Another trip to Tromsø

(See part 1 from 2024.)

Thursday (2026-03-26)

Stay in Gatwick Airport (YOTEL) overnight. Somehow they managed to make a hotel room feel exactly like a plane cabin.

Trip to Gatwick and overnight there
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Friday (2026-03-27)

  • Starbucks at Gatwick, Werthers Originals (couldn’t face a Toblerone)
  • Plane to Tromsø! Thanks Airbus (A320neo)
  • Landed 1240 local time, skipped about 40mins of passport queue; thanks Article 28(1) of the EEA
  • Bus into town (Svipper); thanks Claude for telling me what to do here
  • Lunch at Pastafabrikken; possibly even more expensive than central London, but the garlic bread was really good
  • Incredible evening aurora trip (starting out with a vue panoramique at Skulsfjord while the sun set, then the best display at Lyfjord); thanks Sun, the lights were literally even visible while the sun was up
Northern Lights trip
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Saturday (2026-03-28)

Quiet day really.

  • Wander around town a bit, including over the huge bridge
  • Tried to go up the cable car but it was shut
  • Tried to go into the cathedral but it was, somehow, shut
  • BICEP DAY in hotel gym
  • Sauna in hotel
Click to view gallery
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Sunday (2026-03-29)

Ski-doo trip:

  • 45min bus then 20min ferry
  • Very cheerful Dutch guy leading the tour
  • Met some tourists whose aurora tour on Friday got cancelled because they “were guaranteed not to see anything” :rip:
  • The water closet really is one of the great triumphs of human civilisation and engineering
Click to view gallery
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Then BICEP DAY and sauna.

Monday (2026-03-30)

Click to view gallery
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  • A number of coffee shops including this Norwegian
Click to view gallery
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  • BICEP DAY and sauna, featuring a very garrulous Austrian man I accidentally misclassified as Bavarian and probably mortally insulted him
  • Evening boat trip which was so cloudy you couldn’t even see the Moon, never mind the Northern Lights, although it was quite atmospheric in places
Click to view gallery
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Tuesday (2026-03-31)

  • Wander out to the glass blowing workshop
  • Plane home via Oslo, including jogging across the full length of Oslo airport to make a 55min transfer
  • Arrived home 2230 BST
Click to view gallery
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Stats

  • Puzzles from [Da Vinci Puzzles(https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0FSMG878C) solved: about 20, although it’s not always clear exactly what is a puzzle
  • Saunas: 3
  • Cardamom buns: 1
  • Accidental cinnamon buns: 1
  • Otters seen: 0
  • Times ski-doo overturned: 0 but very nearly 1