Honeymoon Part 1: Singapore ✈ Tromsø
This post was drafted when I was still overseas, so… yeah the tone of the post is a little different halfway through I don’t really have the energy nor time to re-write the whole thing! Btw… For itinerary, I don’t have one!
It’s 8:57 am in Norway, and we’re on a bus to our last adventure of the Tromsø part of our trip which is 1hr 20mins away. I’m glad I peed before I got on the bus!
So far we’ve made it traveling nearly 22 hours by plane from Singapore to Tromsø. Oh god. 3 transits!
SIN → CDG → CPH → OSL → TOS *sweat* and inbetween a plane was found to have navigational errors right after everyone boarded so we had to change planes. I tell you, this #onlyhappenswhenimwithyang (stuck in Shinjuku station, meeting a typhoon, no snow during our entire trip etc) . The domestic flights costs about 500odd SGD in total per person (can be cheaper depending on when you book etc) and we took Scandinavian Airlines for the domestic flights so in case of delays we are bumped to the next flight.
Oh yes, 1 SGD = 4.3 NOK (Norwegian Kroner)
Paid $10 SGD for a hotdog in Copenhagen and $8 SGD for 3 bars of Snickers Maximus!!! Coke is $8.5 SGD for TWO bottles!! VOSS water here is only $5 SGD per bottle lor!
Tromso
“Tromsø is in the middle of the Aurora Borealis (Northern Lights) zone, and is in fact one of the best places in the world to observe this phenomenon. Because of the planet’s rotation, Tromsø moves into the aurora zone around 6 pm, and moves out again around midnight. As it is light round the clock in the summer, no aurora is visible between late April and mid-August.” - Wikipedia
There is very little daylight from Nov - January and it’s not as intense as say the sun in Singapore (thank god). The sun is slowly rising only at 845am, and usually sets at 2+pm. Sunrise is gorgeous with the really beautiful scenery of white mountains covered in snow… Almost everything is covered in snow actually, it really feels like Christmas here especially when some Christmas deco are still around.
Touchdown, and we made our way to the hotel via a cab (150~200 NOK) instead of a bus (60NOK per person) as it was really cold and I didn’t dare to take the chance of getting lost since I don’t know the city well!
Turns out that the city of Tromsø is pretty accessible via foot to a lot of places. There’s Burger King (20 bucks for a meal!), MUJI we joked that the Japanese guide at Visit Tromso centre probably owns it haha) and even Make Up Store (well its from Sweden..)!
halfway to the snowmobile place and I’m gasping at the gorgeous sunrise scenery again… The sky’s a lovely hue of orange/pink and som parts of the river has frozen over but there are still some reflections of the pretty colors. The little houses here look like Sylvanian dollhouses enlarged and some of them have lights hung around.
Random Pic (Not in sequence) - Sunrise on the way to the snowmobile place
So back to reaching the hotel. We’re staying at Clarion Collection Hotel With (There’s a Clarion Hotel Bryggens just beside it and they are two separate hotels) which serves free breakfast, tea and dinner during your stay! The food (and almost everything else) here is really, really expensive so that was great. PLUS! FREE INTERNET! /whoopee
The thing about Norway - almost everything is really well designed and pretty. The airports, and especially Tromsø - it seems almost like they only have one designer for everything because the signboards and all are *almost* ALL in sans serif fonts and very well designed / spaced out even if it’s not in san serif fonts. It’s just so pleasing to look at! : x The toilets are also clean And seemingly always well equipped with toilet paper.
We took a short walk to the Polaria Museum, which is really more like an aquarium and watched some seal acts and a video about life in the arctic. Shops here usually close at 4pm. The Visit Tromso Centre (where you can book all your tours and pay here too) is of walkable distance from the hotel and have English speaking guides as well as a Japanese one. People here have a pretty good command of English so no major worry about communication.
Had lunch and watched the sun set at FishKompaniet, which was just about 20 steps away from our hotel. Yang chose the most Norwegian thing and I went for the safe codfish. Dinner was really expensive at nearly 100 SGD. Their sales tax was 25%!!!
Dried Halibut
Codfish! Notice the weird looking conical shaped broccoli? Cute!
Dog Sled & Aurora
First adventure was the Aurora Dog Sled/Camp over at Villmarkssenter, which is about or less than an hour’s ride from the city. We all met at the Radison Blu hotel and reached Villmarkssenter at around 730pm. It was already dark by then, but the smell of dogs and their barking and howling was hard to miss! I forgot about the cold once I saw the dogs!!!
Dogs for dog sledding!
Camping overnight was really TIRING.
First off it was so cold I couldn’t feel my feet - I was already wearing a pair of furry boots and two layers of socks!
And then the was no electrical heater, which meant that we only had a fire in the middle of the lavvu (Sami herdsmen’s tent/teepee) to keep us warm. Cold air flowed in from gaps (there was a huge hole on top cos they didn’t have a proper chimney)and we had to sleep in sleeping bags which were placed on a pile of reindeer hide.
They started serving dinner and I was just handed my very much needed cup of reindeer soup when someone shouted that the northern lights have appeared and suddenly, half the room was empty! Everyone rushed out with their tripods. I ran out after putting on my gloves and was greeted by the most beautiful sight ever of the dancing northern lights. Once again it was so pretty that I almost forgot about the cold till I couldn’t feel my fingers - damn my touch screen devices. Please get gloves that enable you to use the iPhone or touch screen camera(s). IMPORTANT.
And here… some awesome northern lights!!!
I caught this small one before dinner even started. So pretty...
Dinner resumed after the northern lights went away - they only stayed for about ten to fifteen minutes - and it was REINDEER MEAT. It tasted like.. Pork actually. But it had a weird aftertaste and I continued drinking the soup (which smelt like minestrone) and attacking the vegetables.
the bright light on top of a human body is our female guide serving us reindeer meat. *makes a face*
So we had to feed the fire with firewood to keep warm and everyone woke up every now and then so that wasn’t a problem. I had to pee 3-4 times and it was a nightmare wriggling out of my warm sleeping blanket, putting on my boots, running to the toilet (which was warmer than the tent, wtf I contemplated sleeping in there) and when I came back I had to warm myself near the fire for at least 15 mins. Hot tea was provided, but that really just made me want to pee more often!!!
Wriggling closer to the fire. Can you see the two sleeping bodies (in bags) beside me?
There are no toilets in the shared lavvu/strong> (we had 8 persons in total) so if you wanted to use the loo you had to trek over in the cold to the toilet about 25 meters away. And yes you guessed it - you couldn’t possibly shower in those conditions! >_< thankfully there was hot water (in a flask…), and I managed to wash my face in the morning (with icy water from the tap…).
I thought morning would never come.
And the first thing I did at 9am was to pee - again! Haha.
Breakfast was just plain cereal, fruits, bread and jam which was nice enough since lunch would be served immediately after the dog sledding.
Visited the dog kennels after breakfast and played with some darlings. The dogs are actually mostly crossbred, a mix of Siberian Huskies / Alaskan Huskes / Alaskan Malamutes / Inus and some other arctic breeds.
The dogs were howling non stop throughout the night btw. And they made extra noise when they started picking dogs for sled pulling!
You could choose to steer your own sled or you could have a guide “drive” you. I chose to sit in the sled while Yang steered behind me. I chickened out from steering ahahhhhaha! It was just too cold!!!
I actually felt heartpain for the dogs because I saw a few which were really skinny and among the 6 pulling our sled, one was shivering in the cold! I was really amused when some of them stopped to shit, and some ran with one leg up to pee LOL. It quickly turned to horror though when I realized the shit could be flying into my FACE!
Worse of all, the sled capsized TWICE! #onlyhappenswhenimwithyang once again. Thankfully that was towards the end of the run and the dogs have stopped shitting. At one point my sled was running free with the dogs as Yang fell off the back as well, but thankfully (oh lord! bless you awesome person) the guide caught on to the dogs on time! *sweat* never underestimate the “horsepower” of 6 dogs man.
Yang was amazed that I survived the whole camp - even I was amazed myself too. It was fun lah, but once is enough!!! I dont think anyone would want to sleep in -10 degrees for 3 nights in a row!
Lunch was reindeer meat again and this time round I just told the guide to give me all the vegetables instead. No more deer meat, thank you.
Took a stroll around the city area and there were two H&Ms just around the corner. Unfortunately their prices were higher than Singapore’s so I didn’t get anything. The streets were really icy and slippery… and then we realized that some streets were lighted up - they were having a marathon in the middle of winter! Wah! Seriously respect. It’s -10 and they are in tights!
I needed some meat, so we over to Steakers for dinner. That’s about 10 steps away from FishKompaniet… They were all so near the popular hotels!
Aurora Chasing with Karina Weinschenk
Thereafter we quickly packed our warmest clothes on and headed over for an Aurora chasing tour. Seriously. We booked a tour with a famous guide, Karina Weinschenk. She was really amazing!! The places she brought us to were spot on and great for photography. Of course if you want it easier and didn’t wanna carry around your camera and tripod, there’s always Gunnar / some guy who could provide/rent us the camera and tripod… All you have to do is to bring your CF card!
All I had were my gf-2 and Gorillapod, so I only have some humbly blur pictures. But really, nothing can beat seeing the Aurora Borealis dancing in the sky.. It’s captivating and even if it lasts only 10 - 20 minutes, it’s really worth it. Of course, it was so damn bloody cold that I developed a fever and almost couldn’t make it for snowmobile. Brrr…
All images above with my GF-2 : )
Snowmobile at Lyngsfjord
After Yang got me some Strepsils (they call it Repsils here) and Paracetamol, i grabbed some breakfast and hurriedly went off to catch a bus over at another nearby hotel which is the bus I was sitting in when I started to write this entry. Heh. Now I’m on the way back!
I’m runnin out of vocab to describe Norway and all the beautiful snow laden places. My god!
I’m glad we went for the snowmobile adventure with Lyngsfjord Adventure despite my fever! We were given warm overalls on top of what i was wearing (never felt more puffed in my life) and those were really lifesavers. Yang maneuvered the snowmobile and I was just hanging on for my dear life, braving the chilly wind in my winter clothes and a pair of mittens and helmet for protection.
Thank our lucky stars for the helmet! WE FELL OFF THE SNOWMOBILE TWICE. #onlyhappenswhenimwithyang The second time the snowmobile nearly rolled over us. I was knee deep in snow and thank god I had a soft landing. I knocked the helmet against some small rock, but no concussions and I was alright. Phew.
We were 850m above sea level at the end of the trail and almost reached the clouds seriously. We could see Finland, and were just 4m away from Sweden! (reindeers are the illegal immigrants crossing the borders from Sweden every winter, haha) everything was just so beautiful and pure. The snow was glistening like diamonds and everywhere you looked it was just endless white. You don’t need a bike license to drive the snowmobile (like the ATV and dirtbike I guess) but i tried it and couldn’t control it! HANDS TOO SHORT and it’s pretty heavy to steer. >_<
I must say, Lyngsfjord Adventure is a lovely guide camp to be with. Yang loves this place. Basically you can do whatever we did (dog sled, aurora camp, camp over) at Villmarkssenter here, but this is much warmer a place and the guides are much friendlier and jovial… And there’s reindeer sledding! Feel like SANTA! : x The people in charge here are mostly males, but they are very caring and attentive.
They served a mixture of potatoes/carrots/fish grub for lunch alongside with sweet bread and a dessert biscuit which had cinnamon, sugar, brown cheese in it and it tastes so good! Lyngsfjord also offers Reindeer Sledding so it’s pretty awesome a place to be really - and their tent (Sami Lavvu) has proper heating. It’s a great place to be!
It’s now 3pm and the sun has almost set. Oh yes the bus from Lyngsfjord is much more spacious and warmer too, so comfortable that I’m falling asleep… Zzz. Plus all the shops are closed on Sundays!
So when we got back it was almost 6pm. Know what was the best thing that happened? IT SNOWED! FINALLY! Yang was overjoyed. HAHA!
Flight out at 6am. Panda-eyed. *jets off to Rome* Woohoo!
Fresh snow!
We finally got breakfast on a SAS flight! LOL. Mainly cos this one was super early in the morning.
Tromso was really, really the funnest part of our Honeymoon. And I seriously recommend all honeymoon-ing couple to head there for some new adventure. If a person like me (who cannot stand the cold, who hates sports) can take it, and love it… so would you! And seeing the auroras… simply amazing. Tick off my bucketlist! (the next most possible item to do next is… visiting Blizzcon, wahahaha!)
If anyone needs more detailed information on flight costs and information, please head over to my “tech support” husband at kenshinjeff.jp - he has written a very detailed post on getting there, etc etc.
Useful Links:
★ Karina Weinschenk
★ Lyngsfjord Adventure
★ Tromso Adventure
★ Visit Tromso
★ Guide Gunnar (he’s really good)
★ Villmarkssenter
★ Clarion Collection Hotel With
★ K Jetil Skogli - Camera Rental Aurora Guide
Hope all these helps!
Originally published at www.evonnz.com. You can comment here or there.