Spending time in the city of Kristiansund
THINGS TO DO IN KRISTIANSUND
Kristiansund, it turned out, was a great place to wait out the gale. A pretty town with lots of things to see and do (except on a Sunday), weather notwithstanding. We took in a few nice walks through the old town (‘Innlandet’) and parklands, visited the historic shipyard museum, rode the oldest public ferry service in the world and sampled the local coffee and cinnamon bun offerings.
Old buildings around Kristiansund.
Unfortunately, the local cod (‘Klippfisk’) museum had closed for the season, but luckily we could still get a serving of Bacalao in one of the town’s fish restaurants. It also, almost, turned into to a surprise reunion.
Yummie Bacalao.
SO CLOSE…!
All the way down the coast I (David) had been messaging with an old school friend from Australia, Ian. We had discovered that we were loitering around the Norwegian coast at the same time and had been unsuccessfully keeping an eye out for when our paths might cross. In Kristiansund I sent a message off to say that we wouldn’t make it to Bergen in time to meet them there as we were stuck in Kristiansund with a storm. Hours later I got a message back saying that they were on the Hurtigruten ferry heading south to Bergen and their next stop was…Kristiansund…where they had an hour stopover. What a coincidence!
View over Innlandet towards the harbour.
So, at the appropriate time, I traipsed off through the howling wind and rain to the nearby Hurtigruten dock to wait for them. Suspiciously there wasn’t a lot happening there considering that a great big ferry was meant to be turning up. After a little while I checked on their boat on MarineTraffic. It showed them passing by Kristiansund and heading on to the south. Soon enough came a message from Ian, due to the storm they were by-passing Kristiansund! Damn. So I bade farewell to the seagull that had been sheltering in the lee of a big pole with me and sloshed home. So close! So close.
