dj_ivocha on 3/10/2015 at 15:05
My wife and I are planning to go to Norway for a week around New Year's Eve, but I'm not entirely certain if my planned itinerary is a good one, so if anyone has any suggestions and has been there or lives there, I'd be most thankful to hear them. :)
First, what we want. We want to see the Aurora Borealis and to experience the polar night if at all possible. See some typical Norwegian towns, vistas and nature, maybe a museum or two. Dog/reindeer sledding sounds fun, but would probably break the bank. Speaking of which, we really want to fit under 1000 Euros, even 900 if possible. I know that will be rather hard, considering how hideously expensive almost everything in Norway seems to be, but on the other hand the Norwegian Krone has fallen quite a bit lately, reaching almost 10 for 1 Euro.
With the above in mind, the probably ideal way for us of flying to (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troms%C3%B8) Tromsø or (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alta,_Norway) Alta for a few days, then flying back south to (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trondheim) Trondheim or (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oslo) Oslo is right out, due to the plane tickets alone costing almost 800 Euros. Because of that, I'm thinking of flying to (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bod%C3%B8) Bodø, staying there for 2 nights and hopefully seeing the Aurora and experiencing an almost-polar night. After that we'd take the train to Trondheim, stay there for a day or two (or longer) and either fly home from there, or go to Oslo for a few days as well
What I'm not sure about is whether there is a decent chance of seeing the Aurora from Bodø. I've also read that going by train from there to Trondheim is quite fun as well, due to the beautiful nature. But seeing as it will be during the heart of winter, will we be able to see anything? How dark is the night and how light the day, especially close to Bodø?
We'll almost certainly visit Norway again during the summer in a year or three, that time with a camper van or a car and a tent, so anything we don't see now we'll see then. Still, can we see enough of Norway's nature in the winter for it to be worth it?
Nothing is set in stone yet, though, so we are open to any suggestions, like coming through Sweden to (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narvik) Narvik and then further north via some other means of transportation, or only visiting southern Norway and forgoing the Aurora and polar night, as long as there is enough other stuff to see.
