Steve and Cathy's Blog

We have been lucky enough to have visited Kristiansund in 2019, but the excursion we took then took us way out into the countryside The excursion we have today is the opposite as it’s entirely in the city, which is comprised of four islands, as this sign for the ferry shows. We will visit two of them using this ferry.

Sirena docks at 7:00am right in the center of town. For about the only time on this cruise, we will not be boarding a bus today. Our excursion begins at 9:15am when we meet Tone (pronounced too’ na), who walks us to the sculpture Klippfiskjerringa where we will board the ferry.

Here is a brief description of this sculpture that has become a symbol of Kristiansund and its most storied industry: It is a “Bronze statue of the Klipfish wife to commemorate the workers on the klippfish rocks, sculpted by Tore Bjorn Skjolsvik. It was a gift to the city on its 250 year anniversary, and was unveiled by HRH Queen Sonja in 1992 with three genuine klippfish workers present. The statue has become one of the town’s best-known symbols and photo motifs. The statue is situated on the Pier, close to Fisketrappa/Radhusplassen.”

Tone outlines our tour, which essentially comprises two parts: a visit to the island Innlandet. From there we will take the ferry to Nordlandet and have a guided tour through the Norsk klippfiskmuseum that will teach us about the history of the industry that truly built Kristiansund. She also explains the function of a nearby vessel named Aqua Seawork, with an unusual design making it ideal to sevive the many fishfarms in the area.

Soon we board our historic ferry. Historic in this sense, as explained in Wikipedia: “Started in 1876 and still going strong is the Sundbåt (“Sound Boat”/”Strait Crossing Boat”) shuttle service with a capacity of a few tens of passengers, travelling between the islands. The small motor ferry crosses the harbour from Kirkelandet to Innlandet, then goes on to Nordlandet, to Gomalandet, and back to Kirkelandet, repeating the round trip in half-hour intervals morning to evening on weekdays. The Sundbåt bears the distinction of being the world’s oldest motorized regular public transport system in continuous service.”

In less than ten minutes, we step off the ferry on to Innlandet. Our guide fills us in about the surrounding area:

• Kristiansund was established as a town in 1742, right around the beginning of the klippfisk industry, by Danish-Norwegian King Christian VI.
• Fishing is the principal industry, although servicing the North Sea oil and gas wells has also been important since the 1970s.
• The city can be accessed three different ways by sea. Kirklandet (Church Land) is actually an island, and the bridge/tunnel to the mainland wasn’t opened until 1992. We are very close to the sea here, but the harbor is always calm, an important factor for such a busy fishing port.
• Innlandet (Innermost Land; also humorously referred to as “Tahiti”) has the oldest houses in the city. Many, many others on Kirkelandet were destroyed in a bombing raid in WWII.

• The building we see as we disembark our ferry, Tollboden, is the very oldest, and was the tax collector’s office.

• As we walk through the neighborhood, Tone describes it. Back in the day, a shipyard and warehouses occupied the area. The yellow house we pass was shipyard workers’ housing, now housing three apartments.

• The area has some of the most sought-after houses in the city, despite very strict zoning regulations in place to retain the historic nature of the island.

• The island is indeed humorously referred to as Tahiti. As fjordnorway.com speculates: “Maybe the atmosphere here was particularly warm and exotic during the age of sailing ships? The cultural cafe Dødeladen and the Tahiti wharf are the venues for the annual Tahiti festival, which might well be Norway’s liveliest music festival. 

• The ferry system we are using has been free for the past two years, perhaps as a result of the decline in ridership due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

We board the ferry again. It will stop at Goma, and then take all of us to Nordlandet. After disembarking the ferry, we talk a ten-minute walk up through a neighborhood to the Norsk klippfiskmuseum. 

We are greeted by our host, the assistant museum director. For the next hour, he will walk us through the building complex, which was built as a warehouse in the 1700s for the klippfisk industry. The first thing we learn is: where did the term klippfisk come from. It means Cliff Fish, because the method for drying the salted cod was to lay them on the large boulders around the area for 72 hours.

As Wikipedia explains: “Kristiansund is known as the major bacalhau city of Norway. Bacalhau is made of salted, dried codfish, and has traditionally been exported in large amounts to Spain, Portugal and Latin America as food suitable during Lent.” Apparently the remnants of the industry remain here, but our interest is in its historic past.

The process for salted cod was actually developed by Portuguese fisherman, but its development in Norway was the work of a couple of Scotsmen, lured to Norway by the king to build up Kristiansund. One of them was named William Gordon, and he was responsible for the building of the warehouse beginning in 1749  that now houses the museum. He was also one of the founders of the saltmatured cod industry in Kristiansund and Norway and became fabulously wealthy as it grew.

Our tour lasts for an hour, and it is totally fascinating. The warehouse interior has been retained in its entirety, and photo exhibits added depicting the process as it was done over a century ago (in black and white) and even in the 1950s before its decline (color photos). We are even treated to a fifteen-minute lecture by the museum assistant manager.

The entire klippfisk operation is best described in this photograph of a poster in the museum. The photos below takes us back a hundred years, and gives us a sense of what it was like to live and work in Kristiansund in the early 1900s when the industry completed dominated the city.

Alas, after that hour, we must move on. We board the ferry for the last time and are taken back to Kirkelandet and the center of Kristiansund. Rather than return to the ship for lunch, we seek out a restaurant that serves fish and chips. The large fancy one next to our ship is puzzlingly closed for the summer, so we settle for a tiny shop across the street. It turns out to have very delicious fish and chips, its only offering. And it’s inexpensive. We sit at a table outdoors and enjoy our meal while we watch people go by. 

We head back to the ship. Cathy stays aboard, but Steve is not finished learning more about this city. At the previous museum, he has learned about another one in town specializing in the reconstruction and displaying of classic wooden boats used in the fishing and pleasure boat industry. It appears to be about a one-mile walk from the ship, so off he goes, map in hand. In twenty-five minutes, he has found it.

It is as wonderful as he imagined it would be. It’s a working museum, and there are two or three employees engaged in various repairs. There are at least thirty boats, and all kinds of old shipyard equipment to look at. He is in heaven, and can’t help but wish his brother Dave were here too. He would love this place, being the sailboat owner that he is. 

Forty minutes and dozens of photos later, it is time to head back to Sirena. Sail Away is at 6pm. Back on board, he and Cathy head for the Grand Dining Room. We view the harbor passing by as we eat dinner, very happy to have returned, and leave knowing we now know this interesting city much better than we did. We are on our way to Hammerfest, 650 miles north of here. Tomorrow is therefore a Sea Day, and maybe Steve can catch up on this blog a bit.