Alesund!

[Terri2007]

Hello!

Any recommendations would be greatly appreciated for this cruise port. We are sailing in August of this year.

After reading I am tempted to try and use the public bus transportation, particularly to go to the Aquarium. We wanted to go and view the aquarium for a few hours then had back to town for a walking tour and likely the 418 steps to Mt. Aksla.

If anyone has any specifics about using the public buses - as in how easy and how to pay, otherwise we will likely use the Hop On and Off bus service.

Thanks!

 

[JulieODC]

We are visiting Alesund on the DCL cruise in July - we aren’t in port long enough for most tours to the path of the trolls (Trollstigen), which is what we really wanted to see! If you are in port longer, that might be an option!

Our cruise excursions are almost all sold out by silver booking, and many private tours are too. We ended up going with the DCL tour to Sunnmore and Aksla - which we are looking forward to! Along with a stop at Molo Brew, right next to the dock, after.

 

[ldo]

it's an easy walk thru A to the the 418 steps to Mt. Aksla. 5 year olds an do the steps. we had a nice day 1/2 day walking thru the town and doing the steps. view is awesome. cute restaurant at the top--like those at top of a ski lift.

 

[Terri2007]

Thanks for the advice! I often don't do tours via DCL, not for any reason in particular, but I like to plan the excursions and try and use local transportation where possible. Sometimes this has worked well, sometimes not. Either way, we don't get into port until 11 am and leave at 11pm, so was thinking about the aquarium via bus, then back to town to do the walk to Mt. Aksla, then maybe the local art nouveau museum. Something like that with some coffee and cake thrown in between.

 

[JulieODC]

Thanks for the advice! I often don't do tours via DCL, not for any reason in particular, but I like to plan the excursions and try and use local transportation where possible. Sometimes this has worked well, sometimes not. Either way, we don't get into port until 11 am and leave at 11pm, so was thinking about the aquarium via bus, then back to town to do the walk to Mt. Aksla, then maybe the local art nouveau museum. Something like that with some coffee and cake thrown in between.

Same...this is our on DCL excursion on this trip. But you’ve got a lot more time, so that’s great.

 

[abja09]

Thanks for the advice! I often don't do tours via DCL, not for any reason in particular, but I like to plan the excursions and try and use local transportation where possible. Sometimes this has worked well, sometimes not. Either way, we don't get into port until 11 am and leave at 11pm, so was thinking about the aquarium via bus, then back to town to do the walk to Mt. Aksla, then maybe the local art nouveau museum. Something like that with some coffee and cake thrown in between.

We are on the same cruise! We were in Alesund in 2017 on the Norway/Iceland cruise. It’s a great town to walk around on your own. I did the steps to Mt. Aksla last trip and plan on doing it again. The view from the top is beautiful and there is a little cafe on top to get a snack. We did not use buses so I cannot help you with that part.

 

[Intr3pid]

The Alesund town itself can be seen pretty quickly, and as it's a small town, the public buses will be infrequent.

We are planning on renting a car and driving inland. Theoretically, you could drive all the way to Geiranger on an 8-hour roundtrip, but as the ship docks there the next day, we will try a different direction. That inland trek (incl. the Path of the Trolls) has some of the best mountain scenery in Europe, and it will be a shame to miss it while in town. We did map out a self-drive itinerary with the help of the good folks at TripAdvisor.

If you want to stay close, there are plenty of good hikes, incl. one to Mt. Aksla. It's much easier than the one to Pulpit Rock (in Stavanger), but I'd only do one. You could also visit the local aquarium, and there is a pricey Sunmore Village event organized by Disney if you want something fancy.

 

[Terri2007]

The Alesund town itself can be seen pretty quickly, and as it's a small town, the public buses will be infrequent.

We are planning on renting a car and driving inland. Theoretically, you could drive all the way to Geiranger on an 8-hour roundtrip, but as the ship docks there the next day, we will try a different direction. That inland trek (incl. the Path of the Trolls) has some of the best mountain scenery in Europe, and it will be a shame to miss it while in town. We did map out a self-drive itinerary with the help of the good folks at TripAdvisor.

If you want to stay close, there are plenty of good hikes, incl. one to Mt. Aksla. It's much easier than the one to Pulpit Rock (in Stavanger), but I'd only do one. You could also visit the local aquarium, and there is a pricey Sunmore Village event organized by Disney if you want something fancy.

Intersting. I was looking at renting a car and maybe driving to Runde Island instead of what I mentioned above. I started to look at car rentals. Have you thought about which car rental company and how you will get there from the port?

 

[Terri2007]

Actually sorry about the lazy post! I didn't look very hard. Looks like Avis and Budget are just a 12- 15 min walk from the pier! This is very very tempting!

 

[DisneyConvert]

We did the Norway-Iceland-Scotland cruise in 2018 (omfg, it was FANTASTIC!) and Alesund was a worthwhile stop as there is a lot to see within 3-5km's from the ship. The town & countryside/waterfront is beautiful, and
the people are very nice too!

Have you heard that, in Norway:
"Det fins ikke dårlig vær, bare dårlige klær."

Yeah, I would remember that when you are packing for your port visits. Not like you can come back to Alesund in a couple of days.

So I am guessing that one can take local buses to get around, but (after some convincing) we did the local HopOnHopOff bus and we were happy we did. The Aquarium is on the route and so is the Aksla viewpoint. The map they give you is very helpful, and they even have wifi on the bus (good for downloading and sending emails!). Plus the bus runs frequently, and the inside is dry . . . in case it rains . . . which is has known to . . in Norway

 

[Shira Gertz]

We went to Alesund last summer with our then 7year old. She looooved the aquarium (and we did to). There is this awesome "playground" out int he back where you can dam up the water with boards and a bunch of kids all speaking different languages were playing for a long time. We took the Ho-Ho bus. You could also take a cab. Dependent upon the ages of your kids I would recommend the aquarium.

 

[mmmears]

We are visiting Alesund on the DCL cruise in July - we aren’t in port long enough for most tours to the path of the trolls (Trollstigen), which is what we really wanted to see! If you are in port longer, that might be an option!

Our cruise excursions are almost all sold out by silver booking, and many private tours are too. We ended up going with the DCL tour to Sunnmore and Aksla - which we are looking forward to! Along with a stop at Molo Brew, right next to the dock, after.

We were on the 2018 Norway/Iceland/Scotland cruise and this is one of the 2 DCL tours we booked. No regrets. I thought it would be quicker than using the city bus to get to the museum, and it was a cold, wet, and windy day, so I'm glad we decided not to do the steps up the mountain. I figured it's such a simple itinerary it would be fine to go on the big bus, and it was. Enjoy!

 

[Terri2007]

Thanks for all the great suggestions! Right now I have rented a car in order to try and squeeze in as much as possible. Since it is our first port, this may go okay. Will have to wait and see.