In the summer of 2023, Micha and I spent some time exploring Norway and visiting friends. We started with a trip to Fredrikstad, where my great-grandmother grew up, and then spent a few days exploring the capital city of Oslo. We finished the southern leg of our trip with a weekend in Munich to visit some old friends. After a short rest and recharge in Trondheim, we flew north to Tromsø and spent a few days in the city before setting out on a road trip through the Vesterålen archipelago.
Day 3: Senja and the Segla hike
Our goal for the day was to hike Segla, a beautiful mountain with amazing views of the cliffs of the island of Senja. To get there, we needed to take a ferry. Ferries are a common way of getting around the various islands in northern Norway, and in the summer months they’re often packed with tourists visiting the islands. We learned this the hard way when we missed the ferry from Brensholmen to Botnhamn by three cars. With no alternate way of reaching the island, we simply waited a few hours for the next boat. I was a little nervous driving the rental car onto the ferry, but attendants helped pack as many cars as they could into a giant below-deck garage area.
After reaching Botnhamn, we still had a bit of a drive ahead of us to reach the trailhead in Fjordgård, and it had begun to rain. This drive included a couple of long, dark, one-lane tunnels, during which I sweat the whole time, worrying about how to navigate the turnout spots if someone were to come from the other direction. Sets of wooden beams supported the tunnel on either end, and a string of rickety lights gave almost enough illumination to see the next turnout. The tunnel would have made a great setting for a horror movie.
Eventually, we emerged from the tunnel, avoiding our deaths at the hands of some murderous ghost, and found the parking lot for the Segla trailhead. The hike ahead of us was the most beautiful hike I have ever done. Thankfully, the rain had stopped by the time we reached the trailhead, and the fog was beginning to clear – if we hadn’t missed the first ferry, we would surely have been caught in the rain during the hike.
The beginning of the hike was fairly straightforward; mostly rolling grassy hills with a meandering, well-kept dirt trail. As we continued, however, the trail got steeper and rockier, and involved a little bit of scrambling. The views were well worth it – sharp hills jutting out of the cold blue water up into the clouds above.
Near the top, the trail disappeared and the path forward became much steeper and rockier. The peak disappeared entirely in the fog, and we worried whether we would be able to see anything – and whether we would be snatched away by a hidden troll.
The last step before the summit was a challenging stretch of scrambling up the rocky side of the hill. I had to stop and rest a few times, about half of them from muscle fatigue and half of them to calm my nerves
We reached the summit just when the fog cleared. Again, it struck us that if we hadn’t missed the ferry, we probably would have reached the summit while it was still shrouded in fog, and been unable to see anything. We joked that Ragna was taking care of us.
During the climb, we had been roughly keeping pace with a German family. They reached the summit before us, and we offered to take their picture. The teenage son returned the favor and got one of my favorite pictures ever of Micha and I. However, to get this picture, the teenager had to lean off the side of the cliff, supporting himself with one arm on a small rock while stretching his other arm out over the cliff, precariously holding my phone. I was certain I was about to witness either my phone, or this teenager, plummeting a thousand feet to the ocean below. But neither happened, and we got a great photo out of it!
After a successful hike, we had dinner in the town’s only restaurant and drove to Husøy, where we had rented a cabin. The cabin was amazing. A little difficult to find, as it was basically in the middle of nowhere. I caught myself worrying that it would get dark before we found the cabin, and then realized that the sun wouldn’t set for another month or so – nothing to worry about! The cabin was cute and cozy, with a wonderful wooden stove, a couple of cozy chairs, and lots of blankets. It was so quiet out in the woods that we thought a mosquito was a passing car. We both regretted that we had only reserved the cabin for one night, but we were excited to continue our trip to Andenes the next day.
Day 4: Travel to Andenes
The next day we woke early, gathered our stuff, and hopped back in the car to drive to Gryllefjord, where we would catch a ferry to Andenes, a town on the island of Andøya, where we had planned to take a “puffin safari” – a boat that would travel around a puffin roost just off the shore of Andøya.
But first, we had to get there. We drove a road that wound along the finger-like coastline of Senja, along sandy beaches, lush green hills, and cliffs dropping into the sea below. We passed through a couple small fishing villages, and stopped at a beautiful lookout point for yet more pictures.
We arrived at Gryllefjord and got in line at 10:00 for the 11:00 ferry, having learned our lesson from last time to arrive early. But this was still not early enough! The ferry took all the cars it could, and the remainder refilled the parking lot, waiting for the 15:00. We overheard some locals complaining about how the ferry queue always jams the main road into town lately. With some time to kill, we stopped in at a secondhand store and picked up a few trinkets. I chatted briefly with the shop owner in somewhat broken Norwegian, explaining that we had missed the first ferry, and she said folks had started lining up at 3:30 that morning. We had no chance of making the first ferry! But we did make the second one without issue.
On that ferry, we met Hannah and Pavel, a Czech couple who had also attempted, and failed, to catch the 10:00 ferry. It turns out they also missed the first ferry to Botnhamn the day prior, and ended up taking the same ferry we did to reach Senja. It turned out many people were following a similar itinerary – we would end up running into them and the German family again in Andøya.
Although we reached our Airbnb rather late, and we were tired from the traveling, we had trouble sleeping – we had a beautiful view of the beach and the midnight sun. Eventually, we were able to get some rest, ready for some more hiking and puffin adventures in Andenes!
