Norway without the Nutshell

The most popular thing to do as a tourist in Norway must be to take the Norway in a Nutshell tour. There are a couple of variations to the trip depending on where you start and where you end.

The Oslo-Bergen Norway in a Nutshell trip starts by taking a NSB train from Oslo to Myrdal. At Myrdal you switch to the Flamsbana train that goes to Flam. From Flam, you take a cruise through Sognefjord to Gudvangen. At Gudvangen you hop onto a bus to Voss and at Voss you finally get back onto the train heading for Bergen.

The Norway in a Nutshell is essentially a collection of train/bus/ferry tickets for the whole journey. After doing some research on the internet, Bjorg and I discovered that you can take the Norway in a Nutshell trip for less simply by buying the tickets for each leg of the journey separately.

It was a little difficult figuring out the connections at first but it turned out to be really easy. Here's how we did it.

1. Train from Oslo to Myrdal
We booked the minipris tickets online from NSB. A minipris ticket from Oslo to Myrdal was 199 NOK. It was on this leg of the trip that we passed through Finse (see previous blog entry). You can book tickets at www.nsb.no

2. Flamsbana from Myrdal to Flam.
The Flamsbana is this old train that goes throgh the mountans and passes some really nice scenery. There were waterfalls and litle villages tucked away in valleys. As the weather was still a little cold, the waterfalls were frozen and didn't look as grand. The Flamsbana has fixed price tickets without discount (100+ NOK I think). I don't think there's any need to book these tickets in advance. The train flamsbana schedule is on www.nsb.no.

3. Ferry from Flam to Gudvangen
Flam is a quaint village at the end of the Flamsbana railway by a fjord. Its surrounded by mountains. I wouldn't have minded spending another day in Flam. It was beautiful. The ferry from Flam to Gudvangen offers student price tickets for 105 NOK (I think). You can buy it when boarding. The ferry passes a number of small villages by the water. Although the villages are quite tiny and remote, they are quite old and most have been around for hundreds of years. The schedule for the ferry is on www.fjord1.no.

4. Bus from Gudvangen to Voss
The ferry stops at Gudvangen. From here, you just head imediately onto the buses waiting to collect people on the Norway in a Nutshell package. Because we weren't on the package, we bought student price tickets directly from the driver (I think it was 60+ NOK).

5. Train from Voss to Bergen
Voss is a pretty decent sized town and I hear it is the place to be if you want to do some outdoor adventure activities. The bus stops right next to the waiting train to Bergen. If you'd like to have alook around Voss, then you can just wait for the next train. We got onto the train and bought student price tickets from the conductor for 111 NOK. Needless to say, the route was very scenic.

We started off from Oslo at about 8 in the morning and got to Bergen about 6 in the evening. If you take the direct train ride between Oslo and Bergen, the journey is about 6 hours.

It was a really good trip and we saved quite a lot of money doing it ourselves.

Here are some pictures.