Tromso, Norway — a city of northermosts. Today we saw the northernmost university and the northernmost brewery. The day was chilly, windy, and showery. The town is actually quite large with some 63,000 people. The tour we took was about three hours long and drove past the university, the hospital, over to the big Lutheran Church, a few minutes of shopping, and then up to the museum. There aren’t a lot of highlights of the day, but some parts were interesting.

Our tour guide was Finnish going to college here in Tromso. She spoke very good English and was fairly informative. However, she’s only been here for six months so she really doesn’t have a real background in the city. At the museum I saw an advertisement for tour guides for the various cruise ships and tourist busses that will come through this summer. The wages were advertised at 190 kroner per hours, which is about $31 per hour in dollars. So she got paid about $90 plus tips for her service this morning. I can see why the college studens like this work.

The university in Tromso has a medical school connected with a very large hospital. The university also runs the museum and the people working there for the most part seemed to be students. I bought a wooden top at the museum store and the fellow checking me out was studying the clarinet in the school of music. Nina bought a book and the young lady at the check stand was working on her masters degree in “Peace and Conflict Resolution”. That would be a discipline I would expect to find in Norway. I wished her a lot of luck and took her picture (which may at some future time show up in the picture album). Perhaps she’ll be successful and I could then say, “I knew her when…”.

All of the elevators in this ship have carpets on the floor with the day of the week. I think that is a real convenience! I’m not sure I would know what day of the week it was otherwise. It’s just another customer service provided by Holland America! So, Saturday means I should be taking it easy. I shall do that … sometime.

The next morning we arrived in HonningsvÃ¥g. There should be a little circle above the ‘a’. Maybe I’ve found the right symbol (alt-229)? It’s chilly and blustery (of course). Our tour to the North Cape (the northernmost point in Europe) is at 1:30 p.m. so we’ve taken a short walk around town. Not much to see because it’s Sunday and everything is closed (as it should be). I don’t know if we’ve got internet service here. I expect not because we’re surrounded by mountains and the satellite is most likely blocked.

The North Cape (also called North Point) was very interesting. It was fun to be at the northern-most point in Europe. The wind was blowing, rain showers passed by, and it was just like I expected that far north. It’s now Monday and another sea day. We’re headed southwest to Trondheim where we’ll dock tomorrow morning. Life continues to be very good.