Cruise Day 5 - Bergen, Norway

We arrived in the early hours at the port of Bergen, Norway.

Once part of the Hanseatic League, the port was an important trading center and retains some of its historic charm and buildings.

The wooden buildings there are now fashionable stores and museums about the Hanseatic League

 Lots of neat narrow alleyways full of shops, with wooden floors that make the sound be absorbed and your footfalls and voices sound rather muted.

 

Bergen is also the home of Trolls, and not the Internet variety.

Bergen is still very much a trading center with lots of wares for sale, mainly to tourists and its own residents now.

Yes, they do offer Elk, Reindeer,  and Whale (sorry Greenpeace) meat to eat and had free samples of each. 

A nice thing about Norway is the Norwegian Krona is .10 to the US dollar, so you lop off a decimal point to know what things cost, which makes it easy to figure it out.

I gave each of the meats try.  Explore different cultures, ya know.

First of all, eating Reindeer is, after all, revenge for grandma. It's tasty, too.

Second, it turns out Whale is really, really, tasty. It doesn't taste fishy but instead it tastes like really, really, good tender beef. Apparently, the meat comes from the Minke whale which is not considered endangered and is considered a delicacy in Norway.

We then took the funicular up the mountain, and riding it, as the name suggests, was rather fun as it goes up and down the mountain on a pretty sharp angle.

We got to the top and had a nice scenic overview of Bergen.

At the top, of the mountain, goats wander around, mixing with the visitors and occasionally standing still for some scritches.

 Yes, goats like scritches.

There was also a pretty waterfall on the top of the hill.

And some fun shops like this ice cream store:

We then descended the funicular.

 

After that, we meandered around Bergen, both the historic Hanseatic League area and the more modern areas of Bergen near to it, and then headed back to the ship after a very enjoyable day ashore.