Norwegian Coastal Voyages cruise line
 

My sister and I are planning to take the Norwegian mail boat from Bergen to Kirkenes. Any thoughts on shore excursions? And experience on this line? It's a 7 day trip.

We're also going to Denmark, Finland, Sweden, and Estonia on our own - not with a tour. Do we need to deal with visas to enter the countries? How do we do that?

Would love any suggestions - also on what to see there! Thanks

I have been on Hurtigruten several times. My own view is that the shore excursions are ridiculously expensive for what they are. The few that I did go on spent too much time at places where the proprietors hoped you would buy something (a view held by others about several tours).

This may help:

http://homepage.mac.com/wasleys/norway/

Re visas. What nationality are you?

We took this same trip a few years ago. We (2 couples) took all the shore excursions and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. They were very well organized with interesting destinations. Don't miss the excursion to the North Cape. The trip was fabulous and we would love to do it again. We did not need visas to visit any of the Scandinavian countries...Norway, Sweden or Denmark. This was one of my more memorable trips.

Great pictures- brings back memories of our round-trip in 2002. We took most of the shore excursion and found them easier than planning our own. I suggest you google Norwebian Coastal Voyages and look over their site which contains a lot of info on the excursions.

We did the Hurtigruten from Bergen to Kirkenes several years ago. We took every excursion except Tromso, and enjoyed them.

If you are going for the first time, It seems to me that their excursions are best since you are not familiar with the region. ((*))