It’s been a long old while since I have written a travel related post, most recently would be my “digital nomad” boat experience for a year, and before that probably a very specific post on travelling from Santa Elena (Monteverde, Costa Rica) to Granada (Nicaragua) which was quite popular. I now know someone that Is about to head to Tromsø, Norway, and I was about to start writing up a private Google doc to share with what we did, how we did it, what it cost and some thoughts, but let’s turn it into a blog post instead!
Back in November 2024 my partner and I headed over to Norway to kick off 2 weeks worth of adventures, including interrailing all the way down to Berlin, and eventually back to the UK. We spent time in Tromsø, Bodø, Mosjøen, Trondheim, Oslo, Goteborg, Copenhagen and Berlin, of which the start is all Norway!
Flying there
We flew from London Luton, direct to Tromsø with Wizz Air which worked out at £83.56 per person, including a checked bag, for a 3 hour 30 min flight. Not my favourite airport to leave from, but the price made it worth it, even with the additional travel within the UK.
The plan was from here on out, to travel by train all the way down into Central Europe, however Tromsø isn’t the best connected place, and we ended up getting an additional short flight down to Bodø which cost an additional £56.90 per person before the interrailing could start.
To and from Tromsø airport to Tromsø central is about a 15-minute drive, and you can easily get a taxi straight from the stand at the airport, or apps like Uber work too. Our Uber back to the airport for our second flight was NOK220, currently around £15 at 5:15am (when we didn’t want to wait for the bus in the snow)
Tromsø itself
Tromsø itself is rather beautiful. It’s a small town, and you can easily walk around everywhere, though you might struggle of course depending on the conditions. Depending on when you go, you might only have a few hours of “real” light, or the sun might not even rise in the day (but you’ll still be able to see don’t worry). Or it might be snowing and icy under foot. We had a mixture of all of this, with the sun still rising for some time during the first half of our stay, but by the last day or two, there would no longer be any sunrises!
As you wonder around you’ll find various nice places to eat, drink, buy normal things, buy gift style things, or do various activities (some of which I’ll cover more below). We stayed in the Enter Backpack Hotel for a few nights, made use of the public library, had some tasty coffee at Kaffebønna Stortorget while looking out at the harbour, and the landscape, and Pizza too! But more interestingly we set off to see Reindeer, Orca, did some hiking, went on a boat trip, and saw the norther lights…
Whale watching (Orca)
One of the main reasons we headed all the way up to Tromsø was to have the chance to see some Orca, and we were not disappointed.
We booked with Arctic Adventure Tours which was 5,800 NOK for 2 people, which is currently around £430, or £215 each. That included, pickup outside the
entrance to the Scandic Ishavshotel in central Tromsø, a shuttle further north which takes about 4 hours to a place called Skjervøy where we got suited and booted in very water and windproof cold weather immersion suites, got onto a boat and set out into the Fjords.
A few things to note, depending on what company you go with, you can definitely have a different boat experience. We were in nice modern RIBs, but saw others on larger boats that might be classed are “more comfortable” with more shelter, but the RIB was the right choice for us, and defiantly went faster!
Anyway, we saw Orca, and more, and were very satisfied.
Reindeer feeding
Now, you can buy Reindeer everywhere, be that in a souvenir shop, or at a restaurant, but you can also go and see them for real, and hand feed them.
Again, we got picked up by a shuttle somewhere in Tromsø, had a little drive out away from civilization, and got to see some Reindeer, eat some Reindeer stew, and also learn a little about Reindeer herding history and the people.
Even better, here we had our first sightings of the northern lights.
Sherpatrappa to Utsiktspunkt (Viewpoint)
Just over the Fjord from Tromsø is a lovely hill, with a walking trail called Sherpatrappa that will take you to the top, also with the option of a cable car which can take you one or both ways. You can easily walk across the bridge to get to the start of the trail, and head on up as long as the conditions allow. We set off along the bridge at around noon, got to the train head around 12:30, and got to the top at around 13:20 (a pretty late in the day commitment on our part).
There is a little enclosed observation deck at the top with a café for some drinks and snacks (not the cheapest), as well as a much better outdoor viewpoint a little further along.
Boaty Airbnb and Fjord trip
While looking for places to stay in Tromsø, we happened upon an Airbnb that was also a boat, with a hot tub, and that also offered the chance to go on their nightly boat trips up the Fjords for free. We didn’t want to spend the whole time on the boat as it was slightly more expensive than our other hotel, and also might give us less flexibility with evenings if the boat was out on the Fjords, so only did a few of our nights on the boat.
A few things to note, if you want to use the hot tub, reach out to them and book an evening in advance, and if you want to make sure there is a boat trip during your stay, again reach out to them, as they don’t do it every night (its weather and schedule dependent). Also while looking for availability, be sure to check the Airbnb host, as there are multiple separate bookable rooms on board.
The boat is really central in the harbour, easy to get to and a excellent starting point for basically everything else, especially when icy under foot, vs our other hotel which was a little up a hill, and slightly harder to walk to and from with ice.
Saunas
Do it… of course… We didn’t make it into a sauna in Tromsø, but we did a little further into our trip, we just didn’t have enough time! In Bodø we used pust.io, and they also have two in Tromsø. It was super cheap, and gave us the opportunity to go from the sauna straight into the arctic ice-cold water and back, which was a little chilly, but amazing to do.
So, these pictures of Bodø, not Tromsø, but the “Original (stille) Badstue” looks essentially the same!
A great trip
All in all, a great trip, and I might end up writing more about other parts of it in the future if someone ever asks!
The secret tip if you do head down to Bodo is head up this hill, and have a look at the self playing piano art piece, if it is still there…
