Exploring Lofoten with Hattvika Lodge
After spending a month in Italy, Switzerland, Germany, Czech Republic (or Czechia), and Slovenia we decided to finish off our trip somewhere I have always dreamed of going— Lofoten, Norway. The whole trip was amazing, and every country was special and exciting in its own way, but I couldn’t wait to go to Norway.
Getting to Lofoten Islands isn’t exactly the easiest, there are a couple different ways to get there. It seemed that flying from Slovenia to Bodø, and then taking a 3 hour ferry from Bodø to Svolvær was the most economic. We later realized that during late fall and winter the ferry only operates once a day, and we weren’t going to make it from the airport in time. Luckily the cost different from a ferry to a flight was $80 Canadian, and it actually saved us a lot of time as the flight is only 25 minutes.
We arrived in the evening, picked up our rental car, and drove to Hattvika Lodge— our home for the next 6 days. Driving through the dark left a lot to my imagination and I couldn’t wait to see the landscape in the daylight. During the drive we noticed the sky getting brighter, and suddenly there were full blown northern lights in the sky!
We arrived and the owner, Kristian showed us to our lodge. It’s basically a luxury two bedroom apartment that was created out of a fishing hut. The lodge had a fully equipped kitchen with all the equipment you could need and most importantly, coffee. It also had two beautiful bedrooms and two full bathrooms. On the porch our lodge had a private jacuzzi, and a short walk away was one of the most beautiful saunas we’ve ever used!
We pretty much dropped out luggage and headed right back onto the road to shoot the northern lights. We decided to check out Haukland Beach and Uttakleiv Beach to watch the lights (thanks for the recommendation Kristian)!
None of us had ever seen Northern Lights this bright before. We missed some of the brightest moments with our cameras to really enjoy the lights dancing across the sky for us. That was the warmest welcome Norway could have given us.
Our first day in Lofoten was one of the best days we had for good weather! We decided to make the best of it by driving straight to Reine. The best part of visiting Norway in mid-November is that the sun doesn’t rise until 9am and sets at 3:30pm. Between sunset and sunrise the sun follows across the horizon, it makes the light perfect and golden all day as it never fully gets bright. After sunrise we went over to Hamnøy which is only a 5-10 minute drive from Reine.
Knowing that this might be one of the nicest days we had in Lofoten we used it to the fullest and did the hike to Kvalvika Beach for sunset. What we didn’t know was that there were two trails, one that goes to the bottom of the beach itself, and one that goes to the epic lookout over the beach. We ended up taking the hardest way possible and hiked down to the beach and alllll the way back up, but the views were unbelievable. We definitely slept well that night at Hattvika Lodge.
One of our favourite parts of Norway was when we found this death defying ledge. The hike up was a grind and a half, and when we got to the top we had an amazing view but couldn’t see the ledge. We saw a less used trail that went around the other way, it clung to the edge of the cliff and scaled steeply up and down. After a treacherous but short climb we had the ledge in our sights. There we met two local girls who were far more brave than us, not only did they stand on the edge but one of them danced on the edge with one foot! It was an incredible and death defying experience.
After just under a week we made our long trip back to Vancouver, Canada. We can’t wait to go back and spend more time in Lofoten, maybe this time in the summer to experience the long sunny days! Hattvika Lodge was the perfect home base for adventures in Lofoten. Not only does the lodge have luxury accommodations, but they also have a beautiful dorm for budget travellers with a full kitchen and common area. Kristian, the owner, was more than accommodating during our stay and we are happy to say that we didn’t just have an unforgettable experience at the lodge but we came out of the trip having a lifelong friend.
