Day 3: beautiful Bergen

Today is our first day in Bergen. We had a great  plane trip from Stockholm to Bergen in a half empty Finnish plane.  Paul tried really hard to get into a border control situation by planting his shampoo bottle in my carry on luggage. As we go through checkout, I am stopped and asked whether I have any bottles over 100mls with me. I say no of course not, I am not An idiot. He then opened my bag and went through everything, underwear etc and I kept saying there is nothing in there. (What is wrong with you people).  After practically emptying out my bag, the polite man found a plastic bag with Paul's shampoo in it.  Paul said he told me and I must not have heard him.  How many times does he use that line?  And Why Would he think it was a good idea to put a 250ml bottle into my bag and not his. When the limit is 100mls?


Our hotel which Paul chose is wonderfully located near train and all the attractions. And even has a lobby and lots of staff and guests and looks great.   Imagine our surprise when we got to our room and it was in fact smaller than the room in Our last hotel ie the worst hotel in the world, (chosen by me.)

    

However the bathroom which was almost the same size as the room was much better than the previous hotel so this is a definite win for Paul.  And breakfast was fantastic, best ever..
The weather continues to be perfect, sunny warm but not hot. Perfect for trekking through the town as Paul insisted we did.  Not strolling, walking or purposeful striding but more like 'walking for exercise damn it' style walking. There was actually a reception desk at this hotel ( another win for Paul ) and the helpful girl suggested we do the funicular, fish market and advised that we must have the special soft serve Ice-cream at the top of the funicular.  It all sounded good to me especially the ice cream.
Paul thought the walk/trek sounded like a good idea.




On the way to the funicular ( love that word and cannot say it enough), we went past the fish market,


a number of seafood market stalls selling fresh seafood which they cooked there and you ate it with a
view of the beautiful harbour and mountains.  We had lunch there minus the view as Paul rushed to
the first stall on the other side to the water but the food was yum.  I had giant crab legs chopped into pieces and cooked in a white wine and garlic and other herby type sauce. It was really easy to eat and the best crab I have ever eaten.

Paul wanted to try whale and did. To our surprise, whale is not a fish , but a mammal and looked and tasted more like steak than fish. Interesting but no where near the crab in terms of appearance and taste.


The funicular took us to the top of Bergen with fantastic views over the city. It was spectacular.  The
ice cream at the top was also very special. Well worth the trip.

And then to a really old church  St Johannes or something like that. Beautiful Lutheran church which was made  of  polished wood inside and even smelled like wood. No marble or mosaics like that other showy religion but beautiful.  However it was at the top of a hill  requiring me to climb hundreds of steps. Why are all the most beautiful Churches, castles and other places I want to go to on the top of the highest hills with lots,of stairs. I hate stairs.

That night we had dinner with one of Paul's colleagues from his conference (junket) and her partner. We walked around Bergen and took more photos of what really is a beautiful city, beautiful Bergen.