The Trip: The Lofoten Islands (II)

Hello fellow Erasmus people!

Before starting to tell you about my trip, I'm going to tell you a little more information about the Lofoten Islands and how to move and get there.

How to get about Lofoten

As I've already said in a previous post, we arrived by plane from Oslo. Our destined airport was Harstad/Narvik, to the north of the islands but there were also other flights: you can travel from Oslo Gardermoen to Bodø (also with Norwegian airlines) and then you can choose the company Wideroe.no. This company offers flights from Bodø to Svolvær, Røst, Værøy and Leknes. You can also go from Leknes to Bodø.

[These are the trips and routes that Wideroe do around Norway, as well as other destinations like Newcastle, Manchester, London or Copenhagen. ]

However, going by plane isn't the only option, you can also travel by bus if you are already on the islands. There are a couple of interesting routes with the company 177norland.no. The first goes from Bodø to Svolvær and the second route is carried out in different towns: Narvik, Evenes, Svolvær, Leknes and Å.

And of course, being Norway, it could not be otherwise, there is also the option to go by boat from Bodø to Skrova and to Svolvær. There are also some small cruises with a company called Hurtigruten, which carries out different routes.

• From Bodø to Stamsund it takes about 3 hours and 45 minutes
• From Bodø to Svolvær it takes about 6 hours
• From Stokmarknes to Svolvær it takes about 3 hours
• From Stokmarknes to Stamsund it takes about 5 and a half hours

This company is really interesting because it provides boat trips all over Norway. Also, it has a webpage available in both English and Spanish. They offer 11-12 day cruises, 5-6 short cruises or really short 2-3 day cruises with different start and end points. They are expensive, of course, for example a 5 day trip can cost about 500€ but the experience that you'll have...it would be priceless.

Something a little more affordable would be the ferry routes, also with 177norland.no. This is more of a public transport company and is, therefore, a little more economical. Also you can look at the routes in thn.no. Some of the routes these companies offer are:

• From Bognes to Lødigen in 1 hour
• From Meibu to Fiskebøl in about 25 minutes*
• From Skutvik to Skova and to Svolvær in about 2 and a quarter hours
• From Bodø to Røst en about 4 and a half/5 hours
• From Bodø to Værøy in about 3 and a half/4 hours
• From Røst to Værøy in about 2 hours
• From Værøy to Moskenes in an hour and a half
• From Bodø to Moskenes en about 3/3 and a half hours

*This is the only trip that I have included from 177norland, the rest are from the other webpage.

In reality, the distances in Lofoten aren't that big, they're quite within reach really. To give you all an idea, I've put some distances from Svolvær by ferry, as a reference:

• Svolvær - Moskenes - Bodø - 224 kilometres
• Svolvær - Skutvik - Bodø - 288 kilometres
• Svolvær - Lødingen - Bodø - 346 kilometres
• Svolvær - Melbu - Andenes - 185 kilometres
• Svolvær - Gullesfkorbotn - Andenes - 211 kilometres
• Svolvær - Lødingen - 101 kilometres
• Svolvær - Harstad - 168 kilometres
• Svolvær - Evenes airport - 174 kilometres
• Svolvær - Narvik - 238 kilometres
• Svolvær - Kiruna - 378 kilometres
• Svolvær - Tromsø - 420 kilomtres

Another option to get about is to rent a car or a van with which you can move around the islands. We did that, choosing the company Hertz. To hire a 7 seater van, it was about 100€ per head but in the end we were given nine for the same price because the seven was not available. We hired the van for 4 days.

In summer, you can also go by bike but I'll talk about this in another, slightly longer, post... So come back if you want to discover more about this wonderful archipelago.

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