Five Stars of Scandinavia in the News
ST.PETER LINE Adds Tallinn Port to Princess Maria Cruise Ferry Schedule
ST.PETER LINE Princess Maria Cruise ferry now calls on Tallinn!ST.PETER LINE company adds a visit to Tallinn to Princess Maria ferry cruise schedule. Twice a month the ferry will make a visa-free Helsinki - Tallinn - St. Petersburg - Helsinki run. The cruise will be called "Three Baltic Capitals".
Passengers of Princess Maria cruise ferry will enjoy a unique opportunity to relax during a sea voyage and visit three capitals of the Baltic region within only three days. ST.PETER LINE company offers a comfortable visa-free stay in Russia (up to 72 hours) to all passengers of Princess Maria cruise ferry. St. Petersburg is considered to be one of the most beautiful cities in the world - and rightly so. The most "European" Russian city is situated on islands - there one can see rivers, canals, palaces, theatres and majestic cathedrals. New times added scores of shopping centers and concert halls.
A new visit of Princess Maria ferry to Tallinn opens another - sea communication - line for Finnish citizens. Among the advantages of cruises aboard ST.PETER LINE company ferries are European quality, Russian hospitality and affordable process. During a voyage aboard Princess Maria cruise ferry passengers will be introduced to Russian cuisine at the A’la carte restaurant, enjoy a colorful show program performed by St. Petersburg Music Hall Ballet Theatre and choose any leisure option at their discretion.
Now about schedule details: twice a month every other Monday, starting from October 30 Princess Maria cruise ferry will sail from Helsinki at the evening to arrive in Tallinn at 23.00 of the same day. The passengers are offered a stopover in Tallinn - a night and a whole following day. The ferry sails from Estonia at 19.00 on Tuesday to arrive in St. Petersburg at 09.30 on Wednesday. Various excursion programs are available. Wednesday night at 20.00 the ferry sails from St. Petersburg to arrive in Helsinki at 08.30 on Thursday morning.
The advantage of cruises over other types of leisure is unbelievable comfort. Passengers depart from the very center of Helsinki, from the terminal right opposite the famous Cathedral. Aboard the ship tourists are accommodated at comfortable cabins that become their homes for three days. Upon arrival to destinations (in Tallinn it is opposite the Old City, in St. Petersburg it is Vassilievsky Island) passengers can leave their things at the cabins and go on excursions light.
It is worth remembering that ST.PETER LINE company operates two ships in the Baltic Sea: Princess Maria и Princess Anastasia. Guests of the cruise ferries enjoy comforts of different cabins and convenience of vehicle decks. They can also choose entertainments to please any taste - restaurants, bars, Duty Free shops, SPA centers, fitness halls, beauty parlors, cinema halls and children’s playrooms. Varied show programs aboard the ships are performed by the brilliant St. Petersburg Music Hall Ballet Theatre and presented by a famous XXXX Bars Empire night clubs network.
Five Stars of Scandinavia, Inc. is exclusive agent for St. Peter Line in the US.
To book your one-way or round trip cruise, please visit our website:
http://5stars-scandinavia.com/st-peter-line.html
Three Baltic Capitals Cruise
To book our popular cruise/hotel packages, with up to 3 days in St. Petersburg, please visit our website:
http://5stars-scandinavia.com/cruises-russia.html#p-4
To contact Five Stars of Scandinavia:
E-mail: info@5stars-scandinavia.com
Toll free: 800.722.4126
Tel: 360.923.0125
St. Petersburg Cruises - Visa Free!
St. Peter Line increases Departures
In the beginning of February 2012 ST.PETER LINE will increase the number of Princess Maria's visa free cruise departures to St. Petersburg from eight to fourteen a month. The number of hotel packages will also increase significantly. The new schedule makes it possible to travel to St. Petersburg also on Fridays every two weeks. By increasing the capacity, ST.PETER LINE aims to reply to the increasing demand in Finnish market and to provide even more interesting departure dates and products specifically for Finnish and international markets, says the general director of ST.PETER LINE, Igor Glukhov.
A new kind of Baltic sea cruise
ST.PETER LINE's other ship, Princess Anastasia, will start a new kind of Baltic sea cruise from Helsinki via Stockholm and Tallinn to St. Petersburg in the beginning of February 2012. The passengers are able to spend the whole day in each city and Princess Anastasia will take the passenger to a new city conveniently during the night. As the whole cruise is done with the same vessel no inconvenient ship changes are required. Departures will be twice a week from Helsinki.
ST.PETER LINE's M/S Princess Maria successfully started the traffic between Helsinki and St. Petersburg in spring 2010. By the autumn of 2011 the shipping company had carried half a million passengers. M/S Princess Anastasia that started traffic in August 2011 has also been received brilliantly. M/S Princess Anastasia sails on the Baltic sea visiting five ports, Helsinki - Marienhamn - Stockholm - Tallinn - St. Petersburg - Helsinki.
Our visa free products 2012:
Cruises Helsinki - St. Petersburg - Helsinki, Helsinki - Stockholm - Tallinn - St. Petersburg - Helsinki
1-2 night hotel packages: Helsinki - St. Petersburg - Helsinki
Route trips: Helsinki - St. Petersburg, St. Petersburg - Helsinki, Helsinki - Tallinn, Helsinki - Stockholm, Helsinki - Marienhamn
Departures starting from 3.2.2012:
Princess Maria:
On even weeks from Helsinki to St. Petersburg:
On Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays
On odd weeks from Helsinki to St. Petersburg:
On Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays
The ship sails to St. Petersburg via Tallinn on Mondays and Tuesdays.
Princess Anastasia:
Two times a week with rolling schedule.
Five Stars of Scandinavia, Inc. is exclusive agent for St. Peter Line in the US.
To book your one-way or round trip cruise, please visit our website:
http://5stars-scandinavia.com/st-peter-line.html
To book our popular cruise/hotel packages, with up to 3 days in St. Petersburg, please visit our website:
http://5stars-scandinavia.com/cruises-russia.html#p-4
To contact Five Stars of Scandinavia:
E-mail: info@5stars-scandinavia.com
Toll free: 800.722.4126
Tel: 360.923.0125
Rail Products Worldwide
Five Stars of Scandinavia offers Rail Products worldwide!As booking agent for ACP Rail we are proud to assist you with all your rail needs, i.e. Rail passes, Point to point rail, Attractions such as
The Norway in a Nutshell, Sognefjord in a Nutshell or Hardanger in a Nutshell We are proud to provide travelers from around the world access to its attractive range of "All Country Passes" and point to point train tickets which offer great value and flexibility for exploring exciting destinations by rail, including Europe, the UK, Japan, Australia, China, North America and beyond.
2 Country passes in Scandinavia:
Denmark - Germany / Denmark - Sweden / Finland - Sweden / Norway - Sweden
Will you be traveling in Norway? Pre-order a meal for your train journey
Whether you're traveling alone or in a group, you can pre-order a delicious meal to enjoy at your seat. For a taste of Norway choose from tapas and other tasty dishes.
This service is available on select train journeys including:
Oslo - Trondheim - Oslo
Oslo - Bergen - Oslo
Oslo-Kristiansand-Stavanger-Kristiansand-Oslo
Trondheim - Røros
Trondheim - Bodø - Trondheim
Oslo - Lillehammer
Oslo - Halden - Gøteborg
Oslo - Skien
Oslo - Gjøvik
Please note that you can only pre-order cold food items, beverages, sweets, fruits and snacks.
Visitors can now explore even more countries when traveling with a Eurail Global Pass or a Balkan Flexi Pass!
An exciting addition this year, the Eurail Global Pass now includes rail travel in Slovakia, which makes for a total of 23 European countries covered with this one pass. Eurail Global Pass holders can also enjoy rail travel in Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland. There are a number of pass validities to choose from: Flexi Passes for 10 or 15 days of rail travel within 2 months or Consecutive Passes for 15 or 21 days or 1, 2 or even 3 months of rail travel. Plus there are great savings not to be missed for youth, children and groups of 2 to 5 people traveling together. The Eurail Global Pass really is the ultimate accessory to any European vacation!
The Balkan Flexi Pass is also offering new destinations to explore, now including Bosnia and Herzegovina. Also great for travel throughout Bulgaria, Greece, Macedonia, Romania, Turkey, Serbia and Montenegro, this pass will transport visitors across The Balkans and beyond. Enjoy first class rail travel for either 5, 10 or 15 flexible days within 1 month, all available in adult, youth, senior and child rates.
Happy Holidays
St. Peter Line Princess Maria new Stop-over in Tallinn!
Passengers of Princess Maria cruise ferry will enjoy a unique opportunity to relax during a sea voyage and visit three capitals of the Baltic region within only three days. ST.PETER LINE company offers a comfortable visa-free stay in Russia (up to 72 hours) to all passengers of Princess Maria cruise ferry. St. Petersburg is considered to be one of the most beautiful cities in the world - and rightly so. The most "European" Russian city is situated on islands - there one can see rivers, canals, palaces, theatres and majestic cathedrals. New times added scores of shopping centers and concert halls.
A new visit of Princess Maria ferry to Tallinn opens another - sea communication - line for Finnish citizens. Among the advantages of cruises aboard ST.PETER LINE company ferries are European quality, Russian hospitality and affordable process. During a voyage aboard Princess Maria cruise ferry passengers will be introduced to Russian cuisine at the A’la carte restaurant, enjoy a colorful show program performed by St. Petersburg Music Hall Ballet Theatre and choose any leisure option at their discretion.
Schedule details: every Monday, starting from October 28 Princess Maria cruise ferry sails on Mondays from Helsinki 16:00 to arrive in Tallinn at 20:00 with departure for St. Petersburg 23:30 the same day. Arrival in St. Petersburg at 13:00 on Tuesday. Various excursion programs are available. Wednesday night at 20.00 the ferry sails from St. Petersburg to arrive in Helsinki at 08.30 on Thursday morning.
Fove Stars of Scandinavia offers an exclusive 3-hour private sightseeing tour, including a 1-hour tour by car and 2-hour walking tour of the Old Town of Tallinn.
The advantage of cruises over other types of leisure is unbelievable comfort. Passengers depart from the very center of Helsinki, from the terminal right opposite the famous Cathedral. Aboard the ship tourists are accommodated at comfortable cabins that become their homes for three days. Upon arrival to destinations (in Tallinn it is opposite the Old City, in St. Petersburg it is Vasilievsky Island) passengers can leave their things at the cabins and go on excursions light.
It is worth remembering that ST.PETER LINE company operates two ships in the Baltic Sea: Princess Maria & Princess Anastasia. Guests of the cruise ferries enjoy comforts of different cabins and convenience of vehicle decks. They can also choose entertainments to please any taste - restaurants, bars, Duty Free shops, SPA centers, fitness halls, beauty parlors, cinema halls and children's playrooms. Varied show programs aboard the ships are performed by the brilliant St. Petersburg Music Hall Ballet Theatre and presented by a famous XXXX Bars Empire night clubs network.
Icelandair Summer Schedule - The largest in Icelandair's 74 year history!
As part of the increase, Icelandair will now offer non-stop flights to Akureyri, Iceland from Keflavik International Airport. These flights will be operated with Fokker 50 aircraft leased from Icelandair's sister company, Air Iceland and will depart from Keflavik International up to four times a week starting June 7, 2012 through September 30, 2012. Passengers will be able to book tickets and check bags direct to Akureyri from all North American Gateways including Washington-Dulles.
Known as "the Capital of the North," Akureyri is the second largest urban area in Iceland. Various museums, churches, and the Botanical Gardens fill this charming center of culture that sits on a harbor. Akureyri is also a popular port-of-call for many cruise ships. This charming new destination will allow your clients to see even more of Iceland.
As many of our friends in Denver now know, Icelandair will launch service from Denver International Airport starting May 11, 2012. Flights will depart Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays, and Sundays at 5:15 pm and arrive in Keflavik, Iceland at 6:35 am the following morning. In just a little over 7 hours your passengers can be in Iceland with easy connections to over 20 destinations in Europe and the fastest elapsed time to all Scandinavian Capitals from Denver International.
Earlier this year, it was also announced that Icelandair's seasonal service from Washington-Dulles originally scheduled as 4 flights per week through September 2011 will now operate through January, 2012. Service will resume March, 2012 with up to 6 non-stop flights a week to Reykjavik, Iceland!
Flight FI 644 departs Dulles International at 8:40 pm and arrives in Keflavik, Iceland at 6:20 am the following morning. In just a little over 5 hours your passengers can be in Iceland with easy connections to over 20 destinations in Scandinavia, The U.K and Continental Europe.
For the west coast, Icelandair's service from SEA-TAC International, originally scheduled with 5 flights per week, will now operate up to 7 non-stop flights per week to Reykjavik, Iceland! That's right, Icelandair will now offer daily service from Seattle starting May 23, 2012 through October 27, 2012 and 6 flights per week during shoulder season.
Flight FI 680 departs SEA-TAC International at 4:30 pm and arrives in Keflavik, Iceland at 6:35 am the following morning. In just a little over 7 hours, your passengers can be in Iceland with easy connections to over 20 destinations in Scandinavia, The U.K and Continental Europe.
Further, Icelandair provides convenient code share flights with Alaska Airlines from a host of west coast cities, including, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Portland, San Diego, Las Vegas, Sacramento, San Jose, Spokane and Anchorage. This allows your passengers to book a single combined ticket with Icelandair flight numbers, one-stop check-in and baggage transfer.
As we continue to grow and expand our options for international travel we look forward to the New Year and making Icelandair your preferred airline.
Icelandair new service from Denver
Icelandair is excited to begin service from Denver International Airport with four flights a week (Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays) starting May 11, 2012.
To celebrate service from the Mile-High City, Icelandair is offering special early bird fares from Denver to Iceland starting as low as $489* round-trip for travel in May 2012 when service is launched.
"We were thrilled to choose Denver from a short-list of potential new gateway cities, as we feel it is a natural fit for Icelandair. Denverites will love the nature, lifestyle and culture of Iceland, while Icelanders will feel at home with the landscape, active lifestyle, and independent philosophy in Denver", said Birkir Holm Gudnason, C.E.O of Icelandair.
Denver International Airport (DIA) is fifth largest airport in The United States and the tenth largest airport in the world. DIA will become Icelandair's 9th North American gateway with service to over 20 destinations in Europe.
Thorsteinn Egilsson, General Manger of Icelandair the Americas continued, "Savvy travelers of Denver will now have a fresh alternative when traveling to Europe. Icelandair is happy to enter this city with competitive airfares and convenient routes to Iceland and onward".
Denver International Airport is conveniently situated for serving the metropolitan area and will also act as a hub for the many domestic carriers that offer easy connections into Denver.
In addition to Denver, Icelandair offers non-stop service to Iceland from Boston, New York-JFK, Seattle, and seasonal service from Washington, D.C., Minneapolis - St. Paul, Orlando Sanford, Halifax and Toronto. Connections through Icelandair's hub at Keflavik International Airport are available to over 20 destinations in Scandinavia, the U.K. and Continental Europe. Icelandair also allows passengers to stopover in Iceland at no additional airfare.
* TERMS & CONDITIONS: Departing DIA AIRFARES: Price displayed represents round-trip travel from DIA to KEF. Valid for outbound travel May 11 - May 31, 2012. Valid for new purchases only, are determined by departure date, and are based on round-trip purchase per person. No advance purchase; must be ticketed within 48 hours; Saturday night min. stay; 60 days max. stay. Additional fares and destinations are available on www.icelandair.us. Last Ticket Date: Sep. 30, 2010. Tickets are non-refundable; change fee of $275 p.p. within validity of fare. Other restrictions apply. Seats are limited, and may not be available on every flight. *Prices quoted are exclusive of applicable taxes and official charges by destination of approx. $100–$210 per person, including the September 11 Security Fee.
St. Peter Line visa-free cruise Stockholm - St. Petersburg
Princess Anastasia En Route to St. Petersburg
Princess Anastasia ferry made her first successful voyage from Stockholm on April 2, 2011. On April 3 the ferry sailed from Tallinn to St. Petersburg - it was her first new line trip. Princess Anastasia cruise ferry will sail on her regular runs twice a week. "Princess Anastasia" will arrive in Stockholm every Tuesday and Friday and in Tallinn every Sunday. Prices for the round trip cruise start from $185 per person, based on double, inside cabin, June 15 - August 31, 2011.
Five Stars of Scandinavia, Inc. is exclusive agent for St. Peter Line in the US.
To book your one-way or round trip cruise, please visit our website:
http://5stars-scandinavia.com/st-peter-line.html
To book our popular cruise/hotel packages, please visit our website:
http://5stars-scandinavia.com/cruises-russia.html#p-4
To contact Five Stars of Scandinavia:
E-mail: info@5stars-scandinavia.com
Toll free: 800.722.4126
Tel: 360.923.0125
St. Peter Line Princess Maria cruise ferry first anniversary
On April 21, 2011 Princess Maria cruise ferry of ST.PETER LINE Company sailed on her first anniversary cruise. Exactly one year ago St. Petersburg's Governor Mrs. Valentina Matvienko participated in the inauguration of a successful St. Petersburg - Helsinki regular ferry line.
From the moment of inaugurating the first St. Petersburg - Helsinki ferry line ST.PETER LINE Company has demonstrated unprecedented success in the history of ferry navigation. After the line started operations the ferry operator carried over 220,000 passengers with the share of foreign tourists exceeding 40%. Besides Finnish citizens the new ferry line attracted great interest from citizens of Estonia, China, America and Germany. ST.PETER LINE Company achieved that high level of success offering high quality service and using innovative technologies in organizing the line: the project integrates not only classic ferry runs but also a cruise line concept which the competitors lacked. European quality, Russian hospitality, affordable prices, 72-hour visa free regime for foreign citizens to enter Russian territory, a successful entertainment program allowed to work a kind of revolution creating not only a sustainable passenger flow but also inaugurating a second ferry line. Princess Maria passenger cruise ferry that operates the St. Petersburg - Helsinki line displaces 38,000 tons and can accommodate 1,638 passengers. The ship has 606 cabins in different class and price ranges and the car deck of the ship can carry 395 vehicles.
Due to success of the St. Petersburg - Helsinki line in the Russian and international markets ST.PETER LINE Company decided to open a new St. Petersburg - Stockholm - Tallinn route. Since March 31, 2011 the line has been successfully operated by Princess Anastasia, a modern cruise ferry displacing 38,000 tons and ready to accommodate 2,353 passengers. The guests aboard can enjoy 834 cabins in different class and price ranges, Duty Free shops, a beauty parlor, children's playroom, a SPA center, restaurants and bars. The car deck of the ship can carry 580 vehicles. Inauguration of a second ferry line will allow St. Petersburg to receive about 300 thousand additional tourists in 2011.
ST.PETER LINE Company is confident that ferry service development will confirm St. Petersburg's status as the sea capital of Russia.
See our visa free Cruise packages to St. Petersburg:
Icelandair Interline Partnership with JetBlue
Today Icelandair launched an interline partnership with JetBlue, opening up new travel opportunities for your clients. Connecting between JetBlue’s network in the United States and the Caribbean and Icelandair destinations throughout Scandinavia, the United Kingdom, and Continental Europe, this partnership will enable your clients to book a single combined ticket for JetBlue and Icelandair-operated flights with one-stop check-in and baggage transfer between the two airlines.When connecting in the Americas JetBlue offers award-winning service on flights from dozens of gateways including Chicago; Denver; Fort Lauderdale, Florida; Las Vegas; Los Angeles; and San Juan, Puerto Rico. JetBlue is the largest domestic airline in Boston and at New York/JFK, offering flights that feature all-leather seating, lots of legroom, in-flight entertainment at every seatback, and unlimited free snacks and drinks.
Icelandair offers three cabins of premium service featuring equally impressive new leather seats, personal in-flight entertainment and easy access to the popular destination of Reykjavik via Icelandair's gateway cities of Boston, New York/JFK, and Washington/Dulles. Icelandair will expand service from Boston and New York/JFK to Reykjavik with twice-daily flights on June 1, 2011 and will launch non-stop service from Washington/Dulles to Reykjavik on May 17, 2011 making JetBlue connections the perfect complement.
Once in Iceland, Icelandair offers non-stop connections to destinations in Scandinavia, including Billund and Copenhagen, Denmark; Bergen and Oslo, Norway; Gothenburg and Stockholm, Sweden; Helsinki, Finland and other popular European cities including Amsterdam, Glasgow, London and Paris.
Connecting passengers may also stopover in Iceland at no additional airfare to experience the natural beauty and many attractions in Iceland.
"Icelandair and JetBlue share many of the same philosophies and place the customer's experience in the highest regard", said Helgi Mar Bjorgvinsson, Icelandair's Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing. "Our harmonious networks from New York, Boston and Washington, D.C. and like-minded customer service make this a natural partnership. Together we will open a new world of opportunities for customers traveling from the United States and the Caribbean to Iceland, Scandinavia, the United Kingdom and Continental Europe. We look forward to working together and strengthening our relationship into the future".
Icelandair also offers interline tickets with Finnair, SAS and last year entered into a codeshare agreement with Alaska Airlines. Pricing and schedules for all interline partners are visible in your GDS and will autoprice accordingly.
Hotel Arctic - Ilulissat, Greenland
Hotel Arctic's presentation film "A World beyond Imagination" has been voted the world's best advertising film for a hotel.The video won the accolade at the international tourist exhibition ITB in Berlin where it was the only film in the category to receive a gold award. ITB is the world’s biggest professional tourist exhibition.
We were excited when we were nominated and we are proud to have won the award and to promote Greenland in this way, says manager Erik Bjerregaard, Hotel Arctic.
The film, which lasts two minutes, was produced by the Danish company ParaVision in 2009. The idea was to make a film that was carried by an atmosphere and a film that could be experienced and understood by everyone, regardless of language and culture. The photos tell us the story about a journey into a time warp, where well-being and experiences are in focus. The Greenlandic song writer Simon Lynge has created the music for the film.
Stay at Hotel Arctic during our Summer tours: Ilulissat: Town of Icebergs, Ilulissat, Image of Ice,
Greenland from South to North by Air, Greenland from the Sea
Winter tours: "Winter in Ilulissat", Aurora & Polar Circle Adventure
Icelandair flights to Stavanger Norway!
Fly Icelandair to Stavanger in Fjord NorwayIcelandair offer Norwegian bound travelers more choices than ever when
 |
| Old Stavanger | Paul Smit | IMAGO | Fjord Norway |
Stavanger combines both stunning natural attractions and cultural sights in a mild climate, ideal for breaks when you are looking to pack in lots of activities. These could include trips to windswept beaches, majestic fjords, as well as shopping in Stavanger's cosmopolitan city center and visits to museums.
Icelandair - convenient schedule
Icelandair offers a convenient flight path to Norway with service to 4 destinations in Norway and will operate up to eight flights a week to Oslo, three flights a week to Bergen, two flights a week to Stavanger, as well as three flights to Trondheim.
When you are on your way to Norway, Icelandair is the natural choice.
Icelandair, the flagship carrier of Iceland since 1937, offers service to Iceland from Boston, New York-JFK, Seattle, and seasonal service from Washington, D.C., Minneapolis - St. Paul, Orlando Sanford, Halifax and Toronto. Connections through Icelandair’s hub at Keflavik International Airport are available to over 20 destinations in Scandinavia, the U.K. and Continental Europe. Only Icelandair allows passengers to stopover in Iceland at no additional airfare.
Round-trip fares to Norway from $779* (subject to availability)
Göta Canal Cruise Award
We give you the Best Adventure in Sweden!Göta Canal Cruises - The Blue Ribbon of Sweden
When the international price TRIP Global Award for "Best Adventure in Sweden" was announced yesterday we had the great pleasure to receive first price. The jury consists of tour operators from Sweden's top eight overseas markets, Germany, Netherlands, Italy, Spain, France, Britain, Russia and the United States.
We are of course very happy and proud of this award. A trip on the Göta Canal is truly an incredible experience and a journey I personally think that Swedes should embark on themselves. It is an amazing piece of cultural history that passes by, and also combined with good food and good company says Håkan Gullberg, shipping manager at Göta Canal Steamship Company.
The prize was established by the travel and tourism industry in Sweden (RTS), in cooperation with Visit Sweden, in order to find out what foreign visitors want to experience in Sweden and to highlight those who offer Sweden's best experience.When you compete against the experiences/adventures of Skansen, Kungsleden Trail and Åre it is a true honor to win the grand prize. Meanwhile we know that we deliver an excellent experience on the Göta Canal. Our own customer surveys show, year after year, high customer satisfaction and we constantly work to improve our products, says Peter Henricson, division manager at Strömma.
Enjoy a cruise on the Göta Canal this summer, and choose to channel through Sweden during two, three, four or six days.
An unparalleled cruise in time on one of the most remarkable waterways in the world, the Göta Canal - the Blue Ribbon of Sweden, a voyage with focus on pleasure, experiences and relaxation.
Whether you travel with M/S Juno, Wilhelm Tham or Diana, each cruise should be an unforgettable event for our passengers.
Oceanwide Expeditions Fuel Surcharge
Dear Traveler,
For the Arctic 2011 season, you had been informed of the following clause in our conditions, "It is agreed that if world fuel prices will reach or exceed US Dollar 80 per Barrel Brent 90 days prior to departure Oceanwide Expeditions reserves the right to levy a fuel surcharge of USD 25 per passenger per night, to be paid by the contracting party of Oceanwide Expeditions".
We have been prudent about levying these surcharges, but it does not seem likely that for the Arctic 2011 season that the Barrel Brent will dip under the 80 USD again. Therefore we regrettably have to advise you to expect a revised invoice for fuel surcharges for your booked passengers on our motor vessels in the coming months.
The fuel surcharge will now effectively apply to all new 2011 Arctic reservations.
Lonely Planet Ranks the Westfjords in Iceland a Top 10 Region for 2011!
Westfjords of Iceland |
| Flateyri | Westfjords of Iceland | Ragnar Sigurdsson |
But there is another Iceland: a quiet whisper about a secret and overlooked corner of the country is becoming a clamor that this year might be too hard to ignore. The place is the Westfjords, that oddly shaped peninsula only just connected to the rest of Iceland by a narrow isthmus of land. It’s as isolated as it is spectacular.
Read full article
Visit our website for self-drive tours featuring the Westfjords:
Iceland Grand Circle
Iceland Discovery
Hurtigruten Cruises Fuel Surcharge
Dear Hurtigruten traveler,Due to increases in the cost of fuel, Hurtigruten ASA and its subsidiaries have decided to implement a fuel surcharge policy.
The fuel surcharge will be set at $8 per person, per cruise night, for US, Canadian, Central and South American residents. It will apply to all new bookings beginning April 1, 2011 on all Hurtigruten departures.
Passengers booked and deposited prior to April 1, 2011 are exempt. Note: name changes of exempt passengers are not allowed.
12-day Classic Roundtrip, $88
7-day Northbound Bergen - Kirkenes, $48
6-day Southbound Kirkenes - Bergen, $40
The level and applicability of the fuel surcharge will be reviewed regularly. If the price of light sweet crude oil, according to the NYMEX, remains below $70 per barrel for a period of 30 consecutive days, the fuel surcharge will be eliminated for new and existing bookings on departures following that 30 day period.
We encourage our clients who expressed interest in the Hurtigruten cruises to book before March 31st and save!
New Stockholm to St. Petersburg Ferry Cruise
Legendary ship "Olympia" originally built for Slite Viking Line was recently acquired from Messes. Irish Ferries as "Pride of Bilbao". The ship will be renamed as "Princess Anastasia" and extensively renovated before entering in to the route to maximize passengers' comfort to meet the requirements of international conventions of safety and environment protection. St Peter Line "Princess Anastasia" is a modern passenger ferry with gross tonnage of 38000; she can accommodate up to 2353 passengers. The cruise ferry features 834 cabins of different types and price categories, the car deck can accommodate up to 580 vehicles. Estimated travel time is 25 hours. The new ferry will depart from Stockholm twice a week.
St. Peter Line presents first time in the history Visa Free Cruise from Sweden to Russia. As the schedule is made for the comfort of tourists, the new ferry line will be the most convenient and affordable way of traveling to Russia. Weekend trips are scheduled to make stops in Tallinn on the way from Stockholm to Saint-Petersburg. Passengers from all over the world will be able to enjoy marvelous treasures of Russian North Capital Saint-Petersburg within 72 hours without Russian visa.
The passengers will have an opportunity to stay in Saint-Petersburg from 1 to 3 days using hotel packages and both ships of St.Peter Line fleet. The new ferry will offer excellent condition for the Baltic Sea cruises: beautifully appointed suites and cabins for in style and budget travelers, spacious SPA, Russian and European cuisine restaurants, authentic Russian shows of Music Hall cabaret, bars, discotheques and casino for onboard entertainment and multilingual services for the Guests. The line "Stockholm - St. Petersburg" will become the second line operated by the company: "Princess Maria" ferry has been successfully sailing between Helsinki and St. Petersburg since April, 2010.
More info: St. Peter Line
Forbes Magazine: In Cod They Trust
Even in late March the weather can be nasty above the Arctic Circle, especially in the Lofoten Islands, where my German fishing buddy Ingrid Shumway and I were booked to compete in the Lofotcup, Norway's annual two-day cod fishing tournament. A 60-mile archipelago, the Lofotens fan across the Norwegian Sea like scared bait. They are one of the prettiest--and most out there--places on Earth. Sheared and whittled by 20,000 years of glacial ice, the islands are a sweep of 3,000-foot maritime alps and 3-billion-year-old granite plateaus. If Switzerland were flooded, it would look a lot like the Lofoten Islands.Scattered about are little fishing villages marked by simple fishermen's cabins and two-story wooden cod-drying racks. But don't let the old charm fool you. The place is full of chic coffeehouses, good bookstores, hotels that could win design awards in Milan and some of the most sophisticated seafood anywhere. Especially cod dishes, the Lofotens' still-bustling cod fishery being the reason Viking traders bothered to settle these Lilliputian islands. A thousand years later, in 1991, islanders turned the opening of cod season into a national event and invited out-of-towners.
A word about cod and the Norse. The fish lies in rough relation to northerners as cattle do to Argentineans and sheep to New Zealanders. Norwegians eat it fresh; boiled with fat skeins of its own delicate roe; air-dried and baked into a tomato-based bacalao; or prepped with lye, which turns the fish into something resembling a bar of soap.
Tournament headquarters is in the village of Svolvær, nearly 800 miles (and two more flights) northeast of Oslo. By the time we arrived the light was blue and Svolvær's waterfront looked like Saturday night on Santorini--with Gore-Tex. The cafes were packed with jovial Norwegians, but we managed to squeeze in and enjoy some surprisingly lean and tasty hamburgers.
"Hvalburger," our server corrected. Whales, a fellow fisherman told us, follow the cod, so this was good news.
By morning Svolvær Harbor looked like D-day. Scores of boats carrying 500 or so contestants revved their engines while crews ran around filling bait tanks and checking tackle. Swathed in layers of fleece, wool and rubber, we Gumby-walked to the Blomøy, the 58-foot postwar chartered boat we would share with nine other fishermen, all from Oslo. The day was so clear the mountains looked mythic. The starting horn sounded to a hail of whoops, and we were off. But the moment we left the harbor a north wind kicked up, the sea convulsed, the sky went dead-cod green and ice-pick sleet soon hacked at our faces. We skedaddled into the first handy fjord, but it was so rough there the Norwegian Coast Guard followed us in. Nonetheless, the captain cut to an idle, and the fishing began.
The boat bucked nonstop, one icy wave after another crashed onto the decks, and the wind tied endless knots in our lines. There was something heroic about standing there and surviving. Dock gossip that evening was that almost no cod had been taken by anyone. Something wasn't right.
On the second day we awoke to a perfect Arctic storm. Stowed rope and crab pots made snowy hillocks onshore as we headed out in near whiteout conditions. Within minutes I was totally freezing.
"Dere is no bad weather, only bad clothes," one of the crew noted, glancing helpfully at my dishwashing gloves, which were all that the Svolvær hardware store had left. Then he told us that Blomøy means either "flower island" or "cauliflower" depending, we assumed, on how the fishing was going. The old boat managed to plow through nonstop rollers for 45 minutes before we lurched into another fjord. We resumed battle positions, armed with heavy Norwegian fishing rods and handsomely tooled saltwater reels--all of which counted for nada. After three hours of fish-free torture I'd had it.
Whoever said misery loves company was crazy. All I wanted to do was crawl off somewhere by myself and warm up. I settled for the hold and braved its perilous long vertical ladder only to find a crew member named Odd Burviuk already down there playing "Misty" on his accordion.
"Shouldn't you be running the boat or something?" I asked him.
"Too rough," he replied with a rococo flourish. "I joke. Dis is nothing."
So the old Blomøy can handle weather like this? "Awk!" spat Odd. "She yust need replacement in skandekk, floor and skin. Also dare is tæring damage in the aftermath bastard around some keel bolts in forskipet." After that explanation, he began to play "That Old Black Magic." A yell sounded from above decks. Someone finally had a fish on. I scrambled back up the ladder. The snow had stopped, the air was still, and the Good Ship Cauliflower was bathed in celestial light. I was thrilled to find that the fisherman fighting a fish was Ingrid.
She boated it, too, with a little help from our first mate's gaff. There it was, the ancient Norwegian coastal cod: the Homer Simpson upper jaw, the churlish little chin barbel, the big startled eyes popping out of a scale-less skin. But intriguing. This cold-water cannibal won't hesitate to dine on its younger brethren. It makes its own enzymatic antifreeze that lets it handle water temperatures icy enough to make a grown man … pick up the accordion.
Ingrid's 8-pound cod won her ninth place in the women's division, an achievement we toasted at the Lofotcup awards ceremony on the waterfront that night. But the real celebration began when she led us and some Oslo pals to Svolvær's Rica Hotel, where she had snagged a room with a fishing hole cut into its floor. We settled into armchairs, poured brandy and cast our bait to the wind beneath our now warm feet.
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Gourmet Magazine: Pride of the Norwegian Wood
NORTH OF OSLO, A UNIQUELY LARGE POPULATION OF THE GIANT GROUSE KNOWN AS THE CAPERCAILLIE DRAWS HUNTERS FROM AROUND THE WORLD BY JESSICA MAXWELLON A NARROW FRET OF LAND between Sweden and the Norwegian Sea, Sea, the trees are alive with the sound of capercaillie, the largest species of grouse on earth. Big as a turkey, handsome as a hummingbird, male capercaillie (pronounced "caper-kelly") can weigh up to 15 pounds and are detailed like race cars, with bright indigo backs, mahogany wings, and a blaze of malachite iridescence across the front, all of which the dusky females find irresistible.
Capercaillie are well known for the ruckus they make when startled, something like a pony crashing through the brush, hence their sobriquet, an old Gaelic word for "horse of the woods." And the flesh of this woodland grouse has seduced hunters for centuries. Fine-grained and lilac-mauve, it has a pungency reminiscent of guavas soaked in retsina, the gift of a diet rich in forest berries and pine shoots.
Once common throughout northern Europe, capercaillie had been hunted to extinction in the British Isles by the late l700s. Small, scattershot populations exist today in the French Pyrenees, Slovakia, Scotland, Russia, and the Czech Republic, but a remarkably high ratio of forest to people supports hundreds of thousands of breeding pairs in Scandinavia. Especially in Norway, which is why I was stork-stepping through foot-high snow in a 30,000-acre family forest a few hours' drive north of Oslo, trying to follow the poodle-yip of a little red Finnish bird dog, which, my Swedish hunting guide assured me, had treed an iibergrouse only a few miles away. "When Molly barks, she has found a bird," explained Bertil Kainulainen, a renowned
shooting champion who had been recruited to lead our hunt.
"Now we have to find it," added Knut Arne Gjems, the cheerful, sea-eyed 26-year-old son of our hosts, UlfErik and Gerd Gjems (pronounced "yems"), whose family has owned and hunted this forest for 150 years.
Being so heavy, capercaillie don't really like to fly, and whenever Molly found one, she chased it into a treetop, then distracted it with her incessant yapping so we hunters could, theoretically, sneak up on it unnoticed. So far, every bird had escaped long before we'd gotten to it. Once, we found Molly barking at absolutely nothing. "She smells some oil from a bird," Bertil explained. "But it flew."
Moments later, the dog was off again on what we dubbed another "Molly bolt," and so were we, navigating the cool beauty of the woods, which, given the lack of hunting action, had become its own reason for being there. Having lived in the American Northwest most of my life, I've seen my share of forests. But the Gjems' forest felt enchanted, like the antechamber to Valhalla. A dappled land of birch, pine, and lake, it has, even at midday, a vespertine quality that makes you want to speak in whispers, which made Molly's racket all the more jarring. But that's bird hunting. And this was certainly the place to do it. Thanks to the exceptional management of Ulf, Knut Arne, and his older brothers, Ole Jorgen and Haakon Einarprofessional foresters all-this grand forest remains a virtual larder of ducks, geese, black and hazel grouse, and the elusive capercaillie, not to mention moose, deer, hare, trout, perch, pike, and even thrilling nongame predators: wolf, lynx, and brown bear. But the capercaillie is the most coveted game, a legendary staple traditionally served with lingonberry jam, Norway's answer to turkey with cranberry sauce.
We'd been walking for something like five hours, not counting a break for a good camp lunch of bacon mooseburgers and hot coffee. Molly, as always, was off somewhere, barking like a crazy thing, and we were trudging up yet another snowbound hill, an army looking for a war. Then, without warning, a rapid swooshing sound passed overhead.
"Capercaillie," Bertil announced with quiet admiration, like John Wayne pointing out Rita Hayworth. We saw nothing. But the closeness ofthose mighty wings had set my heart on edge. The hunt was on.
A few minutes later we saw them: five rufous-throated females and a dark male, pecking at pea gravel not 20 yards away.
"I have never seen so much capercaillie here," Knut Arne whispered to me.
Diving behind a tall snowbank, Bertillay down sideways and motioned for me to steady my gun barrel across his back. This was crazy. And dangerous. And it worked. Despite my raging pulse, I got the male squarely in my rifle sight... then he ducked, and moved out of view. As with making sauces and taking photographs and broaching delicate but necessary subjects with a loved one, a hunting shot requires good timing. There is a right moment, then it is gone.
"Why didn't you shoot?" Bertil asked.
Why? Because I'd never gone bird hunting with a rifle, only a shotgun. Because I'd only shot a rifle three times in my life... at target practice the day before. I hit the sweet spot on the cardboard capercaillie each time only because I love animals and cannot bear the thought of wounding one and want to take it square or not at all. And because when the capercaillie ducked, the sweet spot ducked with it, and I was unwilling to take a chance on anything but certain, pain-free death. "It is a rifle," Bertil replied. "You would have killed it."
WE WALKED DOWN MANY MILES of frosty lane that day, hot on the trail of Molly's promising bark. She seemed to find a capercaillie in every cardinal direction, only to have it vanish on the wing. We walked until around three that afternoon, when the light was falling and so was the temperature, and my fingers felt like frozen fish sticks. That's when Bertil's foxy little bird dog became a cinnabar comet streaking up a slope. He took off after her, and I after him. Forty-five minutes and five uphill football fields later we found the tree.
"There," he said, and pointed up at such an obtuse angle I thought he meant the sky.
"No, Yessica, there," he repeated, turning my head toward the top of a very tall spruce. But all I saw was a thatch of branches.
"I don't think that's a bird," I ventured.
"It is a bird," Bertil declared. "Shoot it."
It's hard to disobey the John Wayne of Sweden. So after a Keystone Cops episode of Berti I trying to get me to use his shoulder as a rifle rest and my chickening out three times for fear of ruining his hearing (or worse), I knelt in the snow, leaned into a tree, and took aim. My heart hopped like a pogo stick and so did the thatch of branches in my scope. My blood played kettledrums inside my ears, my arms cramped from holding the heavy rifle so high, and I was panting like a lover. There was no way I could hit anything. Then something hard and true fell into my solar plexus. My pulse slowed. My mind cleared. And soon the capercaillie hung on the cross in my rifle scope. And I pulled the trigger.
"You got it!" Bertil hollered, then ran to get to my bird before Molly did.
It was a yearling male, nearly eight pounds, dropped against all odds at 65 yards in the dark, in the snow, in the good Norwegian woods. There in my arms, the blue and green of its feathers playing against the black, it looked like a gigantic collapsed petunia, the warrior's corsage.
My capercaillie was prepared that night by Jorgen Bestum, who is the gifted young chef at Skaslien Guesthouse (062-94-6666), in nearby Kirkemer, and whose cooking trumps that of chefs at many big-name restaurants. Jorgen made us a starter of crisp-skinned lake trout with leeks and asparagus done in a light butter cream sauce, followed by a champignon consomme with tomato concassee and fresh parsley, so rich with the essences of capercaillie bones, it could have held its own in Paris. As could the rounds of walnut bread that Jorgen baked himself. Our third course was Ulf's mother's recipe, the Gjems Capercaillie Sandwich, a hache of thigh meat on toast with a ragout of Lithuanian chanterelles, crowned with half a roasted capercaillie heart.
But the prize went to the edgy, sexy roasted breast of capercaillie served sherbet-pink in half-inch slices as generous and aromatic as the woods from which the bird came.
"Capercaillie is the grouse de resistance!" I proclaimed.
"And I am Yohn Wayne of Sweden!" countered Bertil. "And I say it is the time for the hunting toast!"
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Forbes Magazine: Girl vs. Moose
When da dog stops barking, da moose is moving." Toward us? Bjorn regarded me with lutefisk eyes. "Yes, maybe. If we have da luck."He nodded, and Ingrid nodded back. Bjorn Johansen was our hunting guide. Ingrid Shumway is the founder of Five Stars of Scandinavia, the U.S. outfitter that books this annual October trip. We were hunting on the opening day of Norway's moose season alongside our hosts, owners of a 10,000-acre private woodlands outside Oslo. The family sold its ancestral home, which is now a hotel, Losby Gods Manor. But they kept the surrounding property--a preferred hunting ground since 1850 for European nobility, including Norway's late King Haakon VII.
The hills are alive with the sound of black and hazel grouse. The bottomlands hide pools of quicksand, plus many mighty moose. For the record, elk, or, in Norwegian, elg, is what Europeans call the animal known in North America as moose ("moose" coming from the Algonquin word meaning twig-eater). The Swedish father of taxonomy, Carl Linnaeus, named them in 1758: Alces alces, Latin for "elk elk." What Americans call "elk" are really wapiti--Eurasian red deer.
Moose are related to the extinct Irish elk, which were the same size as modern Norwegian elk, weighing between 900 and 1,200 pounds, but had enormous antlers. Irish elk had antlers 13 feet across and died out about 10,000 years ago (no doubt from poor posture).
There are an estimated 125,000 moose in Norway--so many that scientists have called for thinning of the population to avoid an agonizing die-off from mass starvation. As it is, hungry moose have shown up in barns looking for food and have sampled Christmas wreaths hung on urban front doors. They have broken into grocery stores, chased joggers, attacked dogsleds. Some, after gorging on fermented apples, have stumbled around drunk and gotten tangled up in hanging laundry. Others have plunged off cliffs, flattening cars.
Last year some 85,000 licensed hunters culled 40,000 moose. The meat was used for such traditional Norwegian fare as moose roasts, ribs, supremely lean steaks and kjøttkake, tasty little meat cakes. About a hundred moose roam the Losby estate, more than enough to assure good hunting for the owning family, their friends and up to two dozen paying guests per season. Throw in the comforts of a room at Losby Gods Manor and a meal at its award-winning restaurant and you have a hunting trip fit for Haakon vii.
At Losby some hunters walk with the guide and his dog (as Ingrid and I did the first day), while others remain posted at prime shooting spots. Then everyone trades places. Bjorn's dog, Piro ("Fire"), is, of course, a Norwegian elkhound, a breed descended from Viking guard dogs, and as such had immediately run off to find moose (elg) and start barking at them.
We chased Piro's bark all morning. Sometimes it floated to the left, sometimes to the right; sometimes it drew thrillingly near, sometimes it narrowed to a small, distant yelp that could have been mistaken for a hawk's cry. We pursued it like the siren-possessed, up granite outcroppings and down hillsides slick with tangerine-colored mushrooms and lichen that looked like golf tees. When Piro ran too far off to be heard, we tracked the signal sent from his collar to Bjorn's insectile, four-antennaed radio.
We crossed forest floors aglow with wild cranberries and raspberry-colored blueberry bushes, then Frankenstein-stepped our way across a lagoon of quicksand, in which I became resoundingly mired for ten sinking minutes. When one of my rubber boots got stuck, I walked right out of it, then had to balance ice skater-like with my other leg pointing out behind, until Bjorn and Ingrid rescued me.
After I'd recovered my breath and boot, we tramped through stands of birch while Piro barked and barked. We had been walking for three hours when at last he stopped. The sudden loss of the hunt's soundtrack made me nervous.
"We stay now," said Bjorn, "let da dog bring da moose to us."
He crouched and took aim while Ingrid and I steadied our 7mm Dakota 76 Travelers, "the best gun on the planet right now for the money," according to Ingrid's husband, Bob, an ace shot. We hunkered down into what might at any moment be the path of a galumphing behemoth.
It was hard not to recall what had happened two years ago to a hunter in this same situation. Aurdal Arne, 68, had shot a bull moose one autumnal morn. As Arne approached the "dead" bull, it reared up and lunged at him. Not wishing to be impaled, he grabbed hold of the moose's antlers as it flailed with the urgency of the dying. "After a minute of madness," he recalls, the moose expired, "and went on to the eternal forest."
Conditions all seemed in our favor. We were downwind. Visibility was flawless. Sound--the ratcheting song of a black grouse--carried plainly. But the straight-up truth is that waiting in a clearing for a rampaging moose feels a lot more like pre-op surgery than sport.
There was a thrashing in the bushes as moose sought to get away from Piro.
"I can smell them," said Ingrid.
Alas, no elg ventured out. Then Piro barked again, and the tension broke like a shoelace. Exhausted, we gave up for the day. Bjorn eventually found the dirt road back to his car, Piro found us, and together we drove to a log shelter called the Resting Place for lunch.
Our hosts had already made a campfire. Cowboy coffee was boiling away in a big black kettle suspended from a rebar tripod minded by Johan Foss, an Oslo surgeon and one of the ten surviving family members who inherited Losby Gods in 1960 when the family matriarch died. His cousin, Danckert Krohn, an Oslo anesthesiologist, cut off thick slices of bacon and fried them in a pan with an ingenious 3-foot sapling handle. His daughter, Kristin, who works for the Norwegian Parliament, readied potato pancakes for the best bacon sandwiches this side of London. Their friend and fellow M.D. Fredrik Hancke helped affix the sandwiches to pronged sticks so we could roast them in the fire, and Bjorn poured thick coffee into hand-carved birch cups.
After lunch Ingrid, Kristin and I posted on a sunny knoll while the rest either walked with Bjorn or posted elsewhere. Just as I had bedded down in the heather for a nap, I heard Kristin say: "There he is!" And I opened my eyes to find a huge earth-colored bull sauntering through brush below us.
Until you have a close encounter with a moose in the wild, you simply cannot fathom how massive they are. Their haunches are hillocks. They stand taller and broader than any horse. This male's huge, many-tiered palmate antlers called to mind the lyric "he's got the whole world in his hands." Ingrid already had her sight on a cow that had climbed the opposite ridge. Before I could say: "Wait, there's a bull!" Ingrid shot. And missed. Both bull and cow bolted into the pines.
The next morning I walked with Johan Foss. "Normally we would have an animal down by now," he said as we followed a small, clear creek up a steep hill. "Very unusual." Few know the property better. From May to October Johan and his wife live in a cabin on the family estate.
"I hunt here. I golf here. I go skiing here, tracking here, pick mushrooms and berries here, go canoeing and swimming and skating on the lakes here. I see things I never see anywhere else." He pointed to a hoofprint in the new grass. "He has been here today. The moose very often come to this place."
That place, called the Lunch Sump, is a traditional dining spot for Losby loggers. A granite rise with natural boulder seating, it offers an excellent long view of a tight valley. An hour later Johan pointed to a dark shape on the hillside and took aim. The wind was up, making white noise in yellow birch leaves. Clouds raced in from the west, then vanished. So did our moose.
"Hunting is waiting," said Johan. He and I departed for a new post near a silvery lake above a sloping V-shaped meadow half a football field wide at the middle. At 12:15 a yellow-backed woodpecker landed on the tree in front of us, just as a message in Norwegian came over Johan's walkie-talkie. He held up two fingers: two moose.
"Listen for the shooting."
At 12:35 we heard Piro barking loudly, closing in on the woods by the lake to our left. The dog fell silent. A ringing shot followed. Then another. Two more. And a fifth. Johan interpreted the radio report: "One moose down. A cow. Ingrid's. Danckert hit a bull, but they haven't found it yet. They'll find it."
They did, of course. Later we all met at an outbuilding fixed with winches and pulleys and tables, where Bjorn and the doctors went about the solemn choreography of butchering the first moose of the season. As night fell and the evening birds began their own hunting, the men moved silently in tandem to tease the rich, red meat from narrowest of sheaths of white fat beneath the chocolate hides. You could smell the sweetness of the forest in it--a miracle of wild nutrition. Isn't it good, Norwegian wood? The Christmas kjøttkake would be excellent this year.
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