The fjord is the trip. The boat is how you see it.
Which Bergen cruise actually turns in the current at Mostraumen. What a February RIB out of Tromso costs once the thermal suit is included. Whether six hours on deck at Kenai Fjords beats a floatplane over Misty Fjords. Reviews of the fjord trips you can book.
Trollfjorden, the Arctic light, Kenai ice, the Seven Sisters.
Four fjords that decide a whole trip, and the boat each one is best seen from. What the day costs, and what the people who sailed it say.
- 01The narrow oneLofoten Islands Silent Trollfjord CruiseLofoten cuts inland through a gap barely a hundred metres wide. The engines go quiet and the walls close over the deck.
02The Arctic dayArctic Fjord Cruise & Fishing ExperienceOut of Tromso into open Arctic water, with lines over the side and whatever comes up cooked on board.
03The ice dayKenai Fjords National Park Glacier & Wildlife Tour from SewardSix hours out of Seward to a tidewater glacier that calves while you watch, with otters and puffins on the way.
04The waterfall dayFjord and Waterfalls Sightseeing Boat TripGeirangerfjord past the Seven Sisters, a short trip that spends its whole hour pointed at the good side.
In Norway the fjord you get is decided by the harbour you leave from.
These four towns sit on completely different water. Choosing between them is the first real decision of the trip, and it is mostly a decision about how far north you are willing to go.
The fjord trips more people book than any others.
See the whole fjord catalogue →Demand on this coast is lopsided. A handful of sailings carry most of the traffic, and these are them, with what each one is actually selling.
1
The Original Fjord Cruise to Mostraumen
Cruise from Bergen’s Fish Market through Osterfjord to the narrow Mostraumen strait aboard a comfortable Rødne boat. You’ll see Bryggen, steep mountains, waterfalls, and possibly eagles, with English and Norwegian audio commentary. Hot drinks, cinnamon buns, waffles, and simple food are sold onboard. Winter ice may change the route.
From · $93
Read our review →
2
Electric Fjord Cruise to Lysefjord & Preikestolen
from $93
3
Oslo Fjord Sightseeing Cruise by Sailing Ship
from $39
4
Scenic Fjord Cruise with Audio Guide Commentary
from $44
5
Arctic Fjord Cruise & Fishing Experience
from $152
6
Fjords and Sommarøy Islands Tour with Salmon Picnic
from $112
7
Mostraumen Fjord Cruise – with Local Tour Guides
from $78
8
Lofoten Islands Silent Trollfjord Cruise
from $140
Six towns that put you on fjord water before lunch.
A fjord is only as reachable as its harbour. These six carry almost every sailing worth taking: four along the Norwegian coast, one in Alaska at the edge of a national park, one at the top of the Icelandic Westfjords.
Big boat, rigid inflatable, or your own paddle.
The hull decides the trip more than the fjord does. A cruiser gives you a heated saloon and three hours of coastline. A RIB gives you spray, speed and the back of a waterfall. A kayak gives you the waterline and nothing else.
What an hour on fjord water actually costs.
Every trip on the site, grouped by price. The cheap end is not the bad end here: some of the best water in Norway is a two-hour sightseeing boat out of a city centre.
City-harbour sightseeing boats, the Lim fjord out of Rovinj, short Oslofjord hops on a wooden ship.
The standards: Mostraumen, Lysefjord, the Arctic half-days out of Tromso, Geiranger under the waterfalls.
Full days with a train or a glacier attached, private RIBs, and the Kenai Fjords deck days.
North of Tromso the fjords change character entirely.
The water widens, the mountains drop straight into it, and the light does the work: blue dusk from November, sun that never sets from late May. Sea eagles follow the boats for the fish, and half the fleet hands you a full thermal suit at the gangway.
On a fjord the calendar picks the trip, not you.
North of the Arctic Circle the sun is gone from late November to mid-January and never sets from late May. Geiranger and the mountain roads shut under snow. Waterfalls run hardest in June when the snowmelt comes off. Wear layers you can take off and expect to be handed a flotation suit on anything fast.
Three things a fjord does that no other coastline can.
Sea cliffs and boat trips exist everywhere. A drowned glacial valley a kilometre deep with a road-free wall on both sides does not.
The gap at Trollfjorden
The mouth of Trollfjorden is about a hundred metres across, and the boats that go in have to slow to a crawl and turn inside a basin barely wider than they are. Walls rise a thousand metres on both sides, the engine noise bounces back off them, and most skippers cut the motors for a minute so you hear the meltwater instead. When the swell gets up outside, nobody goes in at all.
- 1Lofoten Islands Silent Trollfjord Cruise★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 2,979 reviews
- 2Lofoten RIB Sea Eagle Safari Trollfjord Cruise★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 908 reviews
- 3RIB Boat Lofoten Trollfjord Sea Eagle Safari★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 754 reviews
The arm they made a railway for
Naeroyfjord is the narrowest navigable arm of the Sognefjord, seventeen kilometres long and at one point only two hundred and fifty metres wide, with farms still clinging to ledges above the waterline. The Flam Railway exists because of it: twenty kilometres of track climbing almost nine hundred metres so the boat passengers had a way back up the valley.
- 1Viking Village, Nærøyfjord Cruise & Flåm Railway★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 1,047 reviews
- 2Guided Tour To Nærøyfjorden, Flåm And Stegastein – Viewpoint Cruise★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 1,021 reviews
- 3UNESCO Fjord Cruise, Flåm & Stegastein – Incl. Lunch★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 588 reviews
Ice that reaches the sea
Kenai Fjords is one of the few places a boat can idle in front of a glacier that still calves directly into salt water. The captain holds position a few hundred metres off, cuts the engine, and you wait. The crack arrives before the ice does, and the swell it throws reaches the hull about half a minute later.
- 1Kenai Fjords National Park Glacier & Wildlife Cruise★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,756 reviews
- 2Kenai Fjords and Resurrection Bay Half-Day Wildlife Cruise★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,156 reviews
- 3Kenai Fjords National Park Glacier & Wildlife Tour from Seward★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 1,036 reviews
Alaska, Iceland and Fiordland do fjords on their own terms.
Norway has the name, not the monopoly. Alaska adds tidewater glaciers and orca. The Icelandic Westfjords add empty roads and Dynjandi falling down a whole hillside. Fiordland adds rain, three hundred days of it, and a coastline nobody lives on.
Every fjord outside Norway →
Bergen is the shortest walk from a hotel bed to a fjord deck.
Everything out of Bergen →
The quay sits in the middle of town, which is why the western fjords are a morning decision here rather than a logistics problem. Three ways out, in rising order of how much of your day they eat.
Mostraumen, where the current reverses
North up the Osterfjord to a narrows so tight the tide pushes the water backwards through it twice a day. The boat noses in under a waterfall and someone fills a glass from it.
Naeroyfjord and the Flam Railway
A UNESCO arm of the Sognefjord by boat, then the steepest standard-gauge railway in Europe back up through the Flam valley. It is a whole day and it is the day people remember.
The same fjords at forty knots
A rigid inflatable gets further in less time and gets closer to the rock. You will be handed a flotation suit and goggles, and you will be glad of both.
Four fjord bookings that will not wait for you.
Most of this coast can be sorted the night before from a harbour cafe. These four run on train timetables, short seasons and tides, none of which care when your flight lands.
- 01Viking Village, Nærøyfjord Cruise & Flåm RailwayThe railway carriages and the fjord boat run to one linked timetable, and the summer departures sell out weeks ahead.
- 02Lofoten Islands Silent Trollfjord CruiseThe fjord mouth is barely a hundred metres wide. Swell, wind or winter ice closes it, and the boat turns around outside.
- 03Kenai Fjords National Park Glacier & Wildlife CruiseThe park sailings run roughly mid-March to September. Outside that window there is no boat at any price.
- 04Dalsnibba, Flydalsjuvet, Eagle Bend & Fjords TourGeiranger is a summer harbour. The boats and the road over Trollstigen above it both shut once the snow arrives.
Bergen to Tromso: the run that strings the famous fjords together.
Flam
Geiranger
Alesund
Svolvaer
The newest fjord trip reviews.
Older fjord reviews, further down →
Snowmobile and Snowshoe Dual Adventure in Kenai Fjords NP
Read our review →
Snowmobile Classic Tour in Kenai Fjords National Park
Read our review →
8hr Kenai Fjords Whale Watching Tour w/ 1hr Fishing 16 Passengers
Read our review →
Private Speedboat Tour to Lim Fjord and Red Island
Read our review →
Hvalfjordur & Hvammsvik Hot Springs Private Tour
Read our review →
4 hours Best View of the Oslofjord Winter Edition
Read our review →
Private tour, Bergen to Oslo – Nærøyfjord Cruise & Flåm Railway
Read our review →
Panoramic Peaks and Oslo’s Best Fjord Views Hike
Read our review →
Oslo’s Ultimate Fjord View Hike & Norwegian Waffle Workshop
Read our review →