A trip to expensive Norway is worth the price

Norway may be expensive, but the experiences of getting up close with whales and catching the sacred Northern Lights are most definitely worth it, writes Manchán Magan.

Warning, I’m about to describe a holiday involving close encounters with humpback whales, a chance to drive your own dog sled across frozen lakes, snowshoeing up a mountain to see the Northern Lights, and a late-night reindeer ride in snow-clad fjords.

I just feel I should warn you first that it’s in Norway, which means a beer will cost €15 and dinner €35. That said, it’ll be an experience you’re unlikely to forget.

Primarily, it’s the Northern Lights that lure people to Norway. The spectral displays that dance across the polar skies most nights in winter have transformed the old pelt and seal-trading outpost of Tromsø, 350km north of the Arctic Circle, into an idiosyncratic little tourism hub.

The vagaries of a warming ocean have also brought hundreds of migrating whales here, lured by unfathomably large schools of herring. As a bonus, one also encounters indigenous Sami culture, with their traditions of reindeer herding and husky sledding still vibrant. Four nights in the region make for an alluring, if chilly, winter break.

By 9am on my first day I was wrapped in a fur-lined survival suit, speeding in an RIB through a remote fjord towards three gushing spumes of water that signalled the presence of humpback whales.

A 12m-long mass of black rose out of the water as we approached before twisting into a dive again. Seconds later, another humpback rose beside us, turning over on its side for a better gawk. Occasionally, these 30-tonne mammals rub themselves against the boat’s hull: An encounter of asphyxiating intensity.

At one point our guide, a marine biologist, grew hyper alert: The whales had disappeared and she sensed they were setting a herring trap, corralling the fish into a tight ball and then blowing a net lasso of air bubbles right around them.

One whale would then rise up from below, forcing the whole school towards the surface. I didn’t quite believe this until the water suddenly erupted into a bubbling cauldron of frenetic herrings and, a second later, seven whales rose out of the depths in unison to devour the entire lot.

It was all over in the blink of an eye, with only a few disorientated herring left flapping on the surface to prove it wasn’t a dream.

We all took photos, of course, and for once these images would prove useful to someone, thanks to an ingenious citizen science project co-ordinated by the University of Tromsø in which tourists’ photos are used to identify migrating humpbacks by the patterns on their flukes.

Already, a whale spotted off Cork has been tracked five years later to Norway thanks to the project.

By early afternoon, I was back among the quaint wooden buildings of Tromsø and heading for the Sami museum in Tromsø University to get a sense of the original inhabitants of this area.

Most Sami have now been assimilated to various degrees — initially by crude government policies of enforced Norwegianisation and then by the economic lure of modern life.

Nowadays, only those involved directly with reindeer herding maintain a semi-nomadic existence — roaming the frozen northern territories with their herds and returning to their family homes in summer.

The women try to keep the knitting and weaving traditions alive, and the handicrafts they produce should be sought out, even if a pair of socks cost €24.

The Northern Lights was what had lured me here, and on my first night I tried a snowshoeing expedition up Mount Storsteinen behind Tromsø in search of them.

On my second night, wishing to escape any glimmer of light pollution, I headed 200km east into the Lyngen Alps on a public bus that traced around the lead-grey waters of a gradually freezing fjord. Darkness had fallen by 2pm but the soaring peaks were still visible, growing ever higher the further east I went.

The bus wound its way around endless jigsaw-puzzle coastline until at one point it drove straight on to a waiting ferry, seeming to tire of the snowy ribbon of road.

I disembarked at Lyngseidet, a tiny village which in the snowstorm appeared to consist principally of a snowmobile shop, an outdoor clothing store and another tiny ferry port leading across yet another fjord.

In terms of tourism, the Lyngen Alps are an undiscovered realm. Only Magic Mountain Lodge has attracted some renown among ski touring cognoscenti who regard these avalanche prone slopes as ideal back-country skiing with the possibility of skiing from the summit directly down to the sea. That is, once one has first climbed the whole way up, of course.

Across the fjord from Lyngseidet was the Artic-Lyngen Sea-camp, a row of cosy wood cabins beside a traditional lavvu tent, a type of tipi used by the Sami.

The owner had reindeer casserole bubbling on the stove and a hot-tub steaming in the snow. I ate and bathed, then pulled on another fur-lined survival suit and headed out in search of Europe’s largest land animal, the Norwegian elg, a type of moose that comes down out of the high mountains in winter.

The cold was forgotten when the snow stopped and the sky began to light up with dim glimmers of green and pink. It was a muted Northern Light display, but inspiring nonetheless to think of the sun firing out boiling particles so far away and them eventually turning up as these swirls and flurries of celestial pyrotechnics.

As I was heading back, the sky suddenly lights up ten times brighter as the goddess Aurora sent spiralling tongues of magical colour streaking overhead. It felt uncannily sacred.

I was still processing the whales and lights when, the next morning, I found myself at Tour in Lyngen Alps’s basecamp beside yet another fjord with 25 bright-eyed huskies howling to start a sled run.

Above the baying din the dog trainer impressed upon us the importance of holding tight to the sled at all times and keeping the brake pressed down into the snow whenever we were going downhill or else the dogs would literally drag us to the North Pole.

They craved a run and as we donned our fleece suits and insulated mittens they tugged frantically at their harnesses. My five-dog team whined with more determination than the rest and, sure enough, once the anchor rope was untied they sprung forward, dragging me gleefully along a winding, bumpy path through trees which I had to duck and dive to avoid.

My exultation at experiencing these stoic, agile wolf-dogs leaping through a frozen land, in silence but for their panting, made the -6C snowstorm a pleasure.

With experiences like these would you really mind having to spend €15 on a beer? Just try getting there before mid-March for the best Northern Lights display, or earlier to catch the whales before they migrate. Manchán travelled with Project Travel, 01 2108391 www.project-travel.ie

Its basic Northern Lights package costs €745 pps, includes return flights and four nights B&B in Tromsø. Whale watching: €150. Northern Lights Chase near Tromsø: €110. Dog sledding or snowmobiling in Lyngen Alps (plus coach transfers) €224 pps.