Ullandhaug was the area of the city to which we first headed. There would be two components forming this part of the excursion and both from very different parts of Stavanger’s history. We started at the Iron Age Farm open air museum. The location of Jernaldergården felt a little anachronistic, being overlooked by apartment blocks on one side, and this did detract from being able to immerse yourselves fully in the history, but it was still very interesting to visit and the guides did a fabulous job of recounting tales of what life was like in the period between 350 and 550 CE.

We didn’t just wander around the exterior of the farm buildings like the sheep in the area, but also were taken inside one for some more iron age storytelling. The buildings were very interesting, set into the ground and with turf laid on the roofs to keep the places as warm as possible. They were, however, awkward to get into and out of without a lot of bending and risk of bumps to the head.

Staying in the Ullandhaug area we next paid a visit to Ullandhaugtårnet, a telecommunications tower and landmark overlooking the city of Stavanger. Built in 1964 and standing sixty four metres in height there were some delightfully brutalist elements to the design that I loved and that many of our fellow passengers on the excursion couldn’t stand. As a light drizzle accompanied our visit to the tower and there were steps involved to get onto its viewing platform, a fair number of people decided to stay on the bus for the short time of our visit as a result.

Other than providing some lovely views of the Norwegian landscape around Stavanger, the tower itself did not have a lot of history, although it was built next to the spot where another tower commemorating the Battle of Hafrsjord had been erected in 1896 but which had been mostly destroyed during the Second World War. Stone markers with Viking symbols indicated where the remains of the tower had been removed the year before the telecoms tower had been constructed.

We enjoyed the scenery and tutted a little at the mediocre quality of the street art decorating some of the walls before heading back to the bus which was waiting to take us back to Stavanger.

The Princess Patter – the daily programme of events aboard ship when you’re cruising with Princess Cruises – provided all the information we needed to know that the morning would include trivia and nothing else. Sadly, the trivia clashed with the Zumba class which we would definitely have 100% liked to do had we been suffering from possession by the spirits of people who’d died keeping fit. And the trivia overran the start of the acupuncture seminar which would have been thoroughly interesting if parasites had eaten away any of the rational parts of our brains. Some knowledge-testing, then, with a stroll up to the top deck afterwards to watch the approach to Stavanger.

A very quick aside: the front of this particular day’s Princess Patter included the following statements from the senior doctor at the time. As I’m writing this in 2020 it’s worth reminding those who think (or who have a vested interest in promoting the misguided belief) that cruise ships are “petri dishes” and unclean and the sources of viral infections, cruise ships and cruise lines have always promoted higher levels of cleanliness than you would ever have found while travelling by air or staying in hotels.

And with that out of the way let’s get on with the purpose of this post: our approach to Stavanger on Crown Princess.

The morning was cloudy with showers forecast for the day ashore in Norway, but the temperature was pretty good and it was thankfully dry as we headed out onto the top deck of the ship. We started at the aft because you’ve got to start somewhere. One thing you might be able to discern from these pictures is that there was noticeable vibration towards the rear of Crown Princess on this cruise. You can see the effect on the surface of the aft swimming pool. This never bothered us, and we even chose an aft balcony when we cruised again on Crown Princess to the Baltics four years later, but if you’ve not cruised before and feel this is something that could be a problem for you then book a cabin away from where the propellers are.

Heading forwards towards midships brought us to the two main swimming pools that Crown Princess sports. Both pools are open to the elements so it’s not the most ideal ship for cruising to colder climates but don’t let that put you off her as a vessel. We took in some of the views of the mainland and I snapped plenty of photos of exciting things such as telephones and railings. It keeps me out of mischief.

When your cruise ship is scheduled for a port day you may not get much organised in terms of outdoor activities unless, as was the case on this day, you’re not due to anchor or dock until fairly late. To keep passengers entertained, a morning golf chipping challenge was arranged around the Neptune pool, and a good mix of talented and talentless would-be-golfers sent balls into the water, the assembled crowd, and occasionally the target shower unit to general enjoyment.

The day was getting surprisingly brighter as the ship started to see the first signs of the outskirts of Stavanger appear alongside, and we decided to watch the remainder of the sail into the Norwegian port from our cabin balcony. There was a mix of attractive residential properties along the water’s edge and reasonably heavy, industrial sections. While the cruise ship of necessity kept her speed low to stop from producing waves to swamp the shoreline, the same restriction didn’t apply to smaller boats that merrily zipped along between the vessel and the land.

One sight that caught our attention was an old ship. This turned out to be the Rogaland and she’s a ship with a moderately interesting history. She was originally built in 1929 as a combined cargo and passenger vessel making runs from Stavanger to Oslo and Bergen. In 1944, while docked in Bergen, an ammunition barge that had come into the port for repairs exploded (killing a waitress on the ship in addition to numerous dock workers) and the resulting damage sank Rogaland. She was re-floated but not fully repaired until after the war when she resumed coastal routes. In 1989 veteran ship enthusiasts bought Rogaland with the intention of restoring her to her 1929 original look inside and out. Rising costs have reduced that plan to restoring her to her 1964 look instead which was when she last ran the standard passenger and cargo routes and before she worked around shipyards. Finally, if you’ve seen the movie Dunkirk then you might have spotted Rogaland acting the part of a hospital ship.

For the final approach to Stavanger, Crown Princess swung around, bow to port, stern to starboard, in order to reverse into its designated spot alongside. This gave us the chance to see what we’d been missing from our balcony on the northeastern side of the channel into the city, that mostly being some smaller islands connected to the mainland by bridges. Plenty of fellow passengers watched the same views from atop the bridge wings.

Our day in Stavanger included an organised excursion and some free time to explore the city. The first part of our day’s excursion would see us travel to the Ullandhaug area of the city in order to take a look at an iron age farm and a telecommunications tower.

Our bus dropped us off in the main square in the city centre, next to a park and lake, Breiavatnet, and with views to the inlet of water, Vågen, in which Crown Princess was docked. The proximity to greenery and water with all its boats, along with Norway’s naturally crisp (though pleasant) September air, gave everything a fresh feeling somewhat at odds with some of architecture on show, much of which was brutalist or modernist. This was partly the result of damage during World War 2 – the Germans had attacked and occupied the city following a parachute assault in early 1940 – and partly the result of an economic boom in the wake of oil discoveries in the North Sea during post-war years.

The first of the two things to see in Stavanger included in our organised excursion was Stavanger Cathedral. The city of Stavanger considers its formation to be the year 1125 despite the area being inhabited before that, and construction of Stavanger Cathedral is reckoned to have taken place between 1100 and 1150. The building of the cathedral was instigated by Bishop Reinald who likely came from Winchester in the Anglo Saxon kingdom of Wessex, giving Stavanger a loose connection with my home county of Hampshire.

Originally Romanesque in design, reconstruction was required following a large fire in 1272 and Gothic design elements were introduced. The present interior and exterior look of the cathedral, however, follows first a removal of medieval themes from the design then a partial restoration of them in the 1860s and post-war period from the 1940s to 1960s respectively. We can’t really say anything here because we keep changing our dining room too.

The first thing to be brought to our attention just inside the entrance of Stavanger Cathedral was a large tapestry by Frida Hansen. Frida’s history is an interesting one. The wealthy families into which she was born (1855) and married fell into some hardship during an economic downturn and for a time Frida had sole responsibility for her family. She sought to start up a business repairing tapestries and, later, having taken some courses, started producing tapestries of her own. Her skill was such that she put on exhibitions, won awards, and studied abroad. The prevailing art fashion at the time was art nouveau and she introduced this into her work back in Norway. Her final piece of work, however, was the Saint Olav Tapestry that hangs now in Stavanger Cathedral and, with art nouveau having gone out of fashion by the time she started in 1926, this piece reflects more traditional elements of Norwegian design. There is a good write-up about individual parts of the design of the wall covering here: Frida Hansen’s Last Large Tapestry.

Stavanger Cathedral isn’t a particularly large cathedral by any stretch of the imagination and has a fairly basic layout consisting of three main aisles with the nave’s abundance of semi-circular arches immediately announcing the original Romanesque architecture. The pulpit was particularly impressive; wooden, beautifully carved, and surprisingly colourful. If you’re visiting the cathedral in Stavanger then pay particular attention to the designs around the capitals of the pillars. Slightly odd for what was originally a Roman Catholic place of worship, but totally typical for anywhere you find yourself in Scandinavia, you’ll find imagery depicting scenes of Ragnarok which I’ve thoughtfully neglected to photograph thereby forcing you to book a trip to Norway to see for yourself.

As we left the building, a painted and carved wooden portrait consisting of Søfren Pedersen Godtzen, former mayor of Stavanger, along with his wife and eighteen children also caught our eyes, not least because of the eighteen children. I’m guessing there wasn’t a lot of day-to-day work for a seventeenth century mayor in Norway to do or he had aspirations of raising football teams. The cold, Norwegian winters can turn a man’s mind. You might only initially count sixteen offspring but if you look to the bottom left of the group you’ll spot the other two, obviously-deceased children too. A second portrait on the wall opposite was more interesting for its frame incorporating a skull and some almost surreal faces.

So, not a huge amount to see in the cathedral but worth a quick visit because of its historical age in the country and to take a look at some of the artistry on display.

A walk of a few hundred metres from the cathedral brought us to the final part of our final organised excursion on this cruise. Gamle Stavanger is now a clean, quaint area of cobbled streets with white, wooden-panelled buildings but it very nearly didn’t make it out of the 1950s unlike the first person we saw who was still investigating a murder in a liquor joint run by mobsters.

The original houses sprung up during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries but following the second world war and the need to rebuild damaged areas this entire area was set to be demolished and for modern, concrete buildings to go up in place. Fortunately for tourism in general, the city architect at the time saw the potential in conserving the traditional structures and turning the rundown houses and businesses into something far more pleasing to the eye. Today, this old part of the city of Stavanger is a trendy location to own a home and the only major downside is people wandering through perpetually snapping photos.

A few flashes of street art and decoration aside, Gamle Stavanger appeared to be uniformly attractive at first glance but the painted panels and tiled roofs disguised quite a variety of housing designs and helped with the feeling of a natural evolution of buildings rather than something planned.

Gamle Stavanger is situated on the western side of the Vågen inlet which was also where our cruise ship was docked, making for an interesting, almost anachronistic sight in the old town part of the city. It certainly brought home – not that we needed it bringing home – just how large cruise ships are.

There are a few notably historic buildings amongst the collection of generally historic buildings dotted around Gamle Stavanger. A canning museum in a preserved cannery building is probably the main one (particularly if you like cans), although a traditional workers’ cottage and a building dating to 1726 both may be of interest too, with all three located along Øvre Strandgate. Sadly, all three were closed during our visit so we simply had to make do with soaking in some of the tranquility that comes from being taken back in time in our minds in these sorts of attractions. While most of the buildings are private residences you’ll also find some shops and cafés in the streets so whether the museum is open or not it’s all still worth a look around.

We had some time at the conclusion of our tour of some of Stavanger’s highlights to head into the main part of the city had we wanted but the proximity of Crown Princess to where our excursion terminated helped us to decide to hop back onto the ship instead.

Stavanger’s on no accounts the most appealing of the Norwegian ports if you’re taking a fjords cruise but the city has enough to see and do in and around it. Our tour was an eclectic one taking in sights from the Iron Age through medieval periods and into the telecommunications age, and a good taster of how history helps to build a place.

There were fewer photos taken on our cruise departure from Stavanger, you might be pleased to hear, but if you haven’t seen the pictures taken of the Norwegian landscape as we sailed into the city earlier in the day then please read this: Norwegian Fjords Cruise To Stavanger.

Leaving Norwegian waters and hitting the North Sea, Crown Princess then turned southwards to head for home. With us being on the starboard side of the ship this gave us the opportunity to even witness a sunset at sea from our balcony, something we’d not been able to do during the earlier days of this cruise. And you wonder why we like to cruise so much!?

If you’re on a cruise ship that visits Stavanger then you won’t have far to walk as the berths are right beside the old town area – Gamle Stavanger, as it’s known – and other interesting spots aren’t much further away. For us this meant we didn’t have to get up too early to make the most of our time in the port but we were still awake before Britannia had fully come alongside. We were able to watch plenty of cruisers disembark for tours or to head ashore early while we had a leisurely breakfast.

The old town area of Gamle Stavanger was where we wanted to head first. It’s impossible to miss with the ship docked right next to it, but if you do have any trouble then simply look for the largest grouping of white buildings.

We’d been to this part of Stavanger back in 2013 but we did have a specific reason for wanting to return to the cobbled streets and white, wooden-fronted buildings again. When we’d looked into the details of this cruise and mentioned it to my in-laws they’d scoffed at Stavanger’s mention and remarked that they’d been several times, it wasn’t very interesting, and there was a canning museum there that they’d stated was the most boring place they’d visited on Earth.

For us, though, this is the sort of thing we look out for. It might be boring. It might not. But doing different things or having good, old-fashioned, new experiences every now and then is all part of the joy that is travelling in general. And we’re very contrarian too. Tell us that something’s not worth doing and there’s every chance we’re going to try it. We’d made up our mind that the Stavanger canning museum would be the first thing we’d visit.

Something that hadn’t been ashore when we’d visited Stavanger before was the very colourful street art pictured below. Stavanger Houston was created by Houston-based artist GONZO247 in 2018, a gift from the Texas city that is twinned with it.

Being in Gamle Stavanger brought back a lot of fond memories from the 2013 cruise to Norway that had really cemented our love of this form of travel. It was great to see certain buildings and actually remember them, although I tried to snap some different types of shots on this occasion too. I enjoyed getting up close to the various mosses and other plants growing around the place.

One thing you’ll see whenever you look at anyone’s photos or videos taken from this historic area of Stavanger, though, particularly if they’ve cruised to Norway, is a shot of the cruise ship showing just how big it is compared to the buildings and how close it is to them too. I took almost the same photo of Britannia below as I did of Crown Princess the decade before and I can assure you that if we visit Stavanger in the future on another ship there’s every chance I’ll take the same shot again.

In the next post in this series I’ll show off some of the photos from our visit to both the canning museum and printing museum that was all part of the same complex and you’ll be able to find out whether we thought it was as boring as we’d been told to expect.

Purchasing our ticket for the canning museum also granted us access to other museums in Stavanger, one of which was in a modern building beside the more historical one we’d come to see. We decided to wander around the Printing Museum first.

As you might expect from a museum with this name, it housed equipment covering the history and importance of printing in and around the Stavanger area in Norway. Printing presses, book-binding, typesets, and various other bits and pieces were in abundance but there wasn’t a lot of explanation as to what anything really did or what it was for, and we were the only ones there so our visit was one of a casual wander, taking a few photos, oohing over some of the machinery because we like a nice bit of industrialisation, and wondering why this particular museum was part of the same complex that showcased the canning industry we’re really come to see. That would become clear afterwards, though.

We then made our way to the Canning Museum, a very different sort of building indeed. This was a place where actual canning of fish had taken place and you could see lots of machinery, smoking ovens, examples of the cans produced, etc.

Was this the most boring museum in the world, though, as we’d been told? Absolutely not, and the reason for that was simply that upon entering we’d been approached by a man sporting a badge that read “Piers” on it. He asked us and a few other people around if we’d like him to show us around and tell us about the exhibits and we said yes. Oddly, nobody else wanted to at first, so the pair of us got a personal tour showing off all the various things on display along with some demonstrations of some of the equipment in operation, and gradually other visitors drifted over and started tagging along with us as well.

Having a knowledgeable guide for this museum was fabulous and really helped to bring the place to life and we also learnt about the connection to the printing museum next door: the labels, of course! At its peak there were over fifty canneries operating in Stavanger preparing fish to send around the world but the last of them closed down in 2002.

The upstairs section of the canning museum featured rooms set out as they would have been during the height of the canning industry in Stavanger. If you’re a fan of old telephone equipment and pieces of furniture then you’ll love these glimpses into the past.

So, we’d have lied and told my wife’s parents that we’d found the canning museum interesting just for the hell of it if we hadn’t enjoyed our visit there, but thanks largely to Piers we genuinely did like the Norwegian Canning Museum. If you’re visiting Stavanger then you’re likely to take a look around Gamle Stavanger because everyone does, and if you’re there anyway then it’s a decent way to spend some time, maybe learn a few things, or even just pick up some sardines in the gift shop.

In the next post in this cruise travelogue series we’ll take a walk through Gamle Stavanger on the way to another museum included in the ticket price we’d just paid.

Gamle Stavanager was almost demolished in the 1950s but the city architect decided to clean up and restore the by-then near-derelict buildings, and many generations of cruisers would like to thank him for this decision. It’s a very attractive location in an otherwise fairly industrialised city as you can see for yourself below.

In case you’re wondering whether I took another photo of our cruise ship from the same place I’d already taken a photo of our cruise ship, Britannia, when wandering through Gamle Stavanger earlier in the day, then I’m happy to report that of course I did.

As we reached the end of Gamle Stavanger, getting close to our next intended destination, we came across a sculpture, marker stone, and a little bit of street art commemorating the Norwegian philosopher, scientist, and poet, Henrik Steffens, who was born in the city in 1773.

In the next post in this cruise travelogue series we’ll be taking a look around the third of the museums we visited in Stavanger, the Maritime Museum.

The Stavanger Maritime Museum is located within old waterfront merchant buildings, and if you’re visiting Stavanger by cruise ship then they’re a few minutes away from where your ship is likely docked. Rather than a somewhat staid history of maritime industry in this part of Norway, the exhibitions feature authentically decorated and accurately reconstructed representations of businesses instead. This makes for a lovely leap back in time and a very nice way to spend some time ashore.

It’s no secret that we like to cruise – we were visiting Norway on Britannia on this occasion, after all – so it was nice to see some historical nods to cruising featured in the form of vintage posters. The ships featured below are the Sagafjord and Stavangerfjord, both operated by the now-defunct Norwegian America Line. It’s great to see the stylish depiction of the ballroom and unsurprising to see the cabin layouts from the 1960s haven’t really changed at all to now.

The exhibitions in Stavanger Maritime Museum included the Monsen family’s office, the authentic location for shipowners who operated for most of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries there. Reconstructions of a merchant’s home from the early part of the twentieth century and a general store from the same period, as well as a sailmaker’s loft space completed the spaces on show. It was all very well done, nicely laid out, easy to get around, and full of fascinating little details. We particularly liked the incredibly ornate telephone in one of the rooms.

A very nice museum indeed. This was less a place to learn anything new and more a place to absorb some of the feel of the local history, and we very much enjoyed doing just that.

In the next post in this cruise travelogue series we’ll explore a little bit more of Stavanger on foot, taking in the very attractive, very colourful area of Fargegaten.

Across from the fairly narrow harbour of Stavanger there looked to be waterfront cafés, restaurants, and shops, and so we headed that way. It would also give us a nice view back towards Britannia at the cruise dock and that’s the sort of thing you’ve got to take photos of when you’re cruising or other fans of cruising will shun you. I like a good shunning as much as the next person, but sometimes it’s nice to oblige.

There was another interesting-looking ship alongside at Stavanger and this turned out to be MS Rogaland.

Rogaland was built in 1929 and served as a coastal liner between Norwegian ports with cargo holds, including cold storage and the capability to transport live fish. In 1944 Rogaland was alongside in Bergen unloading cargo when another vessel, Voorbode, taking explosives from Oslo for the Germans ran into difficulties and came in for repairs. It was close enough to Rogaland that when the German-requisitioned trawler suddenly exploded the ensuing wave knocked Rogaland to the bottom of the harbour and cracked her hull. She was subsequently raised, repaired, and used for other purposes through the decades until 1989 when historical ship enthusiasts bought her with the intention of restoring her to her 1929 glory. That goal was eventually scaled back to return her to her 1964 state instead and that’s more-or-less what you’ll see today.

Back to our walk around Stavanger; we soon came across Fargegaten, and you’ll know you’ve reached it too when Willy Wonka passes by you with shades on, muttering how it’s all a bit too bright and colourful for his liking. Ignore Willy Wonka. Fargegaten is beautiful. Every building – most wooden-fronted – is slightly different from its neighbour in style, and often painted in the most contrasting hues from the colour palette. The result is a vibrant explosion that could probably cut through the gloom of a rainy day, but luckily for us it was nice and sunny.

It won’t take you long to look around Fargegaten in Stavanger unless you stop in any of the businesses eager for your tourist money, and we might have done the same ourselves except it was impossible to miss the street art all around and we are very fond of street art. We ended up following roads – “Is that another one down there?” we’d ask each other – and soon strolled away from the busier area catering to visitors both from Norway and the cruise ship. Stencil work was most prominent from what we saw, some of it not quite obvious as to intention but plenty that proclaimed their messages loud and clear. Some good stuff here.

Before we finally hit a watering hole to reward ourselves for a good day’s exploration and cultural immersion we made a quick detour to take a look at the Valberg Tower. Built between 1850 and 1853, Valberg served as a watchtower for the city and at the time was the highest point in it with the duties of those stationed there including warning the people of Stavanger if there was a fire. The slope leading up to the base of the tower was just angled awkwardly enough to slightly turn my wife’s already-dodgy ankle so we decided not to go inside in case it was possible to climb even higher, because we’d both inevitably have done it and most likely one of us – I’m not saying who – would get injured worse.

We finished our time ashore in Stavanger with a couple of drinks in Bar Bache. Norwegian ale is not the greatest (well, there are exceptions – Ægir in Flåm being an obvious one that we’d visited in 2015 and would be visiting again later during this cruise) but the point for us is not just to spend locally but to experience locally too if we can, even if you have to suffer slightly. The bar itself was small with an old-fashioned English pub feel to it which was nice as well.

In the next post in this 2023 Norwegian cruise aboard Britannia travelogue series I’ll cover the views from our balcony as we depart Stavanger and head off to the next port of call.

Directly opposite our balcony was the part of Stavanger in which we’d seen the street art and had a drink in the bar just prior to walking back to the ship.

There’s not a lot to be said about the cruise away from Stavanger. While it’s a port that’s often listed on cruises claiming that they’re visiting the Norwegian fjords, it isn’t down a long one with stunning landscapes and towering rock faces to take the breath away. It’s actually a very short journey to get out to the open sea and that mostly involves passing a few low-lying islands. The low-lying islands are very nice, of course, and if you’re at all interested in geology then that adds something else to just the aesthetics, but a sail away or into Stavanger is one of the less memorable, let’s say.

I’m always interested in seeing other ships when we’re cruising around the world, and not just because I’m a fan of being on the sea or because I was born and raised and still live on an island city with strong naval connections, although there might be something to that too. As a keen inhabitant of the Fediverse I like to take part in some of the regular themes of posts that crop up across the various communities, one of which is a German one that posts ships each weekends. It’s nice to find interesting-looking vessels or ones with history to share.

The platform supply vessel Coey Viking stood out for all the obvious reasons you can see in the photo below. Eye-achingly bright yellow. Shaped like a truck without a shipping container to transport. It’s actually a hybrid ship, making use of its battery when operating close to shore to reduce environmental impact, which all sounds grand until you realise that the platforms it supplies are oil and gas ones at sea. I suppose every little helps, and I can’t go into too much about environmental impacts when I like to cruise, after all.

Of course, I won’t engage in any argument from someone trying to talk to me about how damaging all this is while using an expensive device made with rare earth metals, transported at great cost from the other side of the world. We’re all hypocrites, but falling out with those above your own personal line of this much hypocrisy is okay but that much is bad is how religions and cults form, and I’m an atheist.

You’re dying to know what it was we had to eat in the main dining room on Britannia that evening after our sail away from Stavanger, and fortunately I was there to take photos. Cruise food can be very hit-and-miss but I made notes at the time that this was actually very nice which suggests it was actually very nice indeed.

Entertainment on cruise ships is something we often steer away from and that was the case here too as we bought a bottle of wine and retired to our room early to watch a movie in the quiet comfort of our cabin.

In the next post in this Britannia cruise travelogue series we’ll be arriving at a new port for us in the form of Nordfjordeid. Unfortunately, though, arriving is all we end up doing and the day is spent cruising along the Nordfjord instead.