﻿We're heading to the far western shores of Norway to visit the charming seaside town of
Bergen which is located on a picturesque harbor lined with historic buildings and surrounded by
seven mountains. We're showing you a quick preview of the city here with the historic waterfront and
lively outdoor market scenes, including a trip up the mountain top by funicular for a spectacular
view over the city. To get there we're going to take a boat ride and scenic train journey from
Oslo across the country, over the mountains, to Bergen. There are several different ways to travel
to Bergen. Of course there's an International Airport so you can fly here in just a few hours
from anywhere in Europe, but the train and boat ride from Oslo is an excellent option
that many savvy travelers choose, because taking that ride can be just as enjoyable as being at
the destination. Coming right up we will show you fine details of that trip across Norway by train
and boat. The map shows the route will be taking, starting out in Oslo the capital of Norway, and
then across the mountains on a beautiful ride to Flam, where we catch the boat and travel through
the Sognefjord to Bergen on the west coast. Most travelers to Bergen are also visiting Oslo,
the capital of Norway, as we've been doing. In that case you can take one of the most spectacular
train rides in all of Europe. It's easy to board the train, you just get on with your carry-on
luggage, in this case, and find your seat, settle in kick back and let the journey begin, heading
cross-country through some fascinating mountain terrain, passing lakes and rivers and waterfalls.
This special trip is called Norway in a Nutshell because it shows you a big cross-section of the
country in just one day. It's always a pleasure to travel by train, especially with this kind
of scenery gliding by. You don't have to worry about driving, or getting stuck in traffic, you're
not crammed in like on a tour bus, you can walk around in the train, kick back and read a book or
take a nap, have a conversation, visit the snack bar. The scenery keeps getting more spectacular
as you climb through the central regions of Norway, seeming a little bit like Switzerland,
with tall mountains in the distance and glaciers with lakes where the water is clear blue color.
This visual feast is like a natural painting with trees and bushes along the edge of the water,
lovely grasses and shrubs, and just wonderful colorful elements of nature outside our windows.
You'll see a few mountain cabins, lots of snow, and people riding their bicycles on the mountain
road. Most of the other travelers on board the train are tourists from all different parts of
the world, so it's kind of a nice opportunity to have a little conversation, or at least attempt
some conversation. Despite language barriers you can always communicate. I've taken about 500 train
trips in my travels through Europe, including quite a bit in the Swiss Alps, which are really
spectacular, but nothing somehow quite compares with this scenery out the window, these alpine
meadows with glaciers and raging rivers. What a combination! The entire route from Oslo to Bergen
covers a distance of about 300 miles. It's the highest standard gauge railway in northern Europe,
crossing the plateau at 4,000 feet above sea level. We are travelling in July and there's still
plenty of snow. The first short section of rail opened on the Bergen end in 1883 as narrow gauge,
and by 1909 the route extended all the way to Oslo. Typical of the European long-distance
trains there's a dining car on board, so you can just queue up, wait your turn, get a coffee,
have a drink or a complete meal. It's like a coffee shop on wheels. The train can be a friendly
setting for meeting Scandinavians, and you'll find that most of them speak some English. Nobody's in
a rush at this point so it's an opportune place to meet the locals and have a chat. You'll change
trains Midway at the junction of with Myrtle and board the Flam railway which is one of the most
scenic rides in Europe. The Myrdal Junction is a busy place, but there's no real town here to
see. You're just on the platform to wait for your next train. There are also local trains from here
down into Bergen, but we're going down, down, down, down the mountain, down to Flam. That's
a waterfront village where we catch our boat. It's a busy train, so you do need to make reservations
during the high season from May through September, and everybody gets a good view. The Flam railway
fortunately stops now and then to let passengers get off the train to enjoy the view. The most
spectacular sight is a rolling gushing waterfall, a terrific photo opportunity, but wipe the water
off your lens. It's like being out in the Maid of the Mist at Niagara Falls, or in a heavy
rainstorm with a big spray coming at you. You've got about ten minutes to take in the sight, snap
your pictures. The only reason the train stops here is to show you the view, so take advantage.
Some people just sit in the train but it's a lot better to get out and experience it. Yes,
you might get a little wet, but no harm, it's all part of the fun and you'll soon dry off. No doubt
there's something special about waterfalls, and this one is very convenient because we're halfway
through the journey, 30 minutes down, hop out, take a break, jump back on, 30 more minutes to
the bottom. At this point we've reached 2,000 foot elevation and it's a very comfortable platform.
You could walk around on it, very safe with the railings, and then you try and figure out what car
you were on and get back in your seat. And then we continue the second half of the journey down
which gets even more spectacular with beautiful mountain scenery, many hairpin turns. Flam railway
is the steepest standard gauge train in Europe where almost 80% of the journey has a gradient of
over five percent. Because of the sharp angle and picturesque nature, the Flam line is now almost
exclusively a tourist service and has become the third most visited tourist attraction in Norway,
carrying about 600,000 passengers annually. The train journey runs through fantastic nature,
past deep mountains, breathtaking waterfalls, with twenty tunnels and one bridge, and offers so many
of you points that many people feel like traveling it multiple times. National Geographic Traveler
magazine has named the Flam railway as one of the top-ten train journeys in Europe, and Lonely
Planet named it as the best train journey in the world in 2014. Toward the bottom the line passes
a spectacular waterfall with a 460 foot drop, of the most exciting attractions of the trip.
Maximum speed downhill is a leisurely 19 miles an hour, and uphill it's 25 miles an hour. This train
ride downhill takes one hour but the sights are so spellbinding it seems like ten minutes. It's
the only branch line heading out from that main Oslo -- Bergen route. Towards the bottom of the
journey the valley widens and changes character, becoming flatter and with more vegetation and some
houses. The little hamlet of Flam is located on the Aurlandsfjord, a branch of the Sognefjord,
with 400 permanent residents. It's almost entirely a tourist area featuring among other things a
little hotel and a cruise ship port. And you can have lunch while waiting for the boat. It's a
very pleasant little village. It's been called heaven on earth, and of course there's a gift
shop. There's an information counter and there's a ticket office where you can buy train tickets or
boat tickets. After about one hour the boat starts boarding to begin the ride to Bergen. You'll see
lots of great scenery during the boat ride with the mountains towering high above on both sides
of this chasm. The best views are during the first two hours when the mountains are steepest and the
fjord is narrow, so be sure to spend time by a window or even better out on a deck initially.
The Sognefjord is the largest and best-known fjord in Norway, and one of the longest in the world. It
stretches 127 miles inland from the ocean to the small village of Skjolden in the municipality of
Luster. Sognefjord is more 3000 feet deep for about half of its length, reaching a maximum
depth of 4,300 feet. The captain pulls right up to the big waterfall so we all get a good look.
Cliffs surrounding the fjord rise almost cheer from the water up to heights of over 3,000 feet,
making this most dramatic landscape. The average width is nearly three miles. There's more than a
dozen side fjords that branch off from the main body and we see several of them while cruising
along beyond the inner end of Sognefjord lies a mountain range that rises over six thousand feet
high and is covered by europe's largest glacier. We also get a nice view of several picturesque
villages along the shore, always with the dramatic mountain backdrop. There is a casual snack bar on
the ship for a light meal, like a hamburger and soda, but not much else. The fjords were dug
out by giant glaciers that shaped the landscape through several ice ages. This created a deep,
narrow and elongated body of water with steep land on three sides. And all along Norway's west coast
these inlets are often surrounded by dramatic mountain scenery as we see here. Frankly at five
and a half hours, this ride is pretty long, so you might want to consider alternatives,
such as a shorter boat ride then take a bus to the main train line and continue on to Bergen by rail
more quickly. There is a very nice reward towards the end of the boat ride as you approach the city
of Bergen, travel through a vast archipelago of islands and channels linked together by
bridges. You'll see a lot of colorful houses along the shore, some boats tied up at docks,
probably some second homes that are vacation places for the locals, as well as very large
mansions up on the cliffs. It's really quite a sight. After several hours in the boat, you'll
get the first breathtaking glimpse of the town of Bergen, located in the head of a long natural
inlet enhanced by a picturesque harbor, lined with historic buildings and many boats, and surrounded
by seven mountains. You surely want to be out on deck in these closing dramatic moments of the long
boat ride, soaking up the view and getting your pictures. The city wraps around the harbor with
the especially exciting Brygen, the old historic district on the north end in buildings that have
been warehouses for fish but are now shops and restaurants. It's a very easy exit from
the boat because it's a pretty small vehicle and it docks right in the heart of downtown.
That gives us real easy access to walk to our hotel, it's just a few blocks away. Be sure to
look for the other movies we've made about Bergen and the rest of Scandinavia in our collection