Day 4 (Wed 13th Mar) - Ornes to Svolvaer

Overnight we had travelled towards Ornes and at approximately 7:50am we crossed into the artic circle at 66deg 33min north. As I mentioned yesterday, there was a special 'artic circle' baptism later on this morning. I went along to see Neptune, who welcomed us to his domain and let us know we now had the same rights as cod and other fish. If we wanted, he would baptise us and lots of us, myself included, queued up to receive his blessing. Which was to have some ice cubes poured down our neck. Given the cold wind blowing at the time the ice cubes themselves didn't feel that cold. Or maybe the small tumbler of the local liqueur afterwards helped warm me up again.

To mark the crossing there was also a chance to get a special 'artic circle' stamp on postcards. My postcards have been written, stamped and posted so they should be winging their way to people courtesy of Hurtigruten. I have to say at this point, the Hurtigruten ship runs like clockwork and things happen seamlessly. So I am hopeful it will prove to be the same with the cards and I don't arrive back before they do. The company have obviously learnt over the years exactly how to run a cruise ship so that nothing goes wrong and the customers are happy and have no complaints.

While we were lunching the ship docked at Bodo. If you a not careful you can spend all day sitting around on the observation deck watching the world go by. So we got dressed in our outside gear, fitted the grippers to our boots and set off into town. Bodo is the capital of the Nordland county and mainly an administrative centre. We wandered around the centre for an hour or so seeing the cathedral and town hall on our way round the town centre streets.

We also saw a bird which we didn't recognise which had a crest on the top of its head and a pinky-brown colouring and were thinking we would need to look it up on the Internet when we got back to the ship. However, at dinner tonight one of the couples we sit with had seen the bird before and we're familiar with it. The couple are from the Scilly Isles and told us it was a waxwing. Apparently, waxwings are one of the birds from the Scandinavian countries that use the Scilly Isles as a stopover when migrating. 

After leaving Bodo we travelled the Vestfjorden towards Stamsund. The surrounding islands were mountainous and with the skies mainly clear and with brilliant sunshine they were very photogenic. So while the conditions were like that I went outside for a while to take some more photographs. I was hoping there might be a beautiful sunset. But as we steamed towards Stamsund, the weather around us closed in and the clouds obscured some of the distant views.

Dinner each evening is reserved seating at specific tables (rather than choosing any table as happens at breakfast and lunch). The other couple we sit with we're not at dinner tonight. They had booked themselves on an excursion to go to a Viking feast. We we pulling their legs that they would be rolling back later drunk on too much mead and hoped they would find their way back to the ship before we set off again for Svolvaer.

It seems to be too cloudy to see much tonight and the forecast for the northern lights is still set at 2 (on a scale of 1 - 9). But we have been told over the last day or two that the chance of seeing the lights only increases once we reach Tromso and head further north from there. We don't get to Tromso until tomorrow afternoon, when we will be going on our next excursion .. dog-sledding with huskies. I'm really looking forward to this next excursion - I just hope it lives up to expectations!

As for tonight .. I have decided to give the fish rissoles at 11pm a miss. I will check the weather conditions before I go to sleep and if I think it is worth it, lay out my outside gear in case the lights appear. But it doesn't sound likely this wil happen so I am not expecting a phone call or any announcements over the information channel on the tv.