Transatlantic Cruise: Day 16--Bergen, Norway, day 2

Saturday, August 31

It’s Bergen, day 2,  and we take our time getting off the ship and into town on the port shuttle bus as our Bryggen Museum Walking Tour does not start until 11 am.

We no sooner stepped off the shuttle bus and it started to rain.  There are only about 60 days a year that it does not rain in Bergen so we are not surprised.  The shower soon passes as we are strolling around the main square of Bergen, standing under trees and shop awnings to keep dry. 

This monument represents 4 centuries of life in Bergen, each side telling a different story.

Then we make our way to the museum and browse around the displays until the tour begins.  There is a giant chunk of a hull of a 100-foot-long 13^th century ship that was found here.  A portion of the ship is the original wood; the rest added to help us visualize the ship. 

These burned timbers are the actual timbers unearthed during a 1950’s excavation of the waterfront area.  It was a foundation of a wooden tenement built around 1050 displayed right where it was excavated.  Over the centuries many fires destroyed most of the city and new buildings were built on top of the destroyed ones. 

Ice skates!

Our tour guide, Martha, was dressed in period costume and led us through the Bryggen Museum and the historic Hanseatic district, explaining 900 years of Bergen history in 90 minutes. 

The city was perfectly located for trade with anyone along the shores of the North Sea or even the Atlantic.  During the medieval centuries, dried fish was much in demand, and Norwegian wholesalers provided a product that was both cheap and plentiful.  This trade in fish and other commodities made Bergen one of the principal cities in the trading alliance known as the Hanseatic League. 

A carving representing dried cod fish

From 1350 to 1754, German merchants controlled Bergen’s trade.  The German merchants were very strict and lived in a harsh, all-male world.  This wasn’t a military occupation but a mutually beneficial economic partnership.  The Norwegian cod fishermen of the far north shipped their dried cod to Bergen, where the Hanseatic merchants marketed it to Europe.  Norwegian cod provided much of Europe with food and cod oil.  The Norwegians needed grain and linen from Germany.

 

The kitchen is the only place where fires could be built.

The alley between the wooden tenement buildings.
They are very close together and leaning into each other.

Could this be the first linen  hand towel  on a loop to dry hands?

Martha did a great job taking us through the medieval Hanseatic League merchant buildings and living quarters. They were deathly afraid of fires (since they lived in the wooden tenements that burned so often over the centuries) so had no fires in the tenements for heat or light.  The kitchens were the only areas where fires could be built and they were carefully controlled.  It’s dark and cold in Bergen most of the year.  Life must have been very hard….and cold!

 

The Hanseatic office 

Painted cupboard doors

Dining room

Bunks for sleeping--two men to a bunk, each sitting up with back
to a wall.

The walls had painted designs for decoration.

Close up of the wall

After the tour we simply walked around the waterfront and then back to the shuttle bus to return to the ship.

When leaving the harbor, it started raining again…..and we saw a beautiful rainbow.  

We very much enjoyed our visit to Norway and definitely want to return on another voyage.  It was nice to have 2 days to explore Bergen…we couldn’t have done both the hike and the walking tour in one day.  Next will be 2 days at sea as we head toward Iceland.  Keeping our fingers crossed that we can actually port there.