Let’s Go Fishing

Cruising on down the coast we made a short stop in Stokmarknes where we walked through a beautiful museum of Hurtigurten History.  Inside was a fully restored 1956 Hurtigurten ship named MS Finnestarken and a few restored rooms from the ship named DS Finmarken.

Didn’t have time to figure out why a car was parked on the deck. 

Not only did we get to see what a luxury 1956 ship looked like but we learned the history of the Coastal Express ships that connected the whole of Norway’s coast, even during WWII.

It was a short 2 hour stop and then we enjoyed the scenery all along this coastline. Beautiful green mountains, lots of waterfalls, and lovely farm steads all along the way.  And then we entered the Trollfjiord.  Our ship is named after this inlet and is it magnificent with straight, high walls on both sides and so narrow you feel like you could almost reach out and touch the walls.  We spotted several white tailed eagles flying high above.  The captain did a very tight 180° turn at the end of the fjord which had us all in awe of his skill at steering the ship.

And then we were off to Svolvar Island and the town of Lofoten where we went fishing for cod.  We boarded a 1917 wood fishing boat with 5 other passengers, the captain and first mate. The water in the bay was very calm but the sky was clouding up and after about two hours it started raining and the fog closed in on us.  But we caught fish!

I caught one good sized cod and a few smaller fish while John and John only caught small fish.  Susanna caught 19 small fish, a red perch and a small cod.  Some were kept but most were tossed to the seagulls. One man caught at least 5 huge cod.  Wish we knew his secret!

As we cruised back to shore, the 1st mate cleaned the saved fish and boiled the meat in seawater which was then served to us as a snack.  They were so good!!  By the time we landed all on board were sopping wet and ready for a hot shower and a nice toddy.