Norway sells the light. Book the boat first.
Which aurora chase drives far enough to get out of the cloud. What the Lysefjord cruise under Preikestolen costs. Whether the Flåm railway is worth a whole day. Reviews of every tour you can book in Norway.
An aurora chase, a fjord deck, a reindeer camp, the Lysefjord.
The four bookings a first Norwegian trip is built around, and what each one asks of your budget and your evening.
01The clear-sky nightNorthern Lights Chase Minibus TourA minibus that keeps driving inland until the cloud breaks. The only aurora plan that survives a bad forecast.
02The morning on deckThe Original Fjord Cruise to MostraumenUp the Osterfjord from Bergen to the narrows at Mostraumen, close enough to the waterfall to get wet.
03The Sami afternoonReindeer Sledding & Feeding with a Sami GuideFeeding the herd, then a sled run across the plateau. Lunch in the lavvu comes with the story of the reindeer year.
04The cliff from belowScenic Fjord Cruise to Lysefjord and PreikestolenStavanger to the Lysefjord, passing under Preikestolen without climbing a single step.
Chase the aurora by minibus, by boat, or from a sled.
North of the circle the dark months are the season. Three ways to spend a clear evening, what it costs to get on each one, and how far from town it takes you.
Six Norwegian bases, and the day out each one is worth.
An Arctic city that sells the sky, a capital with a fjord at the end of the main street, a wooden harbour in the rain, granite walls in the Lofoten sea, the cliff country south of Stavanger and the art-nouveau town on the Geiranger road.
The Norwegian days out more travellers take than any other.
Every Norwegian tour we have reviewed →The tours that carry the biggest crowds in the country, and what earns each of them the slot.
1
The Original Fjord Cruise to Mostraumen
Set out from Bergen’s Fish Market on Rødne Fjord Cruise’s 3.5-hour voyage to Mostraumen. You’ll pass Bryggen, sail through Osterfjord, approach a waterfall, and watch for eagles. English and Norwegian audio commentary, a warm cabin, sun decks, toilets, and snacks for sale make this an easy half-day outing.
From · $93
Read our review →
2
Reindeer Sledding & Feeding with a Sami Guide
from $198
3
Scenic Fjord Cruise to Lysefjord and Preikestolen
from $82
4
Scenic Fjord Cruise with Audio Guide Commentary
from $44
5
Whale Watching Tour by Hybrid-Electric Boat
from $195
6
Aurora Borealis Tour
from $181
7
Tromsø’s Top-Rated Fjord & Fishing Cruise – All-Inclusive
from $142
8
Fjords and Sommarøy Islands Tour with Salmon Picnic
from $112
Norway is quicker by hull than by road, and always has been.
The Osterfjord narrows, the Lysefjord wall, the Nærøyfjord arm on the UNESCO list, and a battery boat down the Oslofjord. Half of this country only makes sense from a deck.
Lofoten is a mountain range that forgot to stop at the coast.
Peaks drop straight into the sea and the villages hang on at the bottom of them, on stilts. Svolvær is the harbour everything sails from: the silent run into Trollfjord, the sea eagles, and the racks of drying cod that smell exactly like you fear.
Every Lofoten day out →
Tromsø runs on the forecast, not the clock.
Three hundred kilometres inside the Arctic circle, the town books its evenings around cloud cover and its days around the tide. Whales in the dark months, midnight sun in the light ones, and a husky yard twenty minutes from the cathedral.
What a day out in Norway actually costs.
Norway has a reputation and mostly earns it, but the spread is wider than the reputation suggests. Every tour on the site, grouped by price.
Harbour walks, museum entries, the city buses and the short hops out of the cruise quays.
The standards: fjord cruises, the Flåm railway, whale boats and most aurora chases.
Husky driving, private guides, the long Arctic evenings that include dinner and a full set of thermals.
- 1Reindeer Sledding & Feeding with a Sami Guidefrom $198
- 2Whale Watching Tour by Hybrid-Electric Boatfrom $195
- 3Aurora Borealis Tourfrom $181
Oslo puts the fjord at the bottom of the main street.
Everything in Oslo →
The city ends at a quay, and the islands start about eleven minutes later. Take the water first, keep the museums for the afternoon the rain arrives, and eat late on the harbour side.
Silent electric boats, or a shrimp buffet
The battery boats run quiet enough to hear the gulls, which matters more than you would think. The evening sailings swap the commentary for a table of prawns and a bread basket.
Viking hulls and a raft that crossed the Pacific
Bygdøy holds three of them within a walk of each other: the ships pulled out of burial mounds, the polar vessel Fram, and Heyerdahl’s balsa raft. One ferry, one afternoon.
Islands, parks and the streets between them
Oslo is compact and mostly downhill towards the water. A guided loop takes in Vigeland’s stone crowds, the opera roof you can walk up, and the harbour bathing spots locals actually use.
Three things Norway does that nowhere else can.
Boat trips and mountain trains exist everywhere. A fjord arm two boat-widths wide, a railway that drops nine hundred metres in an hour, and a herd of reindeer that belongs to somebody do not.
The Trollfjord
The entrance is about a hundred metres wide and the walls go up a thousand, which is why the big boats cut their engines and drift the last stretch. It branches off the Raftsundet between Svolvær and Stokmarknes, and in winter the sea eagles come down to the water because the boats bring fish. There is nothing at the end of it. That is the point.
- 1Lofoten Islands Silent Trollfjord Cruise★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 2,979 reviews
- 2Lofoten RIB Sea Eagle Safari Trollfjord Cruise★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 591 reviews
- 3Lofoten Island: Silent Trollfjord Cruise from Svolvær★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 389 reviews
The Flåm Railway
Twenty kilometres of track climb from a fjord jetty to the mountain plateau at Myrdal, gaining nearly nine hundred metres without a rack rail, which engineers still find slightly rude. The train stops at the Kjosfossen waterfall for long enough to get soaked, and the seats face the valley side deliberately.
- 1Viking Village, Nærøyfjord Cruise & Flåm Railway★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 1,047 reviews
- 2Guided tour – Viking Village, Nærøyfjord Cruise and Flåm Railway★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 371 reviews
- 3Viking Village, Nærøyfjorden Cruise and Flåm Railway★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 155 reviews
A working reindeer herd
The herds above Tromsø and Alta are owned, counted and moved between winter and summer pasture by families who have done it for generations. Visiting one means feeding lichen out of a bucket in the dark, then sitting in a lavvu while somebody explains why the animals are marked the way they are.
- 1Reindeer Sledding & Feeding with a Sami Guide★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 6,417 reviews
- 2Reindeer Camp and Sami Cultural Tour with Lunch★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 3,326 reviews
- 3Sami Culture and Short Reindeer Sledding from Tromso★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 584 reviews
Four Norwegian bookings that run on a season, not a whim.
Plenty of this country can be sorted the night before from a hotel bar. These four answer to snow lines, ferry timetables and a guiding season that closes without asking you.
- 01Full-Day Trolltunga Hiking, and Climbing TourThe guided season runs roughly mid-June to mid-September. Outside it the trail is under snow and nobody walks you out there.
- 02Scenic Fjord Cruise to Lysefjord and PreikestolenGuided walks run in the snow-free months; in winter the plateau is ice and the trip becomes a boat ride underneath it instead.
- 03Viking Village, Nærøyfjord Cruise & Flåm RailwayThe railway is a timetabled service and the fjord ferry it connects to sails only a handful of times a day. The connection decides your whole day.
- 04North Cape and Sami Family Visit TripIt is a long haul north from Honningsvåg and the final stretch of road shuts at short notice when the weather turns.
Bergen is a wooden town that made peace with the rain.
The Hanseatic wharf leans over the harbour, the funicular climbs out of the weather in six minutes, and the best morning here is spent on a boat heading up the Osterfjord to the narrows. Pack for water from both directions.
- 1The Original Fjord Cruise to Mostraumenfrom $93
- 2Mostraumen Fjord & Waterfall Cruisefrom $81
- 3Past & Present Small Group Guided Walking Tourfrom $26
Bergen gets rain on most days of the year. Plan for it.
The west coast catches everything the Atlantic sends, and a fjord in drizzle is still a fjord. But there is a point where you want a roof. Ship halls, concert naves, long lunches and a train that does the sightseeing while you stay dry.
By place — coast, capital and the Arctic
By kind of day — sky, water, snow or rail
Oslo, Flåm, Bergen, Ålesund, then the flight up to Tromsø.
FlåmThe newest Norwegian tour reviews.
Everything added lately →
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Ulvik adventure: Exploring Hardangerfjord’s Osafjord by RIB
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Tromsø Sweet Temptations tour: afternoon tea & chocolates
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