Iceland/Norway with kids

[liberty176]

Hi!  I am researching and want to pick a summer 2024 cruise in the next few weeks.  We have two kids (will be 10 and 7 at time of travel).  We liked Holland America and loved Princess in the past.

 

I'm looking at a variety of itineraries, 10-21 days in length.  The longest cruise we have taken so far was 17 nights.  I really want to go to some of the hard-to-reach islands around Scotland (Skye, Orkneys, maybe Shetland).  DH wants to go to Iceland, and both of us have been to Norway, but only to Oslo.  It seems like if we try to cover some ports in all of these areas on a single cruise, it will be a longer cruise, and a lot of ports.

 

My questions:

1) Will a longer (14+ days) cruise around this itinerary in June or July have at least some kids on board in summer?

2) Are there any ports that you would consider must-see for a family?

3) Any hesitations from people who have sailed with kids on multiple ports that will seem similar (several ports in Iceland, or several small towns in Norway)?  They are good travelers, excellent walkers/hikers.  They are, however, used to warmer vacations.  Trying to decide if we should try for both Iceland and Norway (since we have the time and budget this year), or if that's just too much and we should go for one or the other.

 

Thank you so much!

[hallasm]

The Norwegian fjords offer many opportunities - here is a similar topic

 

 

[ljandgb]

You could consider a land portion to Iceland, which, IMO, is a much better way to see that country, coupled to a cruise to the other destinations.

 

The ports in Iceland, aside from Reykjavik and Akureyri, are very small and you will be hard pressed to find anything to do beyond the ship's tours, where the passengers will outnumber inhabitants by 3:1 easily.  Iceland's greatest attraction is it's natural beauty, and you'll be barely dipping your toes in with just a few ports.

 

Iceland is very family friendly, and very easy to navigate.  There are few roads, which are all well marked.  There are self catering cottages all over the countryside, making it easy to find lodging for families, and even very small communities have a local pool, with hot tubs and usually a kids' area as well.  They are mainstays of Icelandic culture.

 

Caves, glaciers, waterfalls, horses, volcanoes, natural hot springs.  What's not to love if you're a kid?

 

As you can tell, Iceland is one of my favorite countries.  If you want to consider a land trip, the folks over on TripAdvisor can help you.

[PLee]

How exciting and what an opportunity for your family.  We traveled with our young kids and had a wonderful time.  NCL offered many kids programs to the point we didn't see them during the day when at sea.  We would engage our kids for any trip by having them research where we were to travel.  At that age, I suggest.... Trolls; elves; fairies; horses; reindeer; the 13 Yule Lads (Iceland version of Santa); King crabs......... to name a few.  Safe travels.

[Nitemare]

I agree with LJ.  Iceland is an amazing land vacation, easy to drive which makes it nice for a family with kids.

 

For the rest of your plans a ship makes more sense.   Maybe do a week in Iceland followed by a cruise or the other way around?

[kitkat343]

We loved both the Baltics and Norway with children.  My youngest children were 3 on the Baltics and 2 in Norway, and both locations (with the exception of St. Petersburg) were very accessible for kids.

 

I've been hoping to visit Iceland, but honestly don't think it's a great idea for a cruise, especially for a family.  NCL has been experiencing all kinds of difficulties getting to their ports (they do this in general, but particularly on the Norway/Iceland Prima cruises, which is a shame since the itineraries are amazing).

 

 

 

 

Norway, however, is amazing for kids on a cruise.  If you can get there before the heritage fjords close to ships that aren't emissions neutral, a cruise that visits Geiranger, Flam and Olden would be ideal for children, since all of those ports have wonderful things for kids.

 

If you want to ride the amazing Flam railway, you should book this first, since the railway tickets tend to book up quickly during the height of the tour season. The Flam railway is a five minute walk from where you dock or tender, so this can easily be undertaken as an independent excursion. We booked our tickets online at the Norwegian Railways site at https://www.nsb.no/en/?gclid=CMuvnubiitMCFYoy0wodZb8BnQ .

If that site is showing that everything is booked, other cruise critic posters have mentioned trying http://booking.visitflam.com/en/to-do/a1488268/the-flåm-railway/showdetails , and other posters have stated that this site has access to different tickets and sometimes has availability even when the Norwegian railway site lists no availability. Also, people have reported on the forums that when the train was initially sold out, they kept checking and eventually tickets opened up due to cancellations. Another option is to check with your cruise line – it will be more expensive to purchase this excursion through the cruise line but worth it if you cannot purchase the tickets independently.

A quick online search seemed to recommend that you should sit on the right side of the train on the Flam to Myrdal journey. The view on that side was quite lovely, but might also be on the other side.

In Flam, we had a lovely afternoon visiting a goat farm, exploring the beautiful town of Undredal (the inspiration for the movie Frozen), and then eating local cheeses (including brown caramel goat cheese) and a delicious lunch that was organized by Flam Guide Service ( http://www.fjordsafari.com ). Fjord Safari's booth is located about a minute away from the Flam railway platform, so you will have no problem finding your tour. You can combine this tour with a hike and boat ride along the fjords if your group is all physically fit. It was a very pleasant and enjoyable excursion, which I would highly recommend. We traveled in May, before the goats move to their summer farms so this excursion had to be individually arranged. Flam Guide service stayed in contact with us and gave us updates as they worked to book this reservation, and they also helpfully provided car seats for our children. Our tour guide was highly knowlegdable and helpful and this tour was one of the highlights of our cruise. 

One of the other cities we chose this cruise for was Geiranger. Visitors should please note that if you are planning on driving to the beautiful scenic viewpoints at Dalsnibba that Road 63 opens between mid-May and early June, depending upon how long it takes to clear the snow and when the avalanche risk has ended (the engineers wait until the big spring avalanche occurs before opening the road). You should consider choosing a cruise that visits later to ensure you will be able to experience all of the beauty of Geiranger. It would be helpful if the cruise lines adjusted their itineraries and put Geiranger last on May cruises, since Road 63 opened the on our last port day, when we were in Bergen, but they may have logistical reasons for leaving the port stop in Geiranger earlier. We were told in Flam that the waterfalls all looked gorgeous in May because they are currently filled with snow runoff. This will melt, and then the waterfalls won’t be nearly as impressive later in the season so that might be one reason to choose a May cruise.

Crowds also tend to be a bit thinner in May, so you may experience more availability about booking tickets on the Flam railroad (we booked at the last minute and might have been shut out if we’d tried to book last minute tickets in June) and changing the troll car in Olden.

 

Visitors should note that the viewing platforms in Geiranger are amazing (especially on a clear day) but there are hairpin roads to reach them, and it could be a little challenging if you are prone to car sickness. I would not recommend using Geirangerfjordservice for private transportation, but they do run a bus to the panoramic viewing stations and it seems unlikely travelers would experience the problems we did on a group bus tour, since most of the reviews on tripadvisor are positive for this company.

At the end of the tour, we decided to stop for lunch in Geiranger. We were a little scared to stop at Braserie Posten, since it is in a tourist trap location right near the cruise ship terminal, but the yelp reviews were positive and the food was excellent. There is seating with a beautiful view of the harbor in the back of the restaurant. We went through two bowls of fish soup, since the kids were so happy eating all of it. It is a very short walk from this restaurant to the dock, so this is a nice way to conclude your day in Geiranger. 

We were extremely fortunate to learn that the Loen Skylift opened three days prior to our arrival in Olden. I was a bit anxious about the logistics of visiting a brand new attraction with small children, and the owner of Olden Adventures was very patient and reassuring about the logistics of reaching the skylift. As it turned out, the weather was a bit rainy on the day we arrived, so there were very few crowds. It was still a very beautiful location, with a gorgeous viewing platform. On nice days, paragliders take off from the mountain (that happened the day before we arrived) and that must be spectacular to see if you are lucky enough to get good weather. The food in the restaurant was excellent, especially the sample platter of local meat. It’s unsurprisingly expensive, but the view is outstanding and the food delicious. 

The Loen Skylift is only a 6 km bus ride from Olden, so it isn’t very difficult to get there. Olden Adventures ( http://www.oldenadventure.com/ ) is running shuttles to the Loen Skylift, right next to their buses to the Biksdal Glacier so it would be very easy to travel to both attractions through Olden Adventures. Both buses leave from the only petrol station in town, which is a very short walk from where your ship will dock. 

You can also take a cab to the Loen skylift. It is a 40 minute ride to the Briksdal Glacier, so a cab there would probably be quite a bit more expensive. Please note that cabs will refuse to transport children without car seats, and although they are required to provide them upon request we were unable to fill any taxi requests we made (we only emailed the taxi companies 2 days in advance; you might have better luck if you contact cab companies far in advance). 

The most economical option for getting to the Briksdal Glacier is a public bus that runs from June –August. The Norway tourist office stated that in the 2017 season the bus left Port Olden at 9:58 am, and departs Biksdal Glacier at 1:30 pm, and is currently listed as costing 132 NOK for each adult ticket. You might want to contact the tourist office to see if there is any way to purchase tickets ahead of time or if they can run additional buses if the first one is full.

The Briksdal Glacier has been hit hard by global warming, but the 40 minute bus ride there is quite scenic and lovely, as is the hike itself to the glacier so overall this excursion is a very good choice as long as you realize ahead of time that the most beautiful pictures online of the glacier showing lots of ice are not recent and don’t represent what you will see at the glacier. 

For travelers with young children or mobility issues, there are troll cars available for rent to reduce the length of your hike. These golf carts travel most of the way to the glacier, leaving you with a very pleasant and relatively flat 700 m walk. Since we didn’t expect my 2 year old to make it all the way to the glacier, my husband and 6 year old went ahead of us. To my surprise, my 2 year old slowly but steadily made the entire hike in the allocated time (they tell you what time to return to the platform to catch your return troll car). Reservations are required for troll cars in May and October, and recommended during the summer months (the troll car season runs from May-October). The only challenging thing is that they do request that you tell them what time you’d like to ride on the troll car, which is hard if you want to chose a time to do this excursion based upon the weather forecast (although it is completely understandable they ask you to pick a time, since otherwise there might be a lot of people trying to get on a troll car at one time and this would cause really long delays). I don’t know if the troll car operators are always flexible about the time of your reservation, but we changed our minds about what time to visit the glacier on the day we traveled since we wanted to visit the Loen skylift in the afternoon when the weather was scheduled to be better. I emailed the troll car operators at 9 am as soon as we got on the bus towards the glacier, and they had already switched my reservation by the time we arrived at the troll car office. We traveled in May, when things are less crowded so I don’t know if they will be able to accommodate a change in reservation time during the busy summer months. The troll car website where you can make your advance reservation is available at: http://www.oldedalenskysslag.com . 

Near where you pick up the troll car is a small café off the souvenir shop; they have excellent waffles. They are best freshly made, so if you have time keep an eye on the plate where they store the waffles and order them when everyone else bought up the older waffles. My family started off by ordering 4, and ended up eating 12 (the kids really loved them and since they’d just finished hiking to a glacier without a single complaint I wasn’t going to say no), so we were able to get a lot of fresh waffles. 

 

[Cloudyrain]

On 8/14/2023 at 9:21 PM, liberty176 said:

Hi!  I am researching and want to pick a summer 2024 cruise in the next few weeks.  We have two kids (will be 10 and 7 at time of travel).  We liked Holland America and loved Princess in the past.

 

I'm looking at a variety of itineraries, 10-21 days in length.  The longest cruise we have taken so far was 17 nights.  I really want to go to some of the hard-to-reach islands around Scotland (Skye, Orkneys, maybe Shetland).  DH wants to go to Iceland, and both of us have been to Norway, but only to Oslo.  It seems like if we try to cover some ports in all of these areas on a single cruise, it will be a longer cruise, and a lot of ports.

 

My questions:

1) Will a longer (14+ days) cruise around this itinerary in June or July have at least some kids on board in summer?

2) Are there any ports that you would consider must-see for a family?

3) Any hesitations from people who have sailed with kids on multiple ports that will seem similar (several ports in Iceland, or several small towns in Norway)?  They are good travelers, excellent walkers/hikers.  They are, however, used to warmer vacations.  Trying to decide if we should try for both Iceland and Norway (since we have the time and budget this year), or if that's just too much and we should go for one or the other.

 

Thank you so much!

It’s the school summer holidays in England from around the last week of July until the first week in September so any cruise starting in the UK will have children on board: I caveat that with Scotland breaking up several weeks earlier. 

 

Norway is great for kids; lots of Vikings, popular Fjords destinations offer great options that are child-friendly (Stavanger Petrol museum, Olden Skylift/glacier, Alesund Aquarium or view point, Haugesund Viking village etc. 

 

You could do a week to the Fjords on a cruise and then a week in Iceland land-based, or there are quite a few options that include a few Fjord stops and other interesting options (Orkneys/Faroes etc) on the way to Iceland. 

[CCJack]

I agree with others, I would vote for a Norway Fjords cruise for your situation.   A great kids destination in my opinion.  

 

A separate land based vacation to Iceland would be good.   However, if you did want to choose a cruise that goes to both Norway and maybe just 2 stops in Iceland you could get a taste of Iceland.   However, our cruise in Iceland resulted in quite a bit of bus or van time from port to the inland sites.  That probably would be my biggest concern with kids... a long car ride.    I would prioritize the Norway part. 

 

I cruised a lot with my kids when they were young, and I think lots of other kids on the ship is not something that is necessary.   Especially if your kids are good travelers.   I would not prioritize that part of the decision. 

 

Either way you can't go wrong with these destinations... have fun.

 

[newcruisers70]

Lots of good perspectives here, and I agree that a cruise is an ideal way to see the Norway fjords, and there may be only another year or two where that will be easy (or before prices get much higher as capacity drops when non electric ships are banned).  Iceland is absolutely beautiful too and a land trip there could be a good option.  However there are reasons why a cruise may be preferable to a land trip in Iceland depending on personal preferences.  We just did a 14d Norway cruise with our 11y old and have booked a 14d cruise next summer on Holland America that does 5 days in Iceland, 1 in Norway and 3 in Scotland, and while the key attraction for us is the Iceland stops, we are also keen on stops in Stavanger and Shetlands.  

 

To address your specific questions:  1.  There will almost certainly be kids

2.  Must see ports for a family:  Depends on what the family really likes!  Key for Norway/Iceland is will the kids be really impressed and happy with the stunning natural beauty or not?  If so then Geiranger, Flam, Reykjavik and Akureyri top the list for that imho.  But another consideration - especially for the kids - is do they mind spending a long time in cars/buses on day trips?  The really amazing day trips in Iceland that I have done are pretty much half or full day trips, so if your kids dont want to be on a 4hr+ tour, then.....  You can certainly do full day tours in Norway too, but you can also do great shorter ones in Norway, not so much (in my experience) in Iceland.

3.  We had a similar concern with our recent Norway cruise, especially as our son wanted to go 'someplace warm'.  But he ended up loving it, and we even ended up at the same port twice (Eidfjord, because we did two 7d cruises back to back), but we did two completely different things on each of the days there (a tour to a waterfall one day, and a hike around the area the other day), so it wasn't an issue.  In our experience, our kid's enjoyment of the cruise ship experience was probably more important to a happy time for him than the specific Norway experience.    

 

Re: Iceland, I have done both a land trip to Iceland and a cruise, so have a little perspective on this.  You can't go wrong either way, but why might a cruise be better than a land trip to Iceland?  Specific issues that may be relevant for your situation with kids:  1.  Do they love being on the cruise ship, or if they are first timers might they love it?  Our 11y old son loved being on board, especially the Sports Court, but also other activities such as music shows and entertainment.  2.  Is being able to stay in one room the whole time a plus for you instead of moving hotels every few days?  If so, thats a big advantage for the cruise option.  

[kitkat343]

On 8/22/2023 at 2:54 PM, newcruisers70 said:

Lots of good perspectives here, and I agree that a cruise is an ideal way to see the Norway fjords, and there may be only another year or two where that will be easy (or before prices get much higher as capacity drops when non electric ships are banned).  Iceland is absolutely beautiful too and a land trip there could be a good option.  However there are reasons why a cruise may be preferable to a land trip in Iceland depending on personal preferences.  We just did a 14d Norway cruise with our 11y old and have booked a 14d cruise next summer on Holland America that does 5 days in Iceland, 1 in Norway and 3 in Scotland, and while the key attraction for us is the Iceland stops, we are also keen on stops in Stavanger and Shetlands.  

 

To address your specific questions:  1.  There will almost certainly be kids

2.  Must see ports for a family:  Depends on what the family really likes!  Key for Norway/Iceland is will the kids be really impressed and happy with the stunning natural beauty or not?  If so then Geiranger, Flam, Reykjavik and Akureyri top the list for that imho.  But another consideration - especially for the kids - is do they mind spending a long time in cars/buses on day trips?  The really amazing day trips in Iceland that I have done are pretty much half or full day trips, so if your kids dont want to be on a 4hr+ tour, then.....  You can certainly do full day tours in Norway too, but you can also do great shorter ones in Norway, not so much (in my experience) in Iceland.

3.  We had a similar concern with our recent Norway cruise, especially as our son wanted to go 'someplace warm'.  But he ended up loving it, and we even ended up at the same port twice (Eidfjord, because we did two 7d cruises back to back), but we did two completely different things on each of the days there (a tour to a waterfall one day, and a hike around the area the other day), so it wasn't an issue.  In our experience, our kid's enjoyment of the cruise ship experience was probably more important to a happy time for him than the specific Norway experience.    

 

Re: Iceland, I have done both a land trip to Iceland and a cruise, so have a little perspective on this.  You can't go wrong either way, but why might a cruise be better than a land trip to Iceland?  Specific issues that may be relevant for your situation with kids:  1.  Do they love being on the cruise ship, or if they are first timers might they love it?  Our 11y old son loved being on board, especially the Sports Court, but also other activities such as music shows and entertainment.  2.  Is being able to stay in one room the whole time a plus for you instead of moving hotels every few days?  If so, thats a big advantage for the cruise option.  

Could you come back and report on your experiences after your cruise next summer?  I'd love to visit Iceland with my kids, but was a bit concerned about our ability to find private tours off a cruise ship.  

[newcruisers70]

10 hours ago, kitkat343 said:

Could you come back and report on your experiences after your cruise next summer?  I'd love to visit Iceland with my kids, but was a bit concerned about our ability to find private tours off a cruise ship.  

Happy to do this.  However imho the best way to do it - and what we are going to do - is get rental cars and do self drive tours.  Its very easy to do that in Iceland, and frankly it is considerably cheaper too once you have more than 2 people.  It is also nice to have control over your tour and not be subject to the group timetable

[ljandgb]

On 8/22/2023 at 7:54 PM, newcruisers70 said:

  Re: Iceland, I have done both a land trip to Iceland and a cruise, so have a little perspective on this.  You can't go wrong either way, but why might a cruise be better than a land trip to Iceland?  Specific issues that may be relevant for your situation with kids:  1.  Do they love being on the cruise ship, or if they are first timers might they love it?  Our 11y old son loved being on board, especially the Sports Court, but also other activities such as music shows and entertainment.  2.  Is being able to stay in one room the whole time a plus for you instead of moving hotels every few days?  If so, thats a big advantage for the cruise option.  

 I think this is applicable to any vacation as far as what your kids want. I’m not sure it means that a cruise is the best way to see Iceland so much as the best way to survive vacation when traveling with family that have certain requirements. If my kids wouldn’t tolerate a land trip to Iceland I’d probably skip trying to go and find a cruise/vacation that worked for everyone. YMMV