Bergen Trips to Fjords: Finding the Quay

Where the quay is

Zachariasbryggen sits on the Bergen waterfront right beside the Fish Market, which is about as central as anywhere in the city gets. If you are staying in Bergen you are almost certainly within a fifteen-minute walk, and the walk itself is along the harbour.

The Fish Market is the landmark to aim for rather than the quay name, because everybody knows it and it is signposted from across the centre. Once you are there the quay is alongside and the boat is on the water in front of you, which makes this one of the easier departure points to find anywhere.

How early to arrive

Guests report being asked to be at the meeting point around twenty minutes before departure, and that is a sensible margin rather than an arbitrary one. The Bergen waterfront in season is a busy stretch of quay with several operators working from it.

Arriving with time also gets you a choice. Boarding early means picking whether you start inside at a window table or up on the sun deck, and on a full sailing that choice is worth having. It costs you twenty minutes in one of the more pleasant places in the city to stand about.

Bryggen, which you pass immediately

The sightseeing starts within minutes. Bryggen is the row of narrow wooden gable-fronted warehouses along the north side of Bergen's harbour, and it is a UNESCO World Heritage site, one of the most recognisable frontages in Norway.

The buildings are the remains of the Hanseatic trading settlement that ran Bergen's stockfish trade from the fourteenth century onward, when German merchants controlled the export of dried cod from the north. What stands today has burned and been rebuilt repeatedly, most drastically in 1702, but on the same medieval plots and in the same form. Seeing it from the water is how it was meant to be seen, because the water was the entire reason it existed.

Getting to the waterfront

On foot, for most people. Bergen's centre is compact and the harbour is at the middle of it, so from the main hotel districts, the railway station or Bryggen itself you are looking at a short flat walk.

The light rail runs into the centre from the airport and the southern suburbs, and taxis are straightforward. Nobody needs to arrange transport in advance for this one, which is why the operator offers none. Driving in is possible and parking is in paid garages, but for a three-and-a-half-hour trip from a central quay it is usually more trouble than walking.

If you are here from a cruise ship

A great many people on any Bergen fjord boat arrived on a larger one. The cruise terminals are on the same harbour, and depending on the berth you are looking at a walk of fifteen to twenty-five minutes to the Fish Market, or a very short taxi.

The arithmetic to do is the usual one: three and a half hours afloat, twenty minutes beforehand, plus the walks at either end and a margin, all inside your all-aboard time. It fits comfortably inside a full-day call and is tight on a short one. Take the earliest departure if your ship leaves in the afternoon.

Coming back

To the same quay, which is the convenient part. You step off in the middle of Bergen with the Fish Market in front of you, the funicular up Floyen a few minutes away and Bryggen along the waterfront.

That is worth planning around. A three-and-a-half-hour cruise that returns you to the centre leaves the rest of a day genuinely usable, and the things most visitors want to do in Bergen are all within walking distance of where the boat ties up.

One practical note on timing

Sailings are scheduled and the vessel leaves on time, which sounds obvious and catches people out. This is a working sightseeing service rather than a tour that waits for stragglers, and a boat that has to reach a tidal narrows and return inside three and a half hours does not have slack in it.

So treat the twenty-minute instruction as the actual meeting time. If you are coming from somewhere across the city, or from a ship, build in more than you think you need. Bergen is small enough that being early is a pleasant problem rather than a wasted morning.

The other reason to be there in good time is that the Fish Market itself is worth ten minutes. It has been trading on this spot since the thirteenth century and still sells shellfish, smoked salmon and whale alongside the tourist stalls, and it is the most direct evidence you will get of why a town grew here at all. Arriving early enough to walk through it before boarding turns dead waiting time into part of the day, which is not something you can say about most departure points. Few boats leave from somewhere worth arriving early for.

Before you book

Before you set out

1. Note the departure time

   Then work back about twenty minutes. That earlier time is when you want to be standing at the quay, not the time on your ticket.

2. Head for the Fish Market

   It is the most recognisable point on the Bergen waterfront and every local can direct you to it. Zachariasbryggen is the quay alongside.

3. Look for the vessel

   The boat is at the quay rather than behind an office door, so you are looking for a modern catamaran on the water in front of you.

4. Decide inside or out

   Grab a seat in the cabin if the weather is doing something, or head up to the sun deck first. You can move between them all trip.

5. Watch for Bryggen

   The UNESCO waterfront comes up within minutes of departure, so stay outside for the first stretch if the weather allows it.