Visiting Tromsø: More than lights

I have to admit: We went to Tromsø in Nothern Norway to take pictures of the northern lights. But due to bad weather we not even got a glimpse of them.

But don't panic. We found a wonderful small town without many tourists. Because of the holidays only few people were around in town and so we saw many closed business and restaurants. Nevertheless there were many places to explore. On our second day in town we started with a walk around the southern part of Tromsø, taking a look at the downtown and uptown.

The first things to notice are the beautiful wooden houses, often coloured in red and blue – the oldest dating from 1789. In the southeast you will find some newer buildings that try to combine a modern design with wooden exterior facade, but I vastly prefer the old ones.

On our way we found a few shiny restaurants. As Tromsø is a pretty expensive place to eat, after a few days you will start to think that 40 EUR for a good meal is rather cheap. For your money you will at least get a really nice place to dine most of the time.

On our walk we also saw the world smallest instant portrait studio, just large enough to fit two people in it, although I'm quite sure it's bigger on the inside.

Even without the Aurora we actually quite liked it here and surely will return.