Thread by @ayranundspeck

Heute haun wir auf die Fauske 🎶🎵

Good morning everyone still onboard! This is day 3 of #polarkreisverkehr where I crossed the polar circle in my sleep and will go on my first hunt for aurora borealis

Find the first two parts here

First a little recap - the sleeper I travelled in was manufactured in the 1980s. Doesn’t. Feel like it! Oh and it’s not the fastest one either.

The train also features this large children’s play den. There are all sorts of toys in box on the left.

Breakfast was à la carte today, I went for a salmon wrap and a cinnamon bun (addicted to those). Note the square paper? It’s not a napkin!

It’s an engineering life hack to fix an engineering fail. The tables and the bar are high polished, glass bottles and even paper cups shift around on them like crazy. So each customer receives a special coated piece of paper to make them stick. Genius but 🤣

Very smart: all carriages have these information displays that announce upcoming stations. So passengers who want to get off are notified in time without waking up sleeping passengers through loudspeaker announcements.

Wird’s heute schneien oder

I must have crossed the polar circle shortly before being woken up by my alarm. Dang, missed it!

I also travelled through some stunning landscape in my way. At least so all the travel guides tell. I can’t because it was pitch black outside for the entirety of the journey 😅

Ah that intimidating sound 😌🔊🔊🔊

#bahnzeit in Fauske

Someone likes the Amtrak TurboTrain here 😄

Those stock image oddities always delight me. Just watched @Simply_Railway’s video about Metra electric where the station buffet at Millennium station had the ICE-V (or Experimental) as a logo 😅

On to a 5-hour bus journey. Which is of course not included in my Interrail pass and costs me another 46€

#trainwindow is unbeaten. But I have to admit the bus does put in some effort.

Driver went in to see if not some waiting passenger had fallen asleep. Quality service.

A minute later she had to step on the brakes really hard. The reasons are fleeing here into the woods 😻

It’s gonna be fun don’t be such a

This is a bit poor man’s Hurtigruten. Not quite the original. But at least I got to trace one fjord by water.

And away we sail on the Fjord1 which just slightly less speedy than the corresponding formula.

The self service buffet on the ferry has this national Norwegian favourite. Brunost. Brown cheese. Like: regular cheese but with caramel in it. It’s super nasty. But hidden in a waffle it even becomes enjoyable.

I got some bubbly chocolate as chaser just in case. This seems to be one of the few major brads that have not merged in the nestlé/mondelez/Mars conglomerates. But the logo again reminds me of… cheese. 😑

Great thing about riding bus: you get to travel all these amazing bridges 🫠

Look there is the iron ore port with some aurora busrealis 🤩

And we are in

(…never gonna give you up)
(…never gonna let you down)

Almost missed the ore train. Triple header! And mean evil looking 😈

The Narvigians have a needle to pierce holes into the clouds

And a museum dedicated to conflict and war.

I suggest you spend more time there than me to make the most of the 13€ entrance fee. It really is sobering and frightening, as well as it is educating. Especially for a German, we talk about France Poland and the SU in school. Very little about the Nordic countries.

Running to the station I discover this modernist/brutalis „Aurora“ cinema 😞

But it’s too late I gotta catch the (only daily passenger) train

#bahnzeit!

There she is. Hi sweetie 🥰

The train is operated by VY but the loco comes from SJ, the driver is GreenCargo, the wagons are leased from Trafikverket and I could not buy a (mandatory) reservation from either of those companies. Sometimes I thing rail privatisation is just a game of confuse the cat.

I played the hey I’m a railwayman card colleague laughs hands me a coffee.

Anyways here’s a lovely little choo-choo 🚂apparently the first in Norway. They were late starters.

What is colder than cold?

I know you all love a proper #trainwindow but what about a #traindoor? 😎

Just for the honour I managed to get a reservation for the train while I was already on it. Via a small Gothenburg travel agency trainplanet.com 🤦‍♂️
I would have never foist it myself, thanks @Lenny_du_Nord for the tip.

Did I tell you I sometimes envy cars for their 🌉?

🤤

Landscape is being a cocky show-off

No proper @_DiningCar car but one of the seaters comes with this handy kiosk. I had some dried reindeer sausage but given the cuties imported earlier I spare you a picture of these 😇

#bahnzeit in Abisko

Another train says bye-bye

I will spend an obscene amount of money here for very little value. Will it be worth it? Well, at least the sky is starry clear so… find out with me and tune in again tomorrow!