This travel update is for part one of our two-week stay in Bergen, Norway. It covers September 11 – 13. “Any text in quotes and Italics has been copied and pasted from some informational website like Wikipedia.”

September 11, 2023 – Monday: Taking The Bus To Bergen

We left our Airbnb in Stavanger around 10:20am this morning and rode the local #4 bus to the main bus station. There we waited for the NW400 bus to arrive. I talked to a German girl on the platform for a few minutes. She’s traveling around Norway with a big backpack, camping out and hiking. It’s impressive to me how many Europeans are traveling around Norway enjoying the outdoors.

After the bus arrived, the driver put our bags in one of the storage compartments under the bus, then we found seats on the upper lever. This is a two-level bus and we wanted to sit on the top level so we could the views as we traveled through the countryside.

Google Maps showed our route as being almost due north, over significantly large bodies of water. I was curious about how that was going to work, and it turned out to be a combination of bridges for the shortest water gaps, undersea tunnels for longer stretches, and ferries for the longest water passages.

The views included farmland.

There were green fields, quite a few sheep, and sometimes cows.

At the first ferry crossing we waited about five minutes then the bus drove onto the ferry. We had to get off the bus during the passage “for safety reasons” so we went up to the passenger deck and found comfortable seats at the front looking out over the bow. In this picture you can see a sister ferry off the port bow.

Here’s our double-decker Nor-Way bus on the ferry.

One of the passenger lounges had a model of the ferry.

The land route after that was less inhabited and there was more rugged-looking countryside. It was still very pretty though.

On the second ferry we found another seat in the lounge area to look out the forward viewing windows. Here I am in the lounge. I really like ferries. There was a full kitchen with hot and cold food, toilets, and comfortable bench seats.

When we got to Bergen we got off the bus at the main bus station and then caught the local #13 bus to get to our Airbnb. I downloaded the Skyss app on my phone so I could buy the local Bergen bus tickets. It was about a 10-minute ride to our stop and from there about a six-minute walk to our Airbnb. It was raining lightly so Patti had her rain jacket on.

As directed by our host, when we got to our building at Damsgårdsveien 79 we went to the garage door on the west side of the building and I texted the her to let her know of our arrival. She opened the garage door remotely to let us in, then we went into the lobby and took the elevator up to the fourth floor. Our apartment is the end of the hall. I used the lockbox on the wall outside the door with the code supplied by our host to get the key. Here I am opening up the door.

Sometimes checking into an Airbnb is a little more complicated than checking into a hotel.

This is a nice Airbnb. Shown below are some views of the building from several different vantage points.

The apartment entrance hall has a coat rack, a shoe rack, and chest of drawers.

The living/dining room is very comfortable and there’s a Phillips smart TV.

The kitchen area is roomy and well-supplied.

The bedroom is large enough that we each have a bedside table with room to walk between the bed and the wall. This hasn’t always been the case in Norway. There are two wardrobes that are big enough to hold all our stuff.

The bathroom is spacious and has a washing machine (typical of Norway to place the washing machine in the bathroom).

But the best feature is that we are overlooking the Damsgårdssundet, a narrow body of water between a pond to the east and a fjord to the west. The location of our Airbnb is where the blue dot and the red J are displayed on the map below.

We have a view of the waterway from our balcony.

Here’s the view to the west from the bedroom window. There are some offshore supply ship docks on the north side of the channel and a cruise ship port farther on.

I enjoy watching ships and boats so I look forward to seeing them every day for the next two weeks while we’re here. Here’s a view of our building from across the waterway. I drew blue arrows to our balcony.

Shown below are some additional views of what we see from the balcony (bridges, swans, waterfalls, mountains, rainbows, sail boats, large ships, the morning sunrise).

To finish off our Monday we walked over to the nearest grocery, a Bunnpris, and got provisions for tomorrow morning, then unpacked and settled in. We also watched the final episode of “Ragnarök”, a Norwegian TV series on Netflix. We enjoy watching Norwegian produced shows while in Norway.

September 12, 2023 – Tuesday: Mostly A Day Off

We planned to take it easy today and make future travel plans. We want to go to Stockholm on September 25 but don’t have reservations yet. First, though, we went outside for some exercise for about an hour. Here’s Patti (very small on the right) running on the wooden boardwalk that borders the waterway outside our building. We both ran about five miles.

We passed five swans a-swimming. Maybe at Christmas-time there will be the requisite seven. Actually, we’ve counted a total of nine swans. They usually stick together and travel (swim or fly) up and down the channel in a group.

The waterway has many small marinas like this one.

We planned to run over this pedestrian draw bridge, but it was raised up to let several sail boats sail through, and there were people waiting for it to close, so we ran to the next bridge.

Later on I got this picture of the bridge when it was back down. It has a lane for walkers and two lanes for bikes. Norway really is a great country for walking, biking, hiking, etc.

After our runs we ate lunch and researched Airbnb’s in Stockholm and Copenhagen and transportation between them and transportation to and from Cyprus, where we’re thinking about going from Copenhagen. But didn’t make any reservations yet.

Late in the afternoon we went for a short walk to a couple of grocery stores to the west. We walked by this church.

The church has a nice shiny rooster weathervane on top.

Our walk took us along the waterway, with a good view of the large German AIDA cruise ship across the waterway and a small marina in the foreground.

We saw several AIDA cruise ships in Stavanger — almost on a daily basis.

Later this evening we watched the final episode of “Norsemen” a Norwegian comedy that spoofs the “Vikings” series that was so popular on Netflix.

September 13, 2023 – Wednesday: A Walk Downtown

We looked at Airbnbs in Stockholm again this morning and found a couple we like, but didn’t book anything yet. We saved several as Favorites to a Wishlist.

Today, we planned to walk around Bergen. We also wanted to buy train tickets to Stockholm, so we decided to head to the train station. We walked to the local bus stop and took the #13 bus into town then walked about a half mile to the train station. The pathway / sidewalks were pretty smooth, so it should be easy with our large rolling bags when we leave here on September 25.

We purchased reservations for the Norwegian train from Bergen to Oslo and a separate reservation for a Swedish train from Oslo to Stockholm. Now that we have our transportation to Stockholm finalized, we will book an Airbnb later today.

After the train station we wandered north towards downtown. We like the cobblestone streets and colorful wooden buildings.

We found a place to eat lunch where I got the Traditional Norwegian Fish Pie and Patti got the carrot soup. We both enjoyed our meals.

We read previously that there are a lot of wall murals in Bergen and we saw a few today. This one is probably a Troll.

At the Bergen Vågen (central harbor) there’s a large square with a statue and plenty of tourist shops.

“Vågen is a bay in the centre of the city of Bergen in Vestland county, Norway. It is the central harbour of the city centre, and is the center of the historical core of the city. The city of Bergen originated on the east shore of the bay, and from there it expanded to the southern and western shores over a few centuries.”

On the northeast side of the harbor is the neighborhood of Bryggen which has old wooden trading houses similar to what we’ve seen in other Norwegian cities.

“Bryggen in Bergen, also known as Tyskebryggen and Hansabryggen, includes the old wooden buildings and fireproof stone cellars in the historic city centre of Bergen. The pier was built around 1070, and from 1360 to 1754 was the seat of the German Office in the city and the central hub of the Hanseatic trading business in Norway. The Hansa Company was also the first trading company in the Nordic region. Bryggen consists of approximately 13 hectares with 61 listed buildings, and is on UNESCO’s list of world heritage. Bryggen is the third most visited tourist attraction in Norway.”

We learned about the Hanseatic League that had a large trading center in Bryggen for centuries. They were German merchants who bought Norwegian stockfish and sold European grain in Bergen.

“The Hanseatic League was a tradeguild working for the protection of trade privileges, which for a time dominated trade in northern Europe. Their influence extended from the Baltic to the North Sea area and with associated inland areas from the late Middle Ages into the early modern period. It is named after the Low German word hanse, meaning group, companion, or (trade) company.”

The fish market had a large variety of seafood. Including dried cod (stockfish) that was hanging around.

These King Crab were quite a sight.

When we’d had enough fun for the day, we walked back to the Airbnb passing by the University and walking over the pedestrian bridge back to the building.