NCV Unveils Scandinavia Package Offers
NCV Independent Vacations is offering Scandinavian packages including visits to Oslo, Norway; Helsinki, Finland; and Reykajavik, Iceland and featuring savings on air-inclusive cruise tours. The centerpiece of five Scandinavian packages offered is a six-day southbound, seven-day northbound or 12-day round-trip sailing along the scenic, 1,250-mile Norwegian coast visiting 34 ports between Bergen and Kirkenes, above the Arctic Circle. All tours include the OsloPass and Bergen Card offering free and reduced admission to many museums and attractions as well as unlimited public transportation in those cities. Packages cost $2,780 to $8,680 per person double, and an AARP member discount of $100 to $150 per cabin is offered all year; after July 31 that discount can be combined with senior savings of $95 to $170 per guest 67 and older. NCV also offers fully-escorted packages with similar itineraries. The three all-Norway packages -- 12-day Highlights of Norway, $2,795 to $6,740; 13-day Norwegian Holiday, $2,780 to $6,190; and 17-day Grand Norway, $3,085 to $8,680 -- depart daily year-round while the two Scandinavian tours run through Oct. 31. The 14-day Scandinavian Sampler itinerary, priced at $3,080 to $7,040, offers two nights in Reykjavik, Iceland's capital, where optional excursions range from snowmobile safaris on glaciers and horseback riding to visits to national parks, spectacular geysers and geo-thermal hot springs. The 15-day Scandinavian Sojourn, $3,130 to $6,420, includes two nights in Finland's capital, Helsinki, to explore neoclassical Senate Square and the Suomenlinna Maritime Fortress, and two nights in the Finnish Lapland region, where participants visit with a reindeer-herding Sami family and tour the SIIDA Sami and NatureMuseum. The cruise portion of each tour takes in Alesund's Art Nouveau architecture, the Geirangerfjord (April 15 to Sept. 11), the university town of Tromso, ancient Trondheim founded by first-century Vikings and the Lofoten Islands, which stretch like a wall of mountains off the coast. On land, guests stay upwards of three nights in first-class hotels in Oslo, Norway's 1,000-year-old capital, and Bergen, a UNESCO World Heritage site, transported between the two on the scenic Oslo-Bergen train journey, named one of the Top 20 Rail Experiences in the World. Popular sights include Bergen's Hanseatic wharf Bryggen, the Fish Market, the Bergen Aquarium and Old Bergen and, in Oslo, hundreds of outdoor sculptures, the 700-year-old Akershus Castle and Fortress, the Viking Ship Museum, Nobel Peace Center and architecture ranging from medieval to postmodern. Pre- or post-tour enhancement options go to the Hardangerfjord, the Sognefjord, the Geirangerfjord, or Finnish Lapland, including riding the steep Flam Railway, seeing the Briksdal Glacier by horse and carriage or visiting Ailikas, the holy mountain of the Sami people near the Norway-Finland border. These add-on packages cost $395 to $610, per person, double and include one or two hotel nights, some meals and most transportation and excursions, and are offered May to September, with extra hotel nights available throughout. Independent Vacations include transatlantic flights from New York, intra-Scandinavia flights as indicated on itinerary, a coastal voyage, first-class hotels with buffet breakfast daily, one dinner in Bergen, Oslo airport transfers, air taxes, port charges, and the scenic Oslo-Bergen train trip, the Oslo Pass and Bergen Card. Add-on air fares are available. For more information, call 800-323-7436 or visit www.coastalvoyage.com.
Source: TravelPulse.com - May 16, 2005 / © 2010 Performance Media Group