So, I slept right through last night, through the force 8s and 9s that the Captain of MS Trollfjord advised us about yesterday. I think what “helped” was the fact that it was a head wind most of the way, which meant that the ship wasn’t rocking from side to side when we travelled from Longyearbyen to Ny-Ålesund.
I woke up feeling refreshed and raring to go. The waters of the fjord were calm again so I felt ready to tackle some food. We went for breakfast and Tina checked in with us to make sure we were both ok. JC wasn’t at this point but we couldn’t really work out why.
When we got back to the cabin suite after breakfast, we had an announcement to say that because of the bad weather last night, we would be arriving in Brønnøysund, in Helgeland, an hour later, at 9am. Our scheduled departure time had also been pushed back by half an hour, to 12:30pm instead of midday.
We had no excursions planned, but they were going ahead as scheduled. We would be just glad to get back on solid ground again. We left the ship just after 9am and headed south along the quayside, towards the monument that marks the halfway point of the middle of Norway, from North to South.
Brønnøysund – this monument marks the position of the halfway point of Norway. Nordkapp is 840km to the North, Lindesnes is 840km to the South
We took a few pictures and then headed further south towards a bridge. We were actually looking for the Kjærlighetsbroa (The Love Bridge), which was marked on the map that we had got from the ship. It is supposed to be a very small red bridge, but we could only find the wooden bridge that took us to a park.
Brønnøysund is the gateway to the North Sea paradise – Visit Northern Norway (nordnorge.com)
Never mind, we moved on as we wanted to visit Sørbyen (South Town), which is a district that merged with what is now known as Brønnøysund. There are a lot of old wooden buildings which have blue circular plaques on some of the properties. The blue plaques give historical information about what the property used to be, and who used to live there. We walked around and found quite a few of these blue plaques, and have detailed a couple below. I have had to use Google Translate so this is a literal translation which maybe does not quite make sense sometimes:
“South City’s Well
Bethlehem
Built 1882 for blacksmith Ellie Moe
The blacksmith’s grandson, admiral and war hero Skule Valentin Storheil born here 1907
Fashion shop and bakery 1919-25
Dormitory for female workers on the Nordøyan factories 1960s“
“South City’s Well
Assembly
The Premises established 1909 by Iogt-Logen Torghatten
Evening Room 1909-1920
Meeting Room 1921-30
Singer Room 1931-47
Cinema 1947-90
Assembly Room from 1991″
We then walked to the Brønnøy Church, a neo-gothic building that was constructed in 1870. We didn’t go inside but it had nice gardens with a couple of monuments. One of them listed the people that had lost their lives in WW2. We then headed back towards the port area of the city as JC wanted to go to the Cash Bar, named after the legendary Johnny Cash. It was at this point the we realised that we had found the Love Bridge without even looking. It was a very underwhelming affair but nice to have found it all the same.
We arrived at the Cash Bar too early to have a beer, so we sat down in a window seat with a view of the harbour, and had a soft drink. It is quite a cosy place, with pictures of Johnny Cash and also Elvis Presley and Marilyn Monroe. There is a menu offering pizzas, salads, wraps and burgers. There was a good selection of beers, cold and hot drinks.
I was sitting watching the world go by when I noticed a yacht that had a big banner down the side saying “Ella in the Arctic”. I noticed that she was with a man with a camera, maybe a photographer, and thought it was worth investigating. A google search found her website
I read that Ella is on a record-breaking voyage to raise awareness about climate change and, in particular, how this is affecting the ecosystem of the Arctic. I wanted to go and speak to her but it looked like she was being interviewed by a journalist. I sent her a whatsapp message to wish her luck anyway.
We drank up and walked to the quayside, some five minutes away from the Cash Bar. We were soon back in our suite and relaxed for a while as the ship left the dock.
On the way, we realised that we would be passing the Torghatten Mountain. I decided that we should go up on deck and try and get some photos before everyone else got there first. JC worked out that we would be passing in about 15 minutes time so we went up to deck 9. It was rather breezy so I’m glad that I got wrapped up. It wasn’t long before we saw Torghatten Mountain. It is easier to spot from the other side (which we eventually saw) but it has a natural tunnel that is 160 metres long, 20 metres wide and 35 metres high. Legend has it that a troll called Hestmannen made the hole while he was chasing a girl called Leka, who was not interested in him. He fired an arrow at Leka to kill her, but the troll-king of Sømna threw his hat into the path of the arrow. The hat turned into a mountain with an arrow hole in the middle.
We then went downstairs for late lunch and it was very quiet in Røst restaurant. We ate our food then went back to our room. A few minutes later, I received this message back from Ella:
I was chuffed that she had taken time out of her day to message me back. I did let her know that we were currently sailing west of Dun which had a 3 metre swell at the time, and she did reply to say that she was waiting overnight for the weather to calm down before heading off.
Time passed by as we sailed through the beautiful fjords before we went for our evening meal. We had some good conversation with our new French friends, who are called Francis and Isabelle. Francis asked if we could exchange emails as he wants us to keep in touch. He told us some brilliant stories of when he was younger which kept us going through our meal.
This is what we had to eat:
First course: Broccolini, brown butter foam, sour cream, apple;
Second course: Mushroom gnocchi, onion broth, mushroom, herbs;
Third course: Beef tenderloin, sauce bearnaise, tomatoes, rosti potato;
Fourth course: Selbu blue cheese, pear and raisin compote, fruit crackers;
Fifth course – Tea sorbet, potato and aquavit cake, lingonberries.
During service, we passed a small island called Bessaker where the ship’s horn was set off, whilst people waved on the quayside of the island itself. It was nearly dark but we could see them waving flags and also their mobile phones with lights switched on. According to Claes, the ship was unable to go to Svalbard last May, so the route had to be changed, and the MS Trollfjord docked there. The staff put a team together and played football against the locals. Claes said he didn’t play, he was just a cheerleader wearing a tiara. That is just so typically him. Tina did expand on the whole story the day after. The crew had to ring ahead to the port of Bessaker to check the size of the dock, which was too small for the MWS Trollfjord. Apparently they built a makeshift one especially for the last minute docking.
We felt quite sad last night, talking with the staff of Hurtigruten. Friday is our last day on the ship, and we have met some genuinely lovely people, both passengers and staff.
jctraveller 
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