Hurtigruten; Thursday, 03 May, 2018

Several stops during the night, and in the morning we awoke docked at Harstad.

After breakfast there was a journey through one of the more impressive man-made sections of the route as we sailed through the Risøyrenna, a narrow channel dredged between lots of low lying islands, and one of the key pieces of engineering that allowed the Hurtigruten to become a reality in 1893. The channel leads all the way to the next stop of the day at Risøyhamn.

After Risøyhamn we sailed through increasingly more stunning scenery before reaching Sortland where we stopped for about 30 minutes.

Departure from Sortland signified the start of lunch. After lunch the next stop was Stokmarknes, the spiritual home, and birthplace, of the Hurtigruten. On previous trips I’ve got off here to visit the Hurtigruten museum as admission had previously been included in the price of the cruise, but as there was now a hefty entrance price to visit I decided it was as easy just to stay on board.

About an hour after departing Stokmarknes we entered the stunning and narrow Raftsundet where the mountains come right down to the edge of the water, and then had a quick detour to the mouth of the Trollfjord. Due to the amount of snow still on the mountains we didn’t enter the fjord because of the risk of avalanches.

About 30 minutes later we landed at Svolvær and took that as an opportunity to have a relaxed buffet dinner as most people had eaten earlier as the were off on excursions from the town.

I hopped off and had a little look round the town before we continued south through the waters of the Lofoten islands towards our last stop of the day at Stamsund.

Having taken in the stop at Stamsund, and as the ship headed for open water to cross from the Lofoten islands over to Bodø I turned in for the night, to be gently rocked to sleep by the rough seas.