Cruising Day 7!

06-09: We had a pretty rough night last night on the Barents Sea. Both of us got physically ill, and the ship was really bouncing around. In the middle of the night, it calmed down. We are in Kirkenes today with an excursion to a snow hotel. Kirkenes means church on the peninsula. There is a population of approx. 3,550 in the city and a bit more than that in the outlying areas. It looks a lot larger than that. Many of the homes look so similar. That is because after WWII Sweden sent the necessary supplies to re-build the town. They call them “Ikea Houses”. Many of the signs here are in Russian because we are just 7.5 miles from the Russian border. There use to be a very open border where Russians and Norwegians could drive over freely with a simple visa. You got the visa just once and used it many times. That has stopped for the Russian side. The Norwegian people can still do this but not the Russians. It has hurt their economy and the guide said the town is dying. They hope the iron mine will open again and bring prosperity. The Finland border is approx. 28 miles away.

Everything is running at about thirty minutes late. That might be due to the rough waters yesterday. The drive was beautiful but the snow hotel was a bit of a disappointment. We thought it was a good-sized hotel with a bar where we would sit and have the hot drink and sausage, according to the description. Instead, we started out on a walk to go see sled dogs, and on to see reindeer. We changed shoes to boots provided and then onto the very small hotel with a temperature of 27-28F. There was a bar and we stood around having a tiny glass of elderberry juice. At the entrance there is a large carving of a King Crab and a few colored lights around. We perused the five or six snow hotel rooms. They have a block of ice for the bed with a mattress and a skin over them. There are different carvings in each room. You are given a sleeping bag but there is no restroom. If you need that, you must go outside and down a path in the middle of the night. A few people opted for that from our ship. Next, we were supposed to go to the restaurant and get a hot drink and sausage. With just 12 minutes remaining and quite a walk up a hill to get there and back, we just skipped it. Our guide brought us back a reindeer sausage, which was very good. After a lovely drive back to the ship, we had lunch in the Havly Café. We are a bit tired of the lunch menu. Stuart had a burger and I had Bolognese; both were hot and tasty, a pleasant change. We played a few cards then went back to the cabin and took a nap. We are hoping the water will not be as rough as yesterday.