(Photos above show the Guesthouse 102 at 2:25 am, The valley mountain side at the same time, the glacier at the head of the valley and looking down the road to Longyearbyen also at 2:25 am. Quite special I thought. )
The started at midnight as I looked out of the window at the bright view across the valley. One o'clock was the same as was two. Beautiful bright sunlight and a clear blue sky. Just like you see in some tourist poster for a tropical paradise. But this was not the tropics. This was a polar location, Svalbard. It is true that some sources call it the polar tropics. But there are no palm trees, in fact there are no trees of any kind. Hardly any grass either. What there is, is tundra type and low mixed with colourful tiny flowers.
I am awake trying not to fall asleep in case I miss the shuttle bus for the airport at 2:30 am. I am not the only person awake though. Outside my window I hear the happy conversations of a group standing on the front steps smoking and drinking. From time to time a car goes past or someone walks up the road. Inside in the hall way there are occasional voices or the sound of feet walking past.
I know I could set my phone alarm, in fact I have, but there is the question of would it work or would I be in deep sleep and not hear it? So I chose to stay awake and sit in a chair. I am all packed ready to go and I do at 2:15 am. It didn't take very long to reach the bus stop and turning point outside a neighboring guesthouse. On the balcony of that building a man is standing with his camera taking photos. I am reminded that the Guesthouse 102 manager told me that he has guests who return each year, sleep all day and go out into the midnight sun to photograph.
Quite soon a couple emerge to wait for the bus, which by now I can see way down the valley heading our way. We load our bags in the underneath lockers and take our seats. Then we are off, back down the road calling into each hotel or guesthouse. By the Radisson near the shops, the bus is full. The driver stops just past the last stop and makes his way along the aisle collecting our 50 kroner fares. Then off to the airport.
Everybody is grabbing their bag and rushing into the terminal to queue up for check in. I get into a short queue and ask for a aisle seat and get 2D, which proves to have more leg room and tray room.
I didn't think there would be much chance of a window seat.
There was a large waiting lounge with floor to ceiling glass windows so that you could see the stunning view across the fjord. The sun streamed in the tinted windows but still made the inside hot. In fact I shifted out of the direct rays and into a shadow area.
0415 seemed an unearthly hour to catch a plane but there was one to Oslo at 0450 and already the shuttle was arriving with the load for that flight.
By convenient positioning I was at the boarding check as soon as they announced loading. Using a fingerprint ID I got my seat receipt and strode out across the tarmac to the plane steps. I don't thing that the plane was full, certainly there was a spare seat next to me and across the aisle were a couple free seats as well.
Take off was delayed as Tromso was closed. They were doing runway maintenance and we had to wait. When we got to Tromso we had to circle around while the heavy equipment was moved off the runway.
We took of without too much delay. For the next ten minutes of so the plane flew low so that it was about mountain top height. We flew along fjords and crossed into more fjords and along the coast. While not a perfect position to see all that was on show, I did see the glaciers we visited on the first boat trip. I could see more mountains in the distance behind the ones that had been on view during the boat trip. At one point I could see quite large coastal area which was snow free. It also looked as if it could be reasonably flat land as well.
The we climbed up into the clouds and came put on top. Breakfast was served. Orange juice and a large filled ham roll with coffee. All except the coffee, just the cup, came in a paper bag, which made delivery and collection of the rubbish a very easy task. Repeats of coffee were also offered. If the flight is over 40 minutes and before 9 am (I think it is) then SAS serve a free breakfast.
We landed at a wet and cool Tromso at 5:40 am and most people hurried off. However, I hung around waiting for the first airport bus to depart at 8:15 am. I knew this would be the case so was prepared for it. I did find a table and worked on the computer for a while. The terminal was extremely untidy with rubbish lying all around. Obviously the cleaners don't start all that early in the day.
The bus took off and I basically went straight to sleep. I missed going through the tunnels and woke up in the main street of Tromso. The last stop was downtown and there was no way this driver was going to take me up to the hotel as the first one had done. He pointed the direction out for me although I knew full well that it was going to be along there round the corner and up the hill.
I was pretty exhausted when I arrived at AMI Hotel. I stored my bags and sat in the lounge for an hour or so and more or less slept. I know I got some strange looks from the guests. I came too after some coffee and a orange justice and went off down town for a walk. They were just starting to clean my room so I knew when I did come back that it would be ready.
I headed for the Tourist Office to sort out the details for getting on the Hurtigruten on Wednesday morning. It sails at 1:30 am. The tourist counter staff was a man who turned out to have been born in the Hutt Valley, as I was. He has married a Norwegian woman and has lived here for six or eight years now. He was very helpful and had good English of course. I was given the chance to view the Hurtigruten deck plans on his computer and he gave me suggestions on where to find quiet seats which you could sleep in.
I had a quick lunch in a near by shopping centre and then headed back to the hotel and my welcome bed. I felt like a walking zombie by the time I got into my room. I pulled the curtains and changed into PJ's and got into bed. It was around 1:30 pm.
When I awoke later my watch indicated that it was 7:45. Normally it is set on 24 hour display so my thought was that I had slept right though the afternoon and night. It was quiet. I showered and dressed and went down for breakfast but there was nothing out. For a moment or two I felt quite disorientated. Then I pressed the display setting on my watch and found that it was in fact only about 8:15 pm. I still had the whole night ahead.
Fortunately the hotel leaves out a small selection of food mostly the breakfast kind. So I was able to have juice, bread, two cold boiled eggs, some cheese and some pressed meat. For this I needed to pay 20 kroner. I was happy to do that as I had no strong desire to go down town again.
So it was back to the room, watched some TV – River Queen was on one channel but I put the BBC on for a while. I started the blog but then headed off to bed again.
In terms of travel, this has been what they call a 'Rest Day'.
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