Morning view of Mount Torghatten, Torget Brønnøysund

The overnight sailing was fairly calm following a bit of a swell when leaving Åndalsnes yesterday. We weren’t rushing to get ready for breakfast and were having a cuppa when there was an announcement over the tannoy. Another one of Hurtigruten’s ships, the Otto Sverdrup was passing by in the other direction. There is a tradition within the company that when two ships pass by, the passengers go on deck and fly their own Norwegian flag. Apparently it is a bit of a competition between the ships to see who can get the most passengers on deck. We didn’t have time to do this as the announcement came too late, so we watched from our suite. I don’t know who “won” because it wasn’t announced but it was just a bit of light-hearted fun.

MS Otto Sverdrup

At this point it was time for breakfast so we went to Røst at about 9am. There were different things to choose from today – shrimp cocktail with dill, also herring in a honey mustard sauce. Both were delicious.

We ate our light breakfast and then spoke to Claes about booking our lunch at 1pm. We learned from him that the MS Trollfjord wouldn’t be docking in Træna until 3pm, so it was obviously a long journey from Åndalsnes.

Træna is an archipelago of 477 islands, islets and reefs that are situated 33 nautical miles northwest of the mainland, along the Helgeland coast at the edge of the Arctic Circle. Only four of the islands are inhabited all year-round.  It is also one of Norway’s oldest fishing communities and a good place for hiking. The population is 450. We were not sure what to expect but I decided to do some research as we only had four hours there. I discovered that the ship would be docking at Husøya, which is one of the main islands. More about that later.

As the journey to Træna is more or less 24 hours, I decided that I needed to burn off some of the calories consumed on the trip so far, rather than sitting around. We started off walking on the top deck, but decided to move down to deck 6. Here we could walk right round it, and it was a bit more sheltered from the wind. We passed some pretty impressive rock formations and mountains, including De Syv Søstre (the Seven Sisters) Mountain Range.

De Syv Søstre

I managed to walk 7000 steps whilst taking in the breathtaking scenery as the boat sailed on. It was warm on the deck so went back to the suite to cool down, just before our lunch booking.

Røst again did not fail to please. It is one of the best restaurants we have both ever been to. Today we had the following:
Starter – ox tartare with chive mayonnaise, potato crisp and pumpkin seeds;
Main – sea trout from Tromsø with blue mussel form, pea puree, pea shoots and roast turnip;
Dessert – chocolate mousse with chocolate crumble, freeze-dried and fresh raspberries.

Service and quality of food is second to none on here.

Right on time, at 3pm, we arrived at Husøya. As we disembarked, it seemed as if we were just walking through some industrial units until we saw a sign that directed us to the “city centre” of this small island. JC was doing the map reading so we headed towards a small chapel called Petter Dass-Chapel. Before we got there, we were distracted by another couple who were working their way across a rocky, marshy area to a sculpture. We did think that it might be something to signify the fact that we had crossed into the Arctic Circle, but it wasn’t. We took a photo or two and moved on. We arrived at the chapel a few minutes later. It is named after a 17th century poet-priest along with those who have been lost at sea.

Petter Dass Chapel

Behind the chapel, we saw the island of Sanna, which is made up of very large and imposing rock formations. We saw that some sustainable salmon farming is going on in the sea surrounding it.

We then went back towards the village and had a look around. There is not much to see there, but the locals make an effort. There is the Aloha Cafe for food, coffee, cakes and ice-cream. There is also a local pub called Havfolkets Hus, but we didn’t bother going in. I was now quite determined at this point to find the Arctic Circle globe.

We walked around the corner and saw a small inlet of water that people were swimming in. I looked across the other side and finally saw the globe. I was excited to find it and also mark this significant spot on the world map with a few photos.

Arctic Circle globe

There wasn’t too much else to see except for a memorial to sailors, and also a missionary house. On the front of the house was some information regarding a former occupant, Theodor Holmen. He left his home on Træna in 1898 on a journey where he ended up in Honolulu, Hawaii. He never returned to his childhood home. His little sister, Alma was born in Træna three years after he left. In 1925, Alma received a camera in the mail, from Theodor. He asked her for photos of his former home in Træna and kept in touch with her from the opposite side of the world. Alma learned to take, develop and make copies of photographs. She recorded her life on the islands by taking portraits of people that she sent to Theodor, some 10,000 nautical miles away. Their letters documented life from two different parts of the Earth.

The picture below is one taken by Alma, of a visiting Missionary who is holding the Mission paper.

It was at this point that we decided to go back to the ship, as we had seen everything that we needed to. On the way back we passed the soon to be completed salmon farming facility which will produce 7200 tons of salmon per year. Nothing too exciting about this, you may say, but it’s a place where more jobs are created for the locals in one of the oldest fishing communities in Norway.

The ship left Træna at 7pm prompt and we were soon heading further north toward Reine. We had our usual table in Røst booked, and we had another feast of food.

The courses were as follows:
First course – Naturally dried and salted stock fish (cod) with brown butter emulsion and chive;
Second course – Pepper glazed king crab;
Third course – Reindeer croquette with tarragon mayonnaise and a slice of radish;
Fourth course – baked hake, roast potato, crispy potato skin with torched bell pepper foam;
Fifth course – milk cream, rhubarb and toasted almonds

I had learned that it was a ritual for the Hurtigruten crew to celebrate, with the passengers, the crossing of the Arctic Circle with a bit of a ceremony on the ship. We knew that it would be between 9:00pm and 9:30pm. The lady on the tannoy announced when it was going to happen. They advised that the ship would pass by a globe that was lit up, on top of an island. The ship would pass by it and then the passengers would have a drink to celebrate. Little did we know, there was more to it than that. We watched as the ship passed by the illuminated globe in the rain (I was well prepared for this) and then we went onto the covered area of deck 9 for the next instalment. One of the crew announced that the weather was very unpredictable and we needed to keep the God of the seas and wind happy. We got a visit from the God, named Njord, who came to recite a poem to us. We think that it might have been a passenger who wasn’t prepared for what he had to do, and he had probably had too much to drink. It was funny all the same.

Once Njord had read his poem, we then had to queue to receive our drink. There was one condition to do this though, we had to have some ice poured down our back by the ship’s captain. Some people were quite hesitant but I didn’t hang around. I was soaking wet but didn’t mind, I’d carried out the ritual and just had to sit in wet clothes.

We went to the bar for one final drink and then retired to our room, to get our clothes dried off. The staff on this ship certainly make us feel very welcome, even though we sometimes do get wet in the process.