Today was my birthday! I turned another year older. It’s crazy to think about how long I have been on Earth and what I have accomplished thus far. Even though you could list some of my accomplishments, they are nothing compared to what I still want to achieve in life. I have high aspirations that I will fulfill one step at a time.
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| Birthday "gift" from my sister Symone |
Although it was my birthday, nothing too exciting happened. I went to my bioinformatics class in the morning at 8am and then went to my history class. For history that day we took a field trip to the Tromsø Museum which I had already visited with Callie a couple of weeks ago. After class I went back to my room to pack for our trip to Nordkapp.
At my flat, there was an envelope from my aunt waiting for me. In the envelope were a baloons, birthday mints, a gift bag, and a couple other things along with a pop up flower basket. I really appreciated the thoughtful gift on my birthday in Norway. The paper flower basket is a great touch to my bare room. I also received a little bag of goodies from Callie which included a couple of her grandma's molasses cookies that I absolutely love. My favorite “gift” of all though was from my little sister Symone who posted the above picture on my Facebook wall. The photo made me smile and was a great way to start off my birthday.
It was my birthday, but it was also the beginning of our Nordkapp trip. Nordkapp or North Cape in English is the most northern point of the European continent at 71°10’21’’.Nordkapp is a popular destination and since I was so far in the Arctic already, I thought visiting was a perfect choice.
On the trip I was going with Callie and two young German women, Antonia and Emely. Although I did not know Antonia or Emely well they seemed like sweet young women and I was looking forward to getting to know them better. I was super excited for our trip and I was glad we had finally made arrangements before the snow and darkness come.
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| The Hurtigruten and more specifically Kong Harald |
At 6:30 pm we boarded the Hurtigruten and set sail to the city of Honningsvåg where we would be spending two nights. The Hurtigruten is a company established in 1893 that runs ships along the coast of Norway. The ships depart from Bergen daily and sail to Kirkenes and back in around 12 days. Many people cruise the Norwegian coast on the ships for their vacation. In our case, we used the Hurtigruten to get from point A to point B. The Hurtigruten was the cheapest form of transportation to Nordkapp even though the journey would take 17 hours.
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| Our sleeping quarters on the ship |
The Hurtigruten was huge and reminded me a mini Titanic. The ship we were on was named Kong Harald. The ship was built in 1993 in Volkswerft, Germany and could hold 622 passengers. Although the inside interior was outdated, the ship was still in good condition and the couches we slept on were quite comfortable.
After boarding the Hurtigruten we made camp on the couches of the top level. It was cloudy out so we couldn’t see the Northern lights. I was hoping we would be able to see them while on the ship. Since we were so exhausted we all fell asleep after a couple of hours on the ship.
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