Destination: Norway

LONELY PLANET'S OFFICIAL ITINERARY INFORMATION

Itinerary: Unesco World Heritage-Listed Norway

If all you want to see are the Unesco sites, you’ll cover around 2330km and could do so in a 10-day cultural feast. However, you’ll undoubtedly need to factor in quite a few side-trips, adding time (up to an extra two weeks) and distance to what is already a journey from one end of Norway to the other.



The drafters of Unesco’s World Heritage list must have been tempted simply to list the whole country! As it is, they chose five sites which, if you visit them all, will see you travelling through large swathes of northern and western Norway. Starting in Bergen, a stroll down to the waterfront will take you to the wonderful old trading warehouses of Bryggen, 58 of which have made it onto the Unesco list and which wind back from the harbourside in delightfully but dangerously rickety narrow lanes.

Northwest of Bergen and after passing some of Norway’s finest fjord scenery, you’ll find the 12th-century stave church in Urnes, Norway’s oldest and one of its most fairytale constructions by the banks of the Sognefjord. From there, cross the towering peaks of the Norwegian interior and head for Røros, a postcard-pretty village which captures the essence of central Norway of yesteryear. From there, it’s a long, but astonishingly beautiful haul up to Alta, home to up to 3000 Stone- and Iron-Age rock carvings and one of the earliest open-air history books.

Travelling to Norway?
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