According to the Tauck "what to pack" guide they suggest binoculars. Can anyone on past Scandinavia trips comment on if binoculars are good to have or not? Thanks
We almost always take a small pair of binoculars, but seldom use them. I have a camera with a long lens and that usually suffices for me.
As to whether you need them for this trip, I would say probably not. The beauty of Scandinavia is mostly in the sweeping vistas (particularly in Norway) not in anything you need to get a closer view of. Maybe a glacier. I don't recall seeing any wildlife other than in a zoo. It's one of those things that I would treat as a suggestion, not a "you should do this." If you haven't said, "Gee, I wish I had binoculars with me" on other trips, you probably won't miss them here.
Looking back at my pictures from the trip, the only places I might have used them were during boat tours in Copenhagen and Stockholm (we did these on our own - not part of the Tauck tour). Also, I might have used them to view Kronberg Castle (the model for Elsinore in Hamlet) from Sofiero Palace, across the Denmark Strait. That's about it. Others may feel differently.
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As to whether you need them for this trip, I would say probably not. The beauty of Scandinavia is mostly in the sweeping vistas (particularly in Norway) not in anything you need to get a closer view of. Maybe a glacier. I don't recall seeing any wildlife other than in a zoo. It's one of those things that I would treat as a suggestion, not a "you should do this." If you haven't said, "Gee, I wish I had binoculars with me" on other trips, you probably won't miss them here.
Looking back at my pictures from the trip, the only places I might have used them were during boat tours in Copenhagen and Stockholm (we did these on our own - not part of the Tauck tour). Also, I might have used them to view Kronberg Castle (the model for Elsinore in Hamlet) from Sofiero Palace, across the Denmark Strait. That's about it. Others may feel differently.