Norwegian Fjords with Toddler

[emsetid]

Hi everyone, we're first time cruisers hoping to go on a Norwegian Fjords cruise on P&O's Iona next July with our two year old daughter. We'd really appreciate some feedback on the cruise's itinerary and whether there are any toddler-friendly excursions we could do on some of the stops.

 

We know it's unlikely that we can hike to see a glacier etc. with a toddler in tow, but maybe things like the Loen Skylift and/or the Geiranger Skywalk would be possible.

 

I'll copy the cruise itinerary below. Any feedback/advice would be gratefully received, thank you so much!

 

6 July - leave Southampton

7 July - at sea

8 July - Stavanger arrive in the morning and leave in the afternoon

9 July - Olden arrive in the morning and leave in the early evening

9 July - Innvikfjorden (cruise-by) early evening

9 July - Nordfjord (cruise-by) early evening

10 July - Hellesylt arrive early morning and leave in the afternoon

10 July - Geirangerfjord

10 July - Sunnylvsfjorden (cruise-by)

10 July - Storfjorden (cruise-by)

11 July - Haugesund arrive in the morning and leave in the afternoon

12 July - at sea

13 July - arrive back at Southampton

 

[kitkat343]

Hi we actually did a 7 day on Cunard with a. 2 and 6 year old.  It was an amazing cruise, and Geiranger and Olden were two of our favorite ports.

 

You are traveling in July so you should be able to reach the Geiranger Skywalk (we were there in late may and just missed the opening of the seasonal road.). We visited the rest of the scenic viewpoints in Geiranger, and it was very beautiful and enjoyable for both our kids.  We had booked a private tour for just our family, which didn't work out as well as I had hoped, but we just happened to not get lucky with our driver (the ship delayed us from tendering on time, and although I called the company to notify them of the delay the driver was upset about having to wait and later lied about not being able to take us to one location we requested that the company had told us by email would be fine to visit).  The company, Geiranger Fjordservice, has excellent reviews overall, so I'm sure you would enjoy one of their panoramic bus tours  or if you hire a private driver you might get luckier than we did.   You might want to bring some pills for motion because there is a lot of driving up winding roads.  

 

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.   You can see the view through the beautiful restaurant windows, plus there are beautiful platforms and places to walk around on top of the mountain.  IT was very accessible for a 2 year old.

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.

 

 

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.  You might want to be smarter than me and ask them if it is possible to schedule more time for the short hike so you aren't racing back to the troll car.  Or you can see if you can use a stroller or babywear- my stroller was hard for me to push but if you are stronger that might be an option for you.  It's over unpaved ground so I personally had a hard time pushing the stroller but more fit families might have absolutely no problem with this). 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 . or I believe Olden Adventures may now be able to make troll car reservations for you directly.

 

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. 

 

Stavanger - the highlight is Pulpit Rock, but that wasn't an option for our family because we couldn't baby wear on a hike.  You might be able to and can consider it.  We visited the petroleum museum, which was fine but not outstanding, and took a cruise with Rodne, which was good.  

 

 

Just one thing to note - Norway doesn't allow taxis to transport children without car seats, so please be mindful of that when trying to arrange tours.  We sailed from Southampton, and flew into London.  In London, when it would get rainy and the kids were tired and hungry we could just hop in a cab, take them for food and cheer them back up (once in London it started to rain and I hailed a cab to travel such a short distance the driver told me "um..I don't want to rip you off.  You can walk there" and I explained I knew we were taking a crazy short ride, but my 2 year old was done walking and we just needed to get him some pizza before he melted down.  You cannot take a cab in Norway without car seats, and most locations are  too small to have much public transportation (we also took a Baltic cruise with a 3 year old and didn't have any transportation issues there) .  So that part was frustrating because we didn't know about it and didn't plan in advance.  Taxi companies are required to provide car seats if you book them in advance, so please just make sure you have backup transportation planned.  

 

As a general rule, private tours are best for families of young children but its a little hard to predict whether or not it will be worth it in Norway - on a cloudy day it would be hard to appreciate the beautiful scenic viewpoints in Geiranger (we really couldn't see much in Bergen due to very poor weather) but on a clear day a private tour or a visit to the expensive Loen Skylit is absolutely worth it, but its hard to know ahead of time.  Hopefully you will get some clear weather but it's a bit of a risk.

 

[edinburgher]

18 hours ago, emsetid said:

we're first time cruisers hoping to go on a Norwegian Fjords cruise on P&O's Iona next July with our two year old daughter.

Do you have any tender ports on this itinerary?  Should there be any tender port calls, are you aware of the  P and O rules for any tender port if travelling with young children?  Friends travelling with son, daughter-in-law and two young grandchildren  were caught out by a "step test" with the youngest.

[kitkat343]

2 hours ago, edinburgher said:

Do you have any tender ports on this itinerary?  Should there be any tender port calls, are you aware of the  P and O rules for any tender port if travelling with young children?  Friends travelling with son, daughter-in-law and two young grandchildren  were caught out by a "step test" with the youngest.

That was actually the reason for our delay for getting off the ship in Geiranger on Cunard.  Cunard wouldn't let us carry our two year old across the step test.  After the people running the step test refused to issue a tender ticket, we went to the front desk and after a long debate they finally issued a ticket, but by the time we finally were able to use it it the crowds had died down and no one even checked that we had it.  And then when we went to exit the ship, the Cunard crew did exactly what the Princess crew did - they picked up our 2 year old and handed him over to the sailers on the tender.  I later wrote to Cunard which confirmed a parent should be able to take the step test carrying a 2 year old.  So you might want to write to P&O to confirm their policy ahead of time, so you aren't delayed leaving the ship (if we'd had a group tour we might have had even more problems).

[emsetid]

Thank you both so much for your replies and the really useful information.

 

As a complete newbie to cruises, I'd never heard of tender ports! From a quick search, it doesn't look like any of the ports on our itinerary are tender ports, so hopefully we'll avoid the step test 🙂

 

It sounds like we'll be able to find a few toddler-friendly excursions on some of the ports, which is great to know. Thanks again!

[emsetid]

Sorry, I also just noticed that Iona has two slightly different Norwegian itineraries: one features Stavanger, Olden and Haugesand (with sail-bys in Innvikfjorden, Nordfjord, Sunnylvsfjorden and Storfjroden); the other features Stavanger, Olden, Ålesund and Haugesund (with sail-bys in Nordfjord and Innvikfjorden).

 

Is one itinerary any better than the other? The second one has fewer sail-bys, but maybe Alesund is a must-see destination?

 

Thank you!

[kitkat343]

On 9/30/2023 at 5:07 PM, emsetid said:

Sorry, I also just noticed that Iona has two slightly different Norwegian itineraries: one features Stavanger, Olden and Haugesand (with sail-bys in Innvikfjorden, Nordfjord, Sunnylvsfjorden and Storfjroden); the other features Stavanger, Olden, Ålesund and Haugesund (with sail-bys in Nordfjord and Innvikfjorden).

 

Is one itinerary any better than the other? The second one has fewer sail-bys, but maybe Alesund is a must-see destination?

 

Thank you!

Geiranger has a sea walk, which means that one ship can avoid the tender, and the other ships tender.  

 

I'm a little confused by your last post - are you comparing these itineraries to the original one?  Do you lose Geiranger, or was that always just a sail-bye?

 

I've not been to Alesund, but it is much beloved on this forum.  

[hallasm]

I don't think you have all the details for the two Iona itineraries- also problem with spelling. Assuming that Haugesand is Haugesund?

'Sails bys’ are purely to make the itinerary look better - these are the fjords that are sailed through both in and out of a port in the fjords.
Innvikfjorden and Nordfjord are the fjords into Olden and Sunnylvsfjorden and Storfjorden are the fjords into probably what is a stop in Hellesylt.
 Haugesund and Hellesylt are small towns with somewhat limited options. Olden, Ålesund and Stavanger have good opportunities.

[emsetid]

10 hours ago, kitkat343 said:

Geiranger has a sea walk, which means that one ship can avoid the tender, and the other ships tender.  

 

I'm a little confused by your last post - are you comparing these itineraries to the original one?  Do you lose Geiranger, or was that always just a sail-bye?

 

I've not been to Alesund, but it is much beloved on this forum.  

 

Sorry, I should've explained it better.

 

The first itinerary is the same as the one I mentioned in my original post and it includes Geiranger. I think we're swaying towards that itinerary, as it seems to cover a few of the bigger fjords.

 

Thank you again for replying! 

 

[emsetid]

Apologies about the spelling - I was hastily copying text from the P&O website.

 

The itinerary we're swaying towards has stops in Stavanger, Olden, Hellesylt and Haugesund. 

 

Thank you so much for the very helpful information. It's much appreciated.

[hallasm]

2 hours ago, emsetid said:

The first itinerary is the same as the one I mentioned in my original post and it includes Geiranger.

The itinerary in post #1 does not stop in Geiranger but Hellesylt.

[kitkat343]

9 hours ago, hallasm said:

The itinerary in post #1 does not stop in Geiranger but Hellesylt.

Do people usually  stay in Hellesylt. or do they visit Geiranger?  And is Hellesylt part of the heritage fjords that most ships won't be able to reach after (I think) 2025?

[hallasm]

3 hours ago, kitkat343 said:

Do people usually  stay in Hellesylt. or do they visit Geiranger?  And is Hellesylt part of the heritage fjords that most ships won't be able to reach after (I think) 2025?

It’s not that easy to go from Hellesylt to Geiranger - there is a 1 hour ferry ride to Geiranger.

The fjords into Hellesylt is not Heritage fjord - only the stretch between Hellesylt and Geiranger (Geirangerfjord) will be affected after 2025.

[kitkat343]

2 hours ago, hallasm said:

It’s not that easy to go from Hellesylt to Geiranger - there is a 1 hour ferry ride to Geiranger.

The fjords into Hellesylt is not Heritage fjord - only the stretch between Hellesylt and Geiranger (Geirangerfjord) will be affected after 2025.

Thanks - I was just wondering what will happen to the Geiranger Skywalk when the new rules come into effect.  I met the people who own the Loen Skylift when I was there, and I was glad they won't be hurt by the new rules but thought it might be tough on the Geiranger Skywalk if that's also privately owned.

Edited October 3, 2023 by kitkat343

[hallasm]

1 hour ago, kitkat343 said:

Thanks - I was just wondering what will happen to the Geiranger Skywalk when the new rules come into effect.

Yes, a complete stop for cruise ships in Geiranger and Flåm will cause challenges for many local’s in these areas.
The Norwegian Maritime Authorities (NMA) has come up with proposals and ideas to help smooth out the consequences of this mandate. The NMA proposes to use electric tender boats to transport cruise passengers and enables, for example, LNG ships for a transition period.
Regardless of when or how these new rules are implemented, the bottom line is that sailing in the Norwegian fjords will look different from 2026.

It is possible that cruise lines will visit other shorter and less popular fjords. Or use of electric excursion boats from, for example, Balestrand to Flåm and from Hellesylt to Geiranger. This could become the new norm and will certainly increase the price of excursions to Flåm and Geiranger.

 

Edited October 3, 2023 by hallasm