March 9: Alta
We arrived this morning in Alta, the northernmost port on our cruise.
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| Snowmen (or something else) on the deck |
Our excursion today was a trip to the
Sorrisniva Igloo Hotel, which is constructed out of ice. To get there, we took a shuttle bus to the Alta Tourist Office, and got a taxi from there to the hotel, about 20 miles.
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| A residence in Alta |
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| At the Alta Tourist Office |
Our taxi driver was a middle aged man driving a Lexus LS 500, which starts at about $75,000 in the US, so I assume that taxi drivers in Norway make a livable wage.
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| Part of Central Alta |
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| More housing in Alta |
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| On the way to the hotel |
The Sorrisniva Hotel consists of two sections--a permanent building that houses the check-in desk, a restaurant/bar and bathrooms, and the igloo part (rebuilt every year) that houses the rooms, another bar, a wedding chapel, and a lobby with ice sculptures.
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| Outside the permanent building |
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| Front desk in the permanent building |
The igloo is about 20 feet from the permanent building, and if you have to get up at night to go to the bathroom, you have to walk between buildings.
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| Entrance to the igloo section |
In the igloo section, we first toured the lobby and its ice sculptures.
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| It wasn't that cold |
Next, we went to the wedding chapel, at one end of the igloo building
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| Hallway to wedding chapel |
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| The wedding chapel |
From there, we went to visit some rooms. The beds are basically blocks of ice with a layer of foam covered with reindeer skins.
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| Hallway to the guest rooms |
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| More decorations in the hallway |
Finally, we went to the ice bar for our free drink, which was served in glasses made of ice. I'm not sure how they clean the glasses, or if they don't clean them, now they get rid of them, since they aren't going to melt. To heighten the effect, the drinks were made with Blue Curacao.
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| Not a real fire |
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| Snowmobile storage at the igloo |
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| A view of the igloo, with the permanent part to the right |
Our taxi driver waited for us while we toured the hotel, and we headed back to Alta
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| On the way back to Alta |
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| Entering Alta |
After the taxi dropped us off at the Tourist Office, we walked around downtown Alta.
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| Northern Lights Cathedral, which for some reason, we didn't go in |
It turns out that Alta was hosting a major dogsled race, which we encountered when we returned to town.
They were also having an exhibition of snow and ice sculptures.
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| Not the real Montana |
Dinner that night featured Lutefisk, which is made from dried whitefish, soaked in lye. Their preparation must have been "Lutefisk for Americans", because it didn't taste nearly as bad as I had been warned. Covering it with bacon didn't hurt.
March 10: Heading for Narvik
The ship departed Alta at 1:00 in the afternoon and since we had seen pretty much all of Alta, we just stayed on board.
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| Heading out of Alta |
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| A nice view from the Explorer's Lounge |
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| The same lounge, a week later |
Not far out of Alta, we encountered a little ice.
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| Norwegian Sunset |
Next:
Days 11-13--Narvik and Bergen
