø, as it would be our only real chance to see the town as everything would be closed for the next few days for Christmas.

We headed out and considered taking the ferry across, but due to the holiday ferry schedule we would have had to wait for an hour and a half, so we decided to drive.  Due to the mountains and fjords we'd needed to take a bit of a round-about path:

Svensby to Tromsø

It took a while to get started when there was ice on the outside and inside of the windscreen

It was a pretty awesome scenic drive:



We did a quick stop in Furuflaten for some photographs - Furuflaten sits on the Lyngen fjord just south Lyngseidet:

Furuflaten

Furuflaten

Scenery while driving

Since we were so far north in Winter I had expected to have no light at all, but between 9am and about 3pm we had twilight, which was only slightly less bright than an overcast day.  Once the sun set, though, it was really dark.  We'd picked our dates to when there wouldn't be much moon so we'd have a better chance of seeing the Northern Lights.

After a 2.5hr drive we arrived in Tromsø.

Our first sight was impressive Arctic Cathedral (or Tromsdalen Church), built in 1965:

Arctic Cathedral

Of course of all of the highlights of the town, the giant pile of snow was the kids favourite:

Snow!

In case you forgot how far north Tromsø was (the Artic Circle is 66°33′47.0 - the line we crossed in Rovaniemi was 66°32′55.0 and Malmö is 55°60′50)

Tromsø

Reindeer

We visited a few tourist shops to get our customary sew-on badge and checked out the Tromsø Cathedral, built in 1861:

Tromsø Cathedral

Tromsø Cathedral

We then went for a walk along the main street.  It was starting to get pretty dark, but there were lots of Christmas lights:

Main Street

The Town Library was pretty cool

Christmas Tree

Bridge into Tromsø

Bridge and Arctic Church

East side of Tromsø

Us in Tromsø

Cam under the "Fangst og Fiskerimonumentet

Tromsø Harbour

We stopped to pick up some more groceries on the way home (our last chance until we left due to shop closures over Christmas) and headed back to our cabin.  This time we took the ferry back over.

The place we stayed was the Svensby Turistcentre and it was awesome.  The staff were really helpful, the cabins were warm and well equipped and we had great views:

We had an immediate goal though, our front balcony had collected a fair amount of snow, so Kris and Tom set to clearing it off:

Balcony

Snow

Clearing the Snow

We had hoped to set up on the balcony and watch the lights, but it was too cold and there was too much light from the other cabins.  We ended up driving along the road to Lyngseidet until we found a quiet area and pulled off the road.  Unfortunately there were no Northern Lights this time.