Monday 6th October, 2025 – Stavanger

We arrived in Stavanger to find two things. The first was that we were seemingly parked in someone’s front garden, and the second was that Storm Amy had abated and while the weather wasn’t as good as it had been in Narvik, it wasn’t bad. It looked like we might be able to stroll around rather than look for things to do indoors. It is also one of those cruise ports where you can step off the gangway and be pretty much right in the town.

After my first and only full Cunard breakfast…

We started with a Hop On Hop Off bus, largely because it’s a long way to Sverd i fjell, a commemorative monument created by sculptor Fritz Røed from Bryne and unveiled by King Olav V of Norway in 1983. It consists of three massive bronze swords stuck in a rock next to a fjord. The 33 ft tall monument commemorates the Battle of Hafrsfjord in 872, when King Harald Fairhair “gathered all of Norway under one crown”. It didn’t actually achieve it because the process of uniting Norway dragged on for several more decades, but it’s a nice story! It’s a nice monument in a lovely spot too, so it’s worth a visit. The largest sword represents the victorious Harald, and the smaller pair are for his defeated opponents, in case you were wondering. We were much amused by our bus driver who gave us all a speech about how difficult it can be to reach the monument by “walking for 200 metres and then you’ll see it! If you can’t maybe you should consider your eyesight” and informed us that the people waiting to get back on were the survivors who’d already made the trek and “there were twice as many who got off!”

Nothing was open (there is an ice cream place, as well as a toilet block, but both of them were “closed until Summer” which seemed a bit of a long time to wait) so we caught the next bus along to return to the centre of town. Depressingly a lot of people got off at the shopping centre, many of them Chinese. It seemed a terrible waste of a day to me, but each to their own. We got off by the Tourist Information office, and then went to take a look at the Victoria Hotel which looked rather fabulous. Our hope was to get a coffee but everything was shut till 17:00 and we needed coffee now.

At a former joint-European Capital of Culture (with Liverpool), it’s a given that Stavanger has some lovely areas, especially Gamle Stavanger (the historic centre), and we soon found somewhere suitable on Fargegaten (Street of Colour). Until 2005 it was a perfectly normal street, but then a local hairdresser, Tom Kjørsvik, wanted to create a more vibrant environment and create an attraction. All of the buildings got a makeover, being repainted in all sorts of bright colours in a colour scheme created by Scottish artist Craig Flannagan. It’s now full of cafes, bars, and restaurants and we found a bar offering really good coffee, and freshly baked vegan cinnamon buns.

We split one of the enormous sweet treats between us before going on our way in search of the things we wanted to see. We drew a blank with the Cathedral, which was closed. This was a shame, because it’s Norway’s oldest cathedral, built in a long church style around the year 1125. We’re just going to have to go back.

We opted next to go to the Norwegian Petroleum Museum. We’d seen – and enjoyed – the Norwegian TV series, Lykkeland (State of Happiness) and wanted to get a fuller picture of the discovery and resulting industry that changed Norway beyond all recognition. We’d have expected it to gloss over the down side of oil production, but it doesn’t at all, and was refreshingly honest about things. While we were in there, the heavens opened, and the previously fine day turned distinctly inclement.

We were going to go to the Museum of Archaeology next, wanting especially to see the Viking exhibition rune stones, along with exhibits about how the Vikings constructed ships and navigated the oceans. We did get to see a lot of street art, which Stavanger has in abundance. This is all because of Nuart, a festival and year-round collective. The result is everything from tiny cats painted on doors to entire house sides with vast paintings on them.

With the weather looking increasingly unpleasant, we scooted back on board earlier than planned but first called at a Bunnpris supermarket in pursuit of brown cheese and Kvikk Lunsj (Quick Lunch) chocolate biscuit bars (which look very much like a Kit Kat to me and obviously did to Nestlé as well after they were granted a trademark on the “four-fingered wafer shape” by the European Union Intellectual Property Office – a trademark that was determined inadmissible by the Court of Justice of the European Union). Essential shopping achieved, we called back in at the Tourist Information office, where I bough two jigsaws.

A quick check of the time and we realized we could go straight to the onboard theatre for the day’s celebrity Cunard Insight. This was another Olympic medal winner, Kjersti Østgaard Buaas who was talking about mindset, resilience, and joy,, and had us doing breathing exercises that I found very interesting. It was just a shame the audience was so sparse because people were still on shore. By the time we set off (around 17:00) the fog had come down and visibility was way down as we executed what seemed like a 300 point turn to extricate ourselves from the harbour.

After that it was time for pre-dinner drinks in the Commodore Lounge followed by another very good dinner. We finished the evening in the theatre for “Pride and Prejudice* (*sort of)” which was funny and at least told a story, though I’m not sure I’ll be seeking out the full length version any time soon. The cast were very good, and it was taken at quite a pace, but again I will just say it’s not really what I’m looking for in a theatre outing.