Sail from Copenhagen up Norway's west coast into the UNESCO fjords: Geiranger's waterfalls, the Flåm Railway, Hanseatic Bergen and the Pulpit Rock country around Stavanger. Summer brings near-endless daylight; the season runs May to September.
Cruise route for your dates
8 days from Sat, Dec 5.
- Day 1 Copenhagen · board the ship
- Day 2 At sea
- Day 3 Geiranger · a day ashore
- Day 4 Flåm · a day ashore
- Day 5 Bergen · a day ashore
- Day 6 Stavanger · a day ashore
- Day 7 At sea
- Day 8 Copenhagen · leave the ship
Good to know
- Norway is expensive ashore; the ship is the bargain, so eat on board on port days.
- Bring rain gear for every port; Bergen sees rain or drizzle on about 240 days a year.
- Fjord sail-ins are early; set an alarm for Geirangerfjord.
Eat this
Places the planner can use
Mark places as a must or something to skip. The itinerary is built only from this list; ★ marks the destination’s highlights.
A 17th-century canal lined with brightly coloured townhouses, once a sailors' haunt and now Copenhagen's most photographed street.
A 19th-century amusement park of gardens, rides and fairy-lit pavilions that reportedly inspired Walt Disney.
A self-governing hippie enclave founded in 1971, with murals, communal gardens and its own unofficial rules.
A Renaissance royal castle set in gardens, holding Denmark's crown jewels in a heavily guarded basement treasury.
Two glass market halls of gourmet stalls — smoked fish, cheese and open sandwiches for a standing lunch.
Open-faced rye sandwiches piled with pickled herring, roast beef or shrimp — a proper sit-down lunch, not a snack.
Hairpin road to a skywalk 1,500 metres above Geirangerfjord, often with snow until July.
Fjord boat or kayak past the Seven Sisters and the Suitor falls and abandoned hillside farms.
How people farmed and survived on the fjord cliffs, with a short film and a waterfall walk outside.
Eleven hairpins up the far side of the fjord to the classic postcard view of Geiranger.
One of the steepest standard-gauge railways in the world, climbing past the Kjosfossen waterfall to Myrdal.
A wood-and-glass platform jutting out 650 metres above Aurlandsfjord.
RIB boat into the narrowest, UNESCO-listed arm of the fjord, past seals and goats on the cliffs.
Viking-hall brewpub serving its own beers with local smoked meats and fish.
UNESCO-listed row of old Hanseatic wooden buildings with workshops, museums and cafes.
Funicular to a hilltop with a classic view over Bergen's harbor, trails and a cafe.
Harborside stalls selling salmon, king crab and whale-free seafood snacks to eat on the spot.
Preserved merchant house showing how the German trading league lived and traded stockfish.
Composer Edvard Grieg's lakeside villa and a concert hall for small recitals.
Fish soup, cod or king crab at a harborfront restaurant, a taste of the North Sea.
A four-hour return hike to a flat clifftop 600 metres above the Lysefjord; good shoes essential.
Easier way to see Pulpit Rock from below, plus the Hengjanefossen waterfall and a seal colony.
White wooden houses on cobbled lanes and a museum of the sardine trade that built the town.
How oil changed Norway, with a walk-on drill floor and an offshore escape chute to try; good on a wet day.
The small bronze statue and the star-shaped fortress park, a short walk from the cruise piers.
A relaxed hour on the water past the Little Mermaid statue, the opera house and Christianshavn's houseboats.
A sculpture and art museum built by the Carlsberg brewing family, centred on a plant-filled winter garden atrium.
The real-life Elsinore of Shakespeare's Hamlet, a coastal fortress an hour north of the city by train.