Spirit of Adventure blog

Our final stop this cruise was Stavanger, a very pleasant ‘small-feel’ city on the aptly named Stavanger Peninsula in south-western Norway.

It is otherwise known as the oil capital of Norway, so called due to the amount of industry and port infrastructure in place to support North Sea drilling.

We would normally have seen some of these rigs & ships moored up on our approach to the port, however thick fog clouded our approach to the city on Friday morning, resulting in the port being closed as we made our final approach.

Fortunately after an hour or so the sun started burning through the misty nuisance, and we were able to dock safely by 10:00 after being able to see around 250m (just over the length of the ship).

One of the grandest experiences nearby involves hiking (or on a clear day a helicopter ride) to Pulpit Rock – a spectacular ridge soaring some 2000ft above Lysefjorden (pictured).

Other things to do include meandering around the picturesque town, enjoying sea air and the scenery. The braver, and more wealthy, might have even chosen to purchase an ice cream as the sun shone in the afternoon – however those wishing to spend less than around £10 on this small luxury would be better suited using our onboard ice cream machine which produces marvellously creamy 99’s at no extra charge whatsoever.

Evening cocktail hour approached which marked our departure from what was now a bright sunny city, back out into the North Sea again and towards the UK.

Well that’s it from me this time around – I’ll be handing over to Captain Franko in Dover on the 15th to head off on my own holiday & adventures, and will ‘speak’ to you all again when I return in July.

Happy cruising!

Kind Regards
Captain Kim Tanner