Sommarøy and Tromsø - June 2013

When it was announced that Norway would be hosting our yearly meeting for the european staff, I was excited. I like the nordic countries a lot. But then they told us it wouldn't be in Oslo. No, they would pick us up in Tromsø and bring us to an island called Sommarøy. Ooooo-kay. Not all of my colleagues were happy, most of us would spend half a day and more on a plane to get there. But when the norwegian collegues showed us pictures of Sommarøy (the name means summer island, by the way) nobody thought about complaining anymore. It looked just too good to be true.

So - what is important about Tromsø? First of all, it's in the Arctic. It's 350 km north of the arctic circle, about two hours flight from Oslo. North of the arctic circle also means that the sun does not rise in winter, in Tromsø for two months. It's possible to experience northern lights, Aurora Borealis, there (I didn't know exactly how they come into existence, and I was fascinated by a film explaining the phenomenon at Polaria museum in Tromsø. You can watch a shorter, but just as interesting version of it here).

And then, for two months in summer, there's no sunset in Tromsø. I had of course heard of the Midnight Sun, but as I've never been so far north before, I didn't know what it means to go to bed at 2 am and have the sun shining horizontally in your room. But more about this later.

When my collegue and I arrived in Oslo after two hours flight, it was raining and very grey. Some colleagues had already arrived in Sommarøy and were posting beautiful pictures on Facebook. I got jealous and couldn't wait to get there. I admit that paying about 25 Euro for a hamburger and some french fries at the restaurant of the airport hotel didn't actually make me want to stay there much longer. On the next day we met our colleagues from Malta at the airport, and one of the swedish colleagues also took the same flight to Tromsø. It's always a pleasure to see all of them and I was very much looking forward to meet the teams from 29 countries in Sommarøy. Another two hours flight and one hour by bus later, we finally arrived. Usually I don't take pictures out of windows, but the stunning views we had from the bus made me forget that principle. And Sommarøy - I guess no picture in the world can give the right impression of this incredibly beautiful place. The island is quite small, and a bridge is connecting it with the neighbouring island of Hillesøy. It's a tiny village, few cars, a nice little harbour, there are white, sandy beaches and the sea is turquoise like the mediterranean in the sunlight. But even if you might forget it for a second, stunned by all the beauty, you're in the Arctic. The water is cold, icy cold. And there's wind. So if you feel like taking off your clothes and go swimming right away - don't.

This one - for example - I took at 0:19.

Oh yes, the hotel. At Sommarøy Arctic Hotel, we stayed in groups of four in cabins, most of them with direct access to the beaches and very nice views. It felt like holidays! After a guided tour around the island and a great barbecue (including whale meat and fantastic fish!), we were told that we could use the hot tub (outdoors, of course!) and the sauna. It was already quite late, but not dark at all, the sun was still shining, and I started to think I should get tired after such a long day, but I absolutely wasn't. My body obviously had not heard about the Midnight Sun and thought it was still afternoon or something. I hadn't planned to go to bed early, as the next day was my birthday. I wanted to stay up until midnight anyway. So I joined some of the colleagues in the hot tub, and at 00:00, I still sat in there, a beer in my hand and the midnight sun on my face. Happy Birthday to me! Later I took a walk around the hotel cabins, to the beach, and took some pictures. It felt awesome, just like paradise, it was perfectly calm and peaceful, the seagulls were screaming and I could hear the waves. I still wasn't tired, but as the programme (work!) would start at 8:30 am, I decided to go to bed at around 2 am - and yes, the sun was shining horizontally into my room. I didn't get much sleep that night. But I didn't mind until 10 the next morning when I couldn't stop yawning but still had to work. I have to say norwegian coffee is not the right thing for trying to stay awake, I drank A LOT of it that day and it didn't help.

When we finished work in the late afternoon, Monsieur had arrived in Sommarøy. He had been camping and hiking in the mountains around Tromsø for the last three days and joined us on my birthday. While one group went to the harbour to go for a boat trip, the hotel manager lit a fire on the beach and offered the rest of us seagull eggs with caviar and beer. So cool! Afterwards we also went for the boat trip, and it was fantastic. We were brought to an island where sea eagles live and we even saw some of them. A very nice dinner followed, and afterwards we climbed the small mountain on the island to see the sun not go down. It was an awesome experience. That night, I slept much better. Having Monsieur at my side and memories of the best birthday ever in my head.

0:28. No, that's not sunset.

The next day after the last workshop and saying goodbye to the colleagues and to Sommarøy, we were brought back to Tromsø. Monsieur and me, we still had three days in Tromsø ahead of us. We checked in at Smarthotel, the rooms are incredibly small but nice, and the breakfast was really good (very important reason not to like a hotel: bad breakfast).

On Sunday, we went for a walk in Tromsdalen valley, the weather wasn't actually good, but at least it wasn't raining. In the evening, we visited Uli from "Neues aus der Arktis" and had a very nice evening, planning our tour for the next day and learning about her life in the Arctic. On Monday, unfortunately, the weather was worse than expected. So we changed our plans and went for a shorter tour on Kvaløya island, we wanted to reach Kjølen (about 800m above sea level). The tour was really nice, we walked through a barren valley where some snowy patches still reminded of winter. Uli knows a lot about the arctic flora and I was fascinated by the tiny flowers we found and the variety of moss. Soon it began to rain and we saw the fog creeping up the valley behind us. When we realised that it would take us at least another hour to reach the top and we were already soaked, we decided to go back. The fog quickly surrounded us, and we followed the winter path down. If we had experienced something like this in the alps, I probably would have been worried of getting lost and not finding our way back because of the darkness that would have come in the evening. But thanks to the Midnight Sun, we knew light wouldn't be a problem and we just had to try and stick to the winter path. We arrived back in the valley, soaked and hungry, but happy.

That evening was already our last in Tromsø. We had dinner at the very nice Brasserie 69°N, I can recommend their Crème brulée and I also liked the lamb a lot.

After a short shopping tour on Tuesday morning (reindeer and elk dry meat for my parents and friends) we started our nine hours trip back home. In Tromsø, it was about 10°C, in Oslo 20°C. When we arrived in Zurich, it was 30°C. And on the train back to Bern, we saw the sun slowly disappearing behind the mountains. That night, it was dark again. It felt weird, but also comforting. The Midnight Sun has been an incredibly beautiful experience. I would love to spend more time in the Arctic some day, and hopefully I will also see the northern lights...