Companion road trip to Hurtigruten
 

Hi fellow travellers,
We have just booked the Southbound Hurtigruten trip from Kirkenes to Bergen in early July. We chose the Southbound as it apparently encompasses more scenery versus less towns/urban ports visited in daylight hours as compared to the Northbound journey and we are all about the scenery.
However, a change in plan has meant we now have an extra 4-5 nights that we could spend in Norway.
Our cruise will not visit Geirangerfjord (in July) and we will have a short night time stop only in Alesund, both places that I would love to visit.
We had planned to travel by train back to Oslo after the cruise ends in Bergen so will still do this I think.
My question relates to the 5 days I now have free before the cruise starts and I have thought of a few options but I am sure there may be many others I haven't thought of yet! Could please comment on below?

Fly into Bergen, rent car for 4-5 days, include Geirangerfjord and Alesund as above in round road trip back to Bergen.
Fly into Alesund, rent car for 4-5 days and return to Alesund...itinerary yet to be decided...Norway is my oyster :)
Fly into one of those and drive up to Kirkenes where cruise starts??? (Haven't really researched this option much yet, its a long drive not sure if the scenery would be as spectacular?)

I know of the Norway in a Nutshell options but given that it will be high season am keen to try and escape busloads of tourists.We love scenery and photography and I am quite a confident driver so think that a road trip is an option...

Have lots more research to do but always find personal experience of Fodorites has been invaluable in guiding me previously ,
Thank you.

Why not go north and explore around Kirkenes? Well above the arctic circle and perhaps your last chance to see this landscape and biotope somewhat intact, because it's undergoing rapid changes. Lots of things to see re arctic culture

https://www.visitkirkenes.info/arcti...aroundkirkenes

Have you looked into flying to Kirkenes from Trondheim?

I am leaving Monday for a little road trip around Alesund for 4 days next week. I've previously been to Bergen/ surrounding areas and up to Lofoten. This time I will be with my elderly mother so we are limiting total drive time to about 3 hours per day, meaning you could cover much more ground if desired. For instance, driving down to the Balestrand area or over to the Lom area.

Our itinerary includes arriving in Oslo, Rauma Railway train (supposedly very scenic) from airport to Andalsnes where we will rent the car. [There is a fantastic hike to Rampestreken if you enjoy that sort of thing]
Drive to Geiranger via Trollstigen road and explore that area.
Next day we will drive via Gamle Strynefjellsvegen and the Loen Skylift (fingers crossed for no fog and it has already started snowing last week!--they have a live webcam to check out the views) through the Norangsdalen Valley to Hotel Union Oye.
Next day to Alesund to explore the city.
And finally the last day back to Andalsnes via the Stranda Gondola and the coastline or the Trollstigen (if weather was poor first time) and same train back to Oslo.

You can google those names to see if any of that appeals to you. And you can easily fly into Alesund and skip the Rauma Railway. I considered flying back from Alesund to Oslo but there is a hefty one way drop off fee for rental cars in Norway, which are already quite expensive, and my mother will do much better on trains than dealing with the stress that airports can cause.

We almost did the Hurtigruten cruise but just couldn't swing enough days to take the full cruise and couldn't figure out a good port to port alternative to see what we wanted to see. I hope you do a trip report on it because I do want to take it one day.