Firstly I wanted to apologize for not putting up a post last weekend. I know it's not a big deal, but I did promise myself that I would keep up this one post a week I've been managing. My only excuse is that I was enjoying the feeling of floating on the Norwegian Sea without having to worry about getting anything specific done. And now onto the post.
Almost a year ago now I was sitting with my parents and lazily said (after a commercial of course) that it would be interesting to go on a cruise just once at some point in my life, just to see what it was like. What I didn't know was that my Mum had stored that thought away and later booked us on a cruise with Hurtigruten Cruises on their northern lights trip along the coast of Norway.
I have been to Norway before but that was a very, very long time ago and I couldn't remember what the weather had been like this time of year. I looked at the weather forecast and it predicted predominantly clear skies, but very cold temperatures of below -10 degrees Celsius (which is actually pretty cold even for parts of Norway this time of year) so the main theme I went for was warmth. Thankfully that's something I already own a number of items of. There wasn't a lot of room so I wanted to be as precise as possible and this is what I ended up taking.
Mainly thermals, lots and lots of thermals. To be precise I took 4 short sleeve thermal tops, 1 long sleeve thermal top, 2 thermal leggings, 1 pair of thermal trousers, 2 knee length thermal socks, 4 short thermal socks (and a few pairs of none thermal mainly for exercising in), thermal hat, thermal headband, and lastly a thermal buff. For warmth I also packed my only Merino wool jumper (which I basically wore every day), my gillet (which I also basically wore every day), my puffer jacket, my good old Norwegian jumper that used to be my brother's, my old faithful 3-in-1 fleece and waterproof jacket, a wool scarf I've had since I was a child, a couple of non-thermal buffs to protect my face, Merino wool gloves, and waterproof gloves. Also in the bag was my work out gear, a pair of jeans, a pair of walking trousers, a dress and tights for 'just in case', pajamas, a towel and flannel, a swimming customer, and a whole lot of underwear.
Shoes wise were my snow boots, my running shoes (which I forgot to photograph), and some ballet shoes.
Also coming along were some books for when the long nights drew in, obviously my diary, and my binoculars that come with me on every trip.
My wash bag was probably larger then it should have been, but with dry, sensitive skin and the medicine I'm taking at the moment I didn't really have much of a choice. For that purpose I brought my Soap Friendly aloe vera soap, Palmer's body butter, night and day face oils, The Body Shop lip salve, and The Body Shop hand cream. Suncream is also definitely a must for travelling in this part of the world, despite which my face still got a bit of sun. It was also recommended that we bring ear plugs as the ship is a working ship and we would be able to hear the engine, especially when going into port during the night. Also with me were my Lush Dirty tooth tabs, my safety razor, the Georganics charcoal dental floss, and Georganics bamboo tootbrush.
Lastly was a bag with some of the makeup I'm trying to use up.
Of course the big question is, did I use / wear all of it? And the answer, for the most part, is yes. The temperature and activities I was doing on the trip changed regularly so having all the clothing items I had which would allow me to layer up or down depending was a great choice (even if I do say so myself). As for things I didn't use. I didn't touch the makeup at all, but really who was I kidding, nor did I wear the 'just in case' dress, tights, and ballet slippers. The towel also wasn't used, but I still think I would take it again. Unfortunately I didn't get to use my swimming custom (more on that later), but would also bring that again later. I also didn't use my body butter. But that's not because I didn't need to, I actually really did, but because I was lazy and am now paying the price for it.
All in all I was probably warmer than I needed to be most of the time, which just proves 'There's no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing'.
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