Spectacular vistas and good weather!

The whole day has sort of run together in my head. The scenery here is spectacular in a very different way than Iceland, and there are almost no other tourists.

I should just let the pictures do the talking, but then it wouldn't be a blog, would it?

I got up and had coffee this morning, after scrounging through my host's cabinets for the sugar I hadn't been able to buy on Sunday (I'm sure it was there somewhere in the store, but I gave up.) Then I loaded up the car and headed out. Loading up the car is actually pretty easy, since I decided to live out of the trunk. I've got my suitcase open back there, and I just grab what I need for the next day and leave the suitcase in place. I headed the 10 miles to the ferry terminal, to catch the 8:45 ferry to Senja. The crossing was less than an hour, so I started my exploration of Senja by 10 AM.

View from the ferry

The first place I plugged into my phone was the island of Husøy. I asked on the Tromsø subreddit last week for recommendations, and both the ferry and Husøy (and the whole island of Senja) were recommended. Husøy was a great suggestion! It's connected to the mainland by a causeway and is in a beautiful fjord.

Husøy

The drive there was stunning. The first two pictures at the top of the page were on the way to Husøy. Everything is taking me at least twice as long as Maps (Google or Apple) say it should, because I keep stopping to take pictures. Anyway, I drove across the causeway and hiked to a small lighthouse at the far end of the island. There was a plank walkway for a good part of the hike. The rest of it was on rock or boggy soil. The plant life looked remarkably like the bog plants I liked so much in Iceland.

From there, I headed for Gryllefjord and Torsken, further south. Both are fishing villages. Actually, every village on the coast is a fishing village, with the requisite fish processing house. There is also a lot of fish farming. Most of them are the circular pens (is that what they are?) and have a boat out with the farm. But I did see one that had square pens and no boat, so maybe it's inactive.

The third picture at the top is the fjord for Gryllefjord. From there, I crossed the ridge to get to Torsken, which had an interesting old church with some iron grave markers.

There are a lot of tunnels as you travel around, even on an island as sparsely populated as Senja. Some are up to a kilometer long (there were much longer ones around Tromsø—there were even traffic circles in those tunnels).

Finally, I headed to my Airbnb in Skrolsvik. This night is definitely a step up, as I have a whole house at my disposal. I think this one was $75, so it was quite a deal. Here's the house and my rental Kuga.

Tomorrow I'm going to explore this area first. There is a fort built by the Germans when they occupied the area in 1941 that is very close. From there, I'll head inland a bit. I'm going to a wildlife place called Polar Park. They have a lot of native mammals. The closest I've come so far are moose and reindeer crossing signs. Unless I drive around at night, I'm unlikely to see either! Hence, Polar Park. Then my cabin at Huskylodge tomorrow night, and hopefully lots of puppy love!