Tromso, Norway

(This blog was written on July 9th)

Today was a really great day.  This morning I got up semi-early to go on my first excursion - just a drive around Tromso with a couple of stops.  We stopped at some photo ops, downtown, and probably the city's most famous sight: the "Arctic Cathedral."  Actually a protestant church, this building was designed to imitate glaciers and other arctic-associated ideas.  It features one of the largest stained glass windows in the world, which was impressive although I didn't like the design much.  During our short stop there, I noticed a sign advertising the church's brand new organ, being celebrated with a concert every day in July at 2pm.  Of course, I had to go.  :-) So after my tour finished (11:30am) I spent some time enjoying the sights of downtown Tromso, including a free museum, before making the trek back to the cathedral.  And I mean, trek - the church is on the mainland whereas the rest of Tromso is on an island, and a very long bridge connects the two.  Depending on your speed the brigde takes about 15 or 20 minutes just to cross on foot.  I got there in time to enjoy the wonderful half-hour concert, which felt like it lasted only a few minutes to me.  I was so absorbed that it was shocking to me to look down at my watch and realize it was already over.  The acoustics were phenomenal.  My favorite piece was a very haunting, simple minor melody which somehow seemed mysterious and appropriate to the Arctic region.  And the finale of Bach's Toccata and Fugue wasn't bad either...:-)  It was a fabulous day out.   Oh, and among the other interesting things I saw were the world's Northernmost botanical gardens, as well as the world's northernmost Burger King. :-)  

When I got back to the ship I watched another amazing sailaway from deck 7 (have I mentioned how much I love deck 7?? Crew area in the very front of the ship, with a panoramic view....amazing), and then we had a very easy night.  Marie and Liam made a reservation for casual dining, so we enjoyed a leisurely and wonderful meal after we were finished playing for the night.  As I speak I am sitting on one of the top decks in the cafe area, next to a window.  It is almost 12:30am, yet the sun sits just above the horizon in a perpetual sunset, as it will until about 5am when it will begin to climb into the sky once more.  It is such an unearthly effect.  We are slowly beginning to work our way back south again, although we don't officially leave the Arctic circle until tomorrow.  The unfortunate thing about the midnight sun is that it makes any viewing of the aurora borealis impossible - it never gets dark enough to distinguish it.  But you can't have both!  So I guess I'll just enjoy the one phenomenon.  Someday I would really love to see the Northern Lights, though - it is definitely a dream of mine.