It was a dark, cloudy and windy morning when I got up at 8:30 AM. I got dressed for breakfast and headed to the World Cafe for the buffet. Stephanie slept in again, she is getting better from her cold, but still not 100%.
It is sort of funny that the two rear sides of the buffet are set up for tables of two, and many of these are occupied by only one individual, it is sort of the place to sit if you are eating alone like I was.
I have all but abandoned my usual morning routine of heading to the Library Bar early in the morning for a coffee and pastry and then working on the blog. One reason is that I am not getting up early on this cruise. Almost every night, they have notified us of Aurora sightings, so I have been getting up in the middle of the night to see the Aurora and take pictures, and that is making me sleep in the next morning.
Most of the time I am just getting up and taking photos from the balcony, but I have also gone up to Deck 8 on occasion. This is just enough of an interruption in sleep to make me tired, and it does not help that it is still dark outside even when I do get up at 8:30 or 9:00 AM.
I put together Stephanie’s usual bowl of fruit and a yogurt, got an additional to-go cup of coffee for me and took it all to the cabin. After I get back to the cabin is when I work on the blog posts, and it is actually easier from the room.
I was working away, actually processing some photos when I realized it was 10:25 AM, and I remembered we had a Bridge Tour scheduled for 11:00 AM. I woke Stephanie up and she got ready, but I headed down to Guest Services a little early to make sure we were counted as present while she was finishing getting ready. It was a good thing, the guide was starting to take everyone for the tour, and Stephanie was just arriving in the elevator, I could see her through the glass windows for the elevator shafts, so I told the guide to wait for a minute until she got over to the group.
It was about 10:55 AM, but since he thought everyone was there from already checking in by cabin number, we were going a few minutes early. Stephanie caught up with us and we headed up to the Bridge on Deck 6 for the tour. It was only a group of 10 persons.
One of the officers started the tour on the bridge, but I felt sorry for him, there were a couple of men in the group that just bombarded him with questions. I am sure it was information he would have eventually given us, but they were too impatient to wait for their questions until he had finished explaining everything there. Eventually, he was able to explain things to us without getting interrupted every minute.
It was the second bridge tour we did on a Viking Ocean ship. The first one was while we were underway crossing the Atlantic on a Transatlantic Cruise. We were docked at the pier this time, so it was certainly not the spectacular views that we had while at sea the first time.
The Vikiing Vela is a different class of ocen ships for Viking. It is slightly longer than all of the other Ocean ships and is propelled by Pods, not propellers running on a shaft, and there are no rudders. Many other cruise lines use the pod type of propulsion, but this is the first ship for Viking. There are also no aft thrusters, they just rotate the pods when docking or maneuvering. This may have been some of the reason they had trouble with the propulsion and steering on the cruise right before ours in rough seas. With the pod propulsion system, It is one and the same system, and they do not have a lot of experience with it.
The tour was interesting, there is always something new to learn and the navigation system and electronic charts were on display for us to see, and our bridge guide showed us the route we would be taking when we left later this evening.
The tour lasted about 30 minutes and we headed back to the room to change into some warmer clothing so we could take the shuttle bus into the town of Narvik. The shuttle leaves on the hour and half hour, and we only had about ten minutes to get out to it on the pier. We hustled and were able to get there about a minute before it left, so no time was wasted there. The worst part was the long walk to the actual shoreside of the pier from the ship, there is a long section out over the water to get out to the ship.
We headed into town on the same road we had taken for our tour yesterday. The shuttle stop was at the Aurora Cinema, and we had seen that yesterday. The bus actually passed the stop on the other side of the road and headed to the train station. This seemed odd at first, but we just turned onto the station and then exited the other end. Then we turned left and got back to the bus stop at the Cinema. All of that extra route was just to get the bus turned around, there was no way to turn into the bus stop directly coming in the direction from the ship.
We got off the bus and there was a young man there to answer questions, so we asked where the mall was, and then if there was a pharmacy in the mall. He told us there were two malls, and they virtually had the same stores, one was uphill from here, and one was in the opposite direction.
We headed to the uphill mall. We were specifically trying to find a pharmacy. We had brought a good supply of Nyquil, both Daytime and Nighttime, but Stephanie had used almost all of the Daytime capsules, and we were worried that if I happened to catch something from her, and maybe that was already happening, we would not have any medication left, and the next two days are at sea, with no access to a pharmacy.
We could not see anything on the shelves that simulated Nyquil, and we were trying to use Google Translate through the camera to translate the Norwegian writing on the boxes. There were three pharmacists behind the counter at the back of the store, and they were working on a ticket number system, so we got a ticket and waited for our turn.
Stephanie went to speak to the pharmacist once her number came up, I was still trying to decipher the boxes of different cold remedies on the shelves. The pharmacist had never heard of Nyquil, so she tried to look it up on her computer to see if they had a similar product. In the end, she said they had nothing equivalent available. She tried to tell us that she would normally tell people to get a product on the shelf right in front of her station, but we figured what she showed us was either Tylenol or ibuprofen equivalents. Then she took us over to the area we had already looked at and pointed out the different cough syrups.
In the end, it was not much help. We then did a Google search for “Nyquil equivalent in Norway”. There were several posts and the information from them was that there is not any product sold in Norway that was like Nyquil. They only sell each component found in Nyquil, except for one of the ingredients that can be used for making meth. That particular medication is only available with a Doctor’s prescription, they could not sell it directly without the script. We had not researched how pharmacies work in Norway, so we did not know what the pharmacist could prescribe directly, versus needing a doctor’s prescription. Many European countries give pharmacists the power to prescribe many products directly, much more than in the USA.
In the end, we did not get anything. We thought we would also try the small ship’s store once it opened after leaving port tonight, they usually have a few items, but they are usually also very expensive.
We looked around the mall for a bit before heading back toward the bus stop to return to the ship. We stopped in a sports store to see if they sold any of the Dale of Norway wool items, Stephanie was trying to find the matching hat for her sweater and scarf. There were many stores selling these items in Bergen, so we assumed there would be similar stores in other towns we visited, but so far, we have not seen anything.
The sports store was no different, they had a lot of things for sale, including wool sweaters, but not the brand we were looking for. In the meantime, we had not paid attention to the time and we had missed the next shuttle bus back to the ship, so now we had to wait another 30 minutes. We walked to the bus stop and waited. A few other people from the ship showed up and they were talking with the young man that was there to assist people. He was from Narvik and was just hired to help out at the bus stop, but he also had a Viking Backpack, so we initially thought he worked for Viking, but he did not.
Stephanie wandered around a bit to take some photos nearby, and I just waited at the stop. My hip was hurting more today, probably due to the cold and cloudy weather, there was a chance of snow this afternoon, so it was also humid.
The bus arrived on time and we boarded along with quite a few other passengers. People showed up out of nowhere at the last minute for the bus, so it was almost full. It was a shorter drive back to the ship, we did not have to make any side trips to turn the bus around going in this direction.
After getting off the bus at the pier, we took some photos of the ship and then headed for the long walk out to the ship. We stopped off at the small building we had visited after our tour last night that is out on the pier. There were several locals inside selling handmade items.
It was getting close to 1:30 PM, and we still needed to eat lunch, so we dropped off all our gear and heavy clothing back at the room, and then headed upstairs for lunch. Nothing at the buffet looked that good so we decided to get a burger at the pool grill. It was nice sitting out at the covered pool area, there were only a few people sitting there, and it was nice and quiet compared to the always noisy buffet area.
Our burgers were good, and I enjoyed the freshly made onion rings I had ordered with mine. We enjoyed a couple of glasses of the white wine of the day, a Pinot Grigio, with our lunch. Stephanie headed to the buffet to get us a small plate of desserts, and we ate those enjoying the peace and quiet.
After lunch, we headed to Guest Services to make an appointment with the Future Cruise representative. By this time in the cruise, there were not a lot of appointments available, so we opted for 6:00 PM tomorrow. The lady at Guest Services made sure we were there to make an appointment for a future cruise, not one we had already booked, and we told her it was. Then, she wanted to know where we wanted to go, and we told her we were not sure at first, but then just said Egypt so she could put something down on the appointment. The appointments are only 30 minutes long, so I guess they want to be prepared to show information about a specific trip. The issue with them needing to verify it was for a future cruise is that if you do book a future cruise on the ship, you get $100 per person in shipboard credits for the current cruise, along with a discount on the future cruise itself. I think they just want to make sure people know the rules so that they do not think the $100 credit is available just for going to see the future cruise representative.
We headed back to the cabin to rest. Plus, I now needed to do some research on Viking Egypt River Cruises to see when the best time of the year is to go and what the pricing and availability were. At first, I was not making any progress, the internet was not cooperating, and it has been an issue for the entire cruise. Then I realized that I was being directed to the UK Viking website since I was now physically located in Europe. It appeared to show some different specials, and I could not go into the system to make a reservation to see cabin availability and dates like we usually can in the USA.
I finally had to use a VPN, and use one located in the United States, but that still did not make things work. I then deleted all of the cookies for any Viking website in the browser, and after that, along with using a VPN located in the USA, I was able to get to the correct Viking website just like I was at home.
We looked at cruises leaving around our birthdays in April 2026 and selected one that was taking place over both birthdays and was on a newer Viking River Cruise ship. They are quite small and only have 82 passengers, but there are quite a few of them and they almost leave every day of the month. A lot of the Egypt cruises for 2025 were already sold out, or had limited cabin availability, with higher-priced cabins only for the dates we wanted, so we were sort of forced to look at 2026.
We looked at available cabin locations for the date we wanted and did a little online research to see if there was any preference for location on the ship and recommendations for the side of the ship to be on, but there were no side of the ship preferences since they do a roundtrip, and the ships are so small. Some people said the rear cabins may be more noisy from being nearer to the ship’s engines, but we always prefer the front half anyway.
We wrote all of the information down in our cruise book for this cruise and got pricing for the days we wanted, as well as a cabin selection so we had all of that information to give to the rep tomorrow. It was interesting because the specials for the cruises we saw on the UK website for Viking were much different than the ones in the USA, they were offering the choice of either a free drink package with free gratuities, shipboard credits, or double past cruiser discounts, and $25 per person deposits. The only special we saw on the USA Viking website was ‘reduced fares’ and a $25 per person deposit, which is what we wanted, we pay the $25 and then we get the $200 shipboard credit for this cruise, so it is a good deal even if we cancel later.
We took our showers afterward and were waiting for the ship to leave port at 6:00 PM. The Captain had said they were going to do a 360-degree spin with the ship for practice in the large open harbor, and we were able to watch that from our balcony. I think they are just trying to get more hands-on experience with the pod drive system, especially practice for maneuvering in ports.
It started to snow a little as we were watching the spin maneuver, it was pretty light snow, and we could only see it as it was lit up by the ship’s side lighting below us.
Afterward, we headed to the Library Bar for a glass of wine before dinner. We were just going to eat at the buffet tonight, and while we were enjoying our wine, we received a text from Suzie and Michael, they were going to the buffet at 7;00 PM, about 15 minutes from the current time. We replied via text that we would join them and we all met at 7:00 PM and had the same table as last night, which was nice.
We chatted a bit and then got some dinner. They were serving some Tempura shrimp, two in a small bowl, and they were very good, warm, and lightly battered.
While we were eating, they made an announcement that they had spotted the Northern Lights. A lot of people got up to rush outside, but we were content to finish our meal first and then go out to see them.
Everything seemed to die down with the Aurora while we finished eating, people were coming back to the buffet, so we finished our meal and enjoyed talking for a bit afterward.
Then they turned off all of the lights on the deck outside of the buffet, which we thought was odd, so maybe the Aurora was back. We tried to go outside the stern doors from the buffet, but they were closed. We headed to the pool area and found a door to the outside, but it was really windy on that side of the ship. We headed over to the other side, and it was less windy but the deck was roped off right outside the door.
Then the bridge made an announcement that the Aurora was off the bow of the ship, so we all headed up to deck 9 at the bow. There were lots of people outside, and it was terribly windy if you were not directly behind a glass windscreen. The Aurora was pretty bright, but it was also cloudy, so the pictures were just fair. The deck lights were out here, and only some pedestal lights with red lenses for night vision were illuminated.
I got separated from the rest of our group since it was so dark and there were a lot of folks up there. We were not dressed to be outside, and even less so for being outside in the wind, so it got chilly fast. After a bit, I headed inside by the elevators and sent a text to Stephanie that I was inside. A couple of minutes later she arrived and we headed down to Deck 7 to go to the Explorer’s Bar for a nightcap.
We stayed for just two drinks and then headed back to our cabin.
There was another announcement about the Aurora, and we could see it from our balcony, so we spent some time taking pictures but this time with more clothing and jackets on for the cold wind.
It was actually quite bright in the sky tonight, and we were able to get some good photos from our balcony, the ship was not docking much since we were still in protected waters.
After about thirty minutes, the Aurora faded and we headed back inside for the night. It was about 11:00 PM, and we headed to bed.
At about 1;00 AM there was a phone call alert for the Aurora, so I got dressed and headed out onto the balcony. It was visible but faint, and there were a lot of clouds and haze, so the pictures were not good. Stephanie had not budged, I am not sure she even heard the phone call.
The rest of the night was uninterrupted……damn the Aurora for interrupting our sleep again!
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