Day 5: Goodbye Oslo, Hello Kirkenes

We got up very early today to fly up to Kirkenes.  We’re really going to miss our hotel overlooking the Opera House, the great views, and Oslo.  One thing we were able to see from our balcony was this iceberg sculpture in front of the Opera House.  Oslo was awesome.

The airport was extremely busy this A.M.   We were running to our gate and were the second to the last people on the flight.  Then the plane took off a half hour late :-).  The airport was even busier than this photo.

Amazingly our luggage made it to Kirkenes.  It was the first out on the conveyer belt, so obviously it was the last on the plane.  Kirkenes is situated 250 miles above the artic circle.  Here’s a map that shows how far north we are. 

 Kirkenes is also very near the Russian border, thus the stacking dolls in the one tourist shop.

Kirkenes is definitely a working town—not much sight seeing, but fun to walk around town.  We do have a very nice hotel.  Here are views from our room.

Tomorrow we start our trip from Kirkenes down to Bergen.  We're traveling on a working ship, so this should be a very different kind of trip.  We’re on the ship for five nights.  I took this photo of one of the sister ships this afternoon.