July 18 2025 Tour Notes
This is a beautiful tour. If you are considering it I'd just give a few things to be prepared for.
There is a lot of driving. Between Stockholm and Copenhagen and then from Oslo to Bergen, you will spend multiple days primarily in the coach. I got car sick. Unfortunately the distances are great and the roads small and winding around the fjords. Unless you took a private helicopter from sight to sight, there isn't a better way. Even the cruise ships need to bus passengers around to the sights.
Fish is the mainstay of the diet and will be served at every meal. Many of the meals were a traditional Smorgasbord buffet with a lot of choices, but some had only seafood. I ate reindeer and whale off the buffet.
Tauck has a pretty full schedule of activities and doesn't leave much free time. Most museums and sights are only open 10-5 in these countries. We arrived in Copenhagen at about 4 pm on the bus, then Tauck took us to Tivoli gardens at 630. The next morning we did the walking tour, canal cruise and palace visit with Tauck from 9-1, then at 4 Tauck took us to a castle with dinner afterward, returning about 930. The next morning we left for the airport at 11. Similarly we had only one afternoon in Oslo and about 3 hours in Bergen between the morning tour and the farewell dinner (which is at a restaurant on a private island you have to take a ferry to and from). Because of that you may be disappointed if you don't have a careful plan of what exactly you are going to do with that precious free time. I was grateful we had a guidebook and knew ahead of time exactly what to do.
The highlight were the rural days driving and sailing the Norwegian fjords. The vistas are so beautiful words fail me. Afterward my wife and I tried to think of anywhere we had been that is more naturally beautiful. I've been to 45 countries, 24 States and 22 national parks, and the fjords stand alone at the top.
Comments
We did the Norwegian fiords tour last month and there was one day where we had several hours on the bus but breaks to go on a lift up a mountain. A fantastic lunch and lots of scenery. everywhere else the ship was right there. Sailing the fiords was magical. We arrived a day early in Bergen and saw pretty much all and then stayed two days extra in Oslo. Of course there was no Stockholm, just Goteborg and of course no Copenhagen. We may take the new Copenhagen Oslo tour in the future, we loved Oslo and a couple more things we would like to see there.
MLP - Great summary of your experiences. I was born in Denmark and spent my formative years there so I am admittedly biased. I agree with the stunningly beautiful Norwegian fjords.
For some reason many are bothered by what they perceive as long bus drives, but I think there is no better way to see the countryside than by driving through it.
We just did this tour last month and I don't remember a single buffet that only offered seafood. In fact I kind of got tired of seeing roast pork on them. The farewell dinner I believe was all seafood. If you don't eat seafood, be sure to tell Tauck and your TD. They will make sure you always have options.
Longer coach rides have been a feature of every Tauck land tour we've taken. If you want to avoid that, then take river cruises or small ship cruises which tend to have way less coach time.