Category: Travel

  • Tromso

    Continued from Bergen

    Days 8 -11

    Tromso was the star of the trip because it featured the event that was the raison d’être of the entire vacation. We reached the airport at around 11 AM and caught a Flybussen to the city. For a change, we bought tickets on board – 100 NOK pp. If you’re willing to wait, there are city buses too (#40, 42) that will get you to the city at half the price but in double the time. The journey took us half an hour and we were dropped right in front of our hotel – Scandic Ishavshotel. The check in was only at 3PM, so we dropped our luggage in a maze of its brethren! We had chosen the hotel for the superb views it offered. We walked around a bit taking in the excellent view outside before lunch.

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  • Bergen

    Continued from Tallinn

    Days 6,7

    We landed in Oslo in the afternoon, and flew to Bergen the next morning. More on Oslo in a different post. The flight took less than an hour. Bergen was a magical sight even before we landed. Our first view of it was a series of colourful “toy” buildings, nestled amongst gigantic blocks of ice and dark swathes of water.

    A bus from the airport, which we already had tickets for, took us to very near our hotel in about 30 minutes. D was floored, literally, soon as we got out of the bus. Walking on ice is tricky business. The Thon Rosenkrantz is just off Bryggen, and once again we got lucky with the room being ready though we were early.

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  • Tallinn

    Continued from Stockholm

    Days 4,5

    Tallink had an overnight ferry that would take us from Stockholm to Tallinn, the capital of Estonia. Our cabin was tiny but comfortable, and later in the night, we walked through the different bars and restaurants (one of which featured a cabaret) and then on to the deck. In both cases, we found ourselves severely under-dressed! Dinner was the lasagna we had packed, and a cinnamon bun.

    Breakfast is not included in the ferry ticket and needs to be purchased separately. Quite easily done online at the time of booking. It was a notch lower than the Victory Hotel level, but made up for it with the sea view. We reached Tallinn on time, and began searching for the tram/bus stop to take us to the hotel. After walking a bit, we realised that we were near enough to just continue walking! The Hestia Hotel Barons had the room ready even though we were very early. 

    The hotel was built in 1912 and remodeled in 2007. But a lot of the fixtures seem to have been retained. The lift was a classic. Its mechanism was obviously modern, but its exterior is from a bygone era. The room was comfortable, and we quickly freshened up before stepping out for the day’s plan.

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  • Stockholm

    Days 1-3  

    In the grand scheme of this trip, I have to admit that Stockholm was an afterthought. It just seemed a good place to start the journey. But once we started planning, we didn’t need a syndrome to like it! An Emirates passage that began in Bangalore at 4.20 AM got us to the city by noon, via Dubai. To my pleasant surprise, my sinuses, for the first time in forever, were behaving! Immigration was a breeze and we had decided to change the currency after we got to the hotel. This was because we had purchased a bunch of city transport, entry pass and such online before the trip.

    The Arlanda Express was one of them, and it got us to Stockholm Central in about 20 minutes. Thanks to the wifi aboard the train, we also figured out the way to the Visitor Center near the station, from where we had to collect our 72 hour city pass and travel cards. Both are super useful if you’re planning to use public transport extensively, and visit tourist attractions. The walk also gave us our first taste of the city being decked up for Christmas, and the cold ahead! Stockholm was at 2°C when we landed on December 1st. A good time to mention the importance of layering, on which we had spent a little less than Rs.50,000 – thermals, jackets, snow pants, gloves, boots and such. But it was all well worth it.

    T-Centralen had an entry right next to the Visitor Center and we took the train to Gamla Stan, our base for the next 3 days, one stop away. Santa was on hand to welcome us to the Old Town! Our hotel – the Collector’s Victory Hotel was a 5 min walk away, and we discovered even faster routes in the next couple of days! Check-in time in this part of the world is usually 3PM, and we were early. So we dropped the luggage and headed to Slingerbulten, a restaurant nearby that promised excellent meatballs, and delivered very well on it – served with lingonberries, mashed potato and a delicious cream sauce. We also tried a Rökt Renröra (smoked reindeer) with horseradish cream and bleak roe, served on rye bread, and washed it all down with an apple cider.

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  • Look, Druk! Part Three

    Continued from Thimphu and Punakha

    Part 3: Paro

    After a breakfast that included a masala omelette and an aloo paratha, we set off for Paro. While on the latter dish and food in general, from what I understand folks in Bhutan don’t really like roti. They’re pretty happy to eat rice all day, happily acknowledging their tummy growth while at it. In many restaurants, rotis are for Indian tourists. Also, Buddha and non veg co-exist in Bhutan, and apparently the king is a non-vegetarian too. But then again, as per Theravada, the Buddha had no qualms about followers eating pork, chicken etc so long as the animal wasn’t killed specifically for them. In fact, they couldn’t refuse it if offered as alms since it would arouse the thought of ‘self’.

    Meanwhile, the journey to Paro was the same route from the day before, barely bypassing Thimphu city. That made the journey almost a 2 hour one. We passed the airport, which we realised was a reasonably risky one to land at, given the proximity of the buildings. The Paro dzong was on the outskirts of the town and Sonam assured us that our hotel would give us a great view.

    Lunch was once again a place Sonam and we agreed on – My Kind of Place. A contemporary cafe that had gotten rave reviews online. Comfortable and stylish seating and a nice view of the main road below. Here’s the thing – this would be an expected standard in say, Bangalore, but not so common in Bhutan. In that sense, we felt that Paro was more creature-comfort friendly than Thimphu.

    Unfortunately, they didn’t have Hoentay (momo) that day, so we tried the noodle soup. Beef for me, and chicken for D. Pho like, both were excellent. Their Suja (butter tea) was also the best I had tasted thus far. We got the place to ourselves until the end when a party of moms and kids landed. From their behaviour, we stereotyped them as local posh moms, but they talked about paying in dollars that took that hypothesis for a spin!

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