Honningsvag

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I think I finished part way thru our last sea day so will start this entry with that night. It was our second formal night and we had another wonderful dinner with our tablemates. Erin wanted to get our pictures taken while dressed up so we attempted that. The photographer had some problems figuring out how to pose us since as he put it we were very different sizes and shapes. He had Mom on a chair for a few shots which didn’t make sense since that just made her shorter. Anyway, we’ll see if any of them come out and if not try again the next time.

The show was another cast show called Escapade and was pretty good. One of the girl dancers had sprained her ankle in rehearsal the day of their first show but she was back tonight. We called it a night after the show.

Friday started with mass at 8 and then breakfast in the Dining Room and then Bathrobe Bingo before we docked in Honningsvag about 11. Mass was funny as the priest had them bring the Red Vestments but they had shrunken (obviously someone decided to wash them) and he almost couldn’t get his head thru. He was laughing because it was so shrunken so had the other Sharon take a picture of him wearing it. He then noticed the lights over the alter (well it’s the cooking island most of the day) weren’t working so he moved everything down to one side. He thought this was hilarious and had to have a picture of that too. We were short Bingo players so a couple of us bought 2 cards. So playing 6 plus the free cards for wearing our bathrobes made it hard work. I did win the first game but the other 3 were all won by a couple celebrating their 11th anniversary.

We grabbed a quick bite in the Lido then headed down for our transfer to the North Cape. Well it was only supposed to be a transfer with no narration but our driver was great and told us all about the area which was very interesting. She was actually from Poland but has been up here for 7 years. She just finished college and after working this summer is planning to tour the US before finding a real job. We made a short stop at a Sami Village. The typical souvenir stop but it was mostly hand crafted stuff and they did have some people there in native costumes and a reindeer. I believe there are 5 or 6 tribes left and they are the only ones allowed to manage the reindeer. They bring them over to the island by ferry in May so they can breed and then they swim back in the fall. They mark them by cutting a pattern in their ears. We saw quite a few reindeer along the road (and some in the road). The driver said it costs 6000 Kroner if you hit one so she was very careful. I did buy a sweater here which was much less than we saw in the earlier stops and I like the pattern better. Erin bought a moose wearing a sweater (she has a shortage of moose in her house as most of you know)

We got to the North Cape and headed out for the traditional picture at the Globe Statue and some shots from the top before heading into the visitor center to write up and mail some postcards. The North Cape is said to be the northernmost point of the European Continent but there’s actually a spot that can be seen from there that is goes out further. However, you have to hike out to that one so is less used/known. We then went down and watched the 15 min film on the area which was very good. Then it was time to head back to town. We took a few pictures with the trolls by the giftshop at the pier then headed back on board to get ready for dinner.
There was no show since the ship wasn’t sailing till 8:30 (was originally supposed to be 10:30 but they moved it up so the scenic cruising would be at 10 instead of midnight). So Mom and I decided it would be a good time to do laundry and we had it mostly done (a few things are still a bit damp) then headed up to see the North Cape from the sea. It was fun to see the same area we’d been at that day from the ship.

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