Today was the first full day in Bergen, and the hotel breakfast buffet reflected the fishing town vibe of the city. Fish and cavair was on the buffet. Interestingly, the normal eggs and waffles were not on the buffet, but rather, we available upon request. I made myself a salami and turkey sandwich with some local brown cheese called "brunost cheese", it's brown from the caramelized sugars...the cheese is kind of sweet tasting...the sandwich was good. I also had a croissant and jam and took a couple of hard rolls back with me to the room to eat later with the cloud berry jam that I still had.

After breakfast, Jason and I wondered around the town and eventually went to where we thought the meeting spot was for the cultural and food tour that we had scheduled. It was the office on a wharf, not the meeting spot. Jason actually really liked the wharf, it was quiet and people were catching fish off the side. We hung around a bit and took photos and watched people fish then we had to walk about 20 minutes back to where the meeting spot was (I had gotten an email about where to meet but forgot).

We eventually got to the right location and met the guide. I was apprehensive about the tour due to the heavy fish influence in the town and the fact that I HATE fish. There was a second couple in the group and the four of us with the tour guide went on our tour. The first stop was for fish cakes...which I ate, they weren't terrible...not good...but not terrible. The second thing we had was Norwegian waffles which are flat and heart shaped with some of the brunost cheese...it was pretty good...apparently, the food of Norway is fish and waffles and ice cream...we toured the fish market area and went to the old German part of Norway and heard stories about the during WW2 a munitions ship blew up and almost destroyed the area...then we had dried fish, Norway's biggest export, which was terrible, and then toured the city some more...ending up at a pub where we had "meat soup", which was also good...after that, we went to a coffee shop and had iced tea (normally we would have had coffee, but since it was such a hot day...like 65...we had iced tea instead). Finally, we went to a bar that a king if Denmark met a woman that he fell in love with at...the story ends with everyone dying in captivity...and had a beer...a Sprite for Jason. Afterwards, we went back to the hotel, I had gotten a message that the luggage was at the hotel, and Jason was anxious to see if his luggage was available.

We got to the hotel and both suitcases were here! Jason was super excited because he had his wallet and everything in his bag in one of the suitcases. He got his money and wanted to switch out some US currency for Norwegian currency, so we went to a currency exchange and he got $10 switched to Norwegian currency. Afterwards, we wanted to go to the top of one of the 7 mountains that surround Bergen...when we were on the tour, the guide mentioned that it would be a place with great views...the guide mentioned there was a tram that would take us to the top, but we could also hike it as well...we originally were going to take the tram, but after having a conversation with a woman with luggage in line, she suggested we hike it because it was only a 30 minute hike (she was taking the tram because she lived up the mountain and didn't want to drag her luggage up the mountain), so we decided to hike to the top. It took about 30 minutes and was very very steep, but we made it. At the top, Jason said: "we made it"...I told him that we came to a mountain, we could have taken the easy way and taken the tram, but instead we chose to do the work, and we saw all the good views along the way, and we make it to the top of the mountain together...I said, I'm sure there is a life lesson in an analogy in there somewhere, but I'd rather just get some ice cream from the ice cream store at the top of the mountain and enjoy the view. While eating ice cream, an older woman was sitting at a table next to us…apparently, she was overheated because she just took her shirt off and began fanning herself…a good reminder that we were still in Norway…lol.