Tromsø is the largest city located within the arctic circle. In winter, it is a popular destination for chasing the Northern lights. Keep reading to find out how to spend 3 days in Tromsø for making the most out of a winter trip to Norway!
Where to stay
Since you are only staying for a couple of days, I highly recommend to find an accommodation in the city itself. This might be a bit more expensive, but you will be a lot more flexible and get more out of your stay if you do this!
Accommodation options
Budget: Ami Hotel. We stayed at this Hotel. It’s located on a hill a little over Tromsø and offers great views over the city. It has a shared bath and shower, but otherwise the rooms are really nice and spacious. They have free coffee, tea and hot chocolate in the common area 🙂
Mid-range: Radisson Blu Hotel Tromsø. Can’t go wrong with a classic Radisson hotel. The location is super central and many tours depart from here!
Luxury: Scandic Ishavshotel. This hotel is right by the water and looks very very nice! Once again, many tours depart from here!
How to get around
By foot
Even though Tromsø is the largest city above the arctic circle, it is still super walkable and not too “big” in the grand scheme of things. We walked everywhere, because I strongly believe you see the most when you explore a new place on foot!
By bus
If you’re not a walker, you can take advantage of the local bus network. While we didn’t use this option ourselves, we saw buses constantly all around town. Therefore, if you have internet, you should easily be able to figure out which bus to take to get to your desired destination.
However, I do need to mention that depending on the weather the timetable is not fully reliable. We wanted to take the bus to the airport on our last day, and the bus had a delay of 20+ minutes because it was snowing so heavily!!
By taxi
I was shocked to see how many taxis there were around town. I have never seen that many taxis in a place before, except maybe in New York or London. Anyway, I assume if you decide to stay outside of Tromsø you should have no issues getting home even at later hours of the day with the generous amount of Taxis available. I cannot comment anything about the price though.
Airport Express
This is not really a “getting around” type of transportation, but rather as the name suggests an option of how to get to and from the airport. On our day of arrival we took this bus because we didn’t know any better. I believe this is more expensive than taking the local bus (we paid 11 CHF per person, and the regular bus would be around 6 CHF I was told). However, for our return trip we chose this option again. The reason being that unlike the local buses, the airport express bus is much more likely to run on time. This might be especially important if it’s snowing heavily, then you can still count on the airport bus being on time.
How many days should you spend in tromsø?
Personally I think that the two full days we had was enough for the city of Tromsø. However, if you’re dead set on seeing the Northern lights you might want to plan to have at least 4 evenings in the area to increase your chances of having at least one clear night.
The amount of time you should spend also depends on the budget you have. If you want to see more of the surroundings, you might want to add one of two days to your trip. However, the amount of time you should spend also depends on the budget you have. Norway is expensive, and so are the day trips that are offered from Tromsø into the surrounding areas. There are definitely more activities that we could have done, but we personally didn’t have the budget for more days anyway.
To find out more about budgeting for Tromsø check out my post here.
What to pack
I usually don’t include this in my itinerary posts, but I feel really passionately about the packing essentials for Tromsø so I must mention them 😀
Here’s the list:
- 2 thermal underwear sets: With this I mean two thermal bottoms, and two thermal tops. I only had one pair, and I wished I had a second thermal layer that I could add. So bring two!!
- Ski pants: Even if you are travelling with a carry on, please please squeeze in your ski pants! I think nothing will keep you as warm as this. Also, it’s very slippery and you don’t want to have a wet butt after/if you fall
- Turtle necks: Don’t just bring jumpers, bring turtle necks. When we were there it was really windy, so I really appreciated the snug collar of my turtle neck.
- Gloves, scarf, hat: This is self explanatory.
- Under-gloves: I’m not sure if this is the correct description, but bring some thinner gloves to wear under your gloves. Ideally these will have some sort of touchscreen feature so you can use your phone to take pictures in the cold without completely taking off the gloves.
- Thermos bottle: If you have space, bring a thermal bottle or buy one there. I would have loved to have some hot tea while waiting outside for the Northern lights to appear.
- Small backpack: you’ll want to have a small backpack to carry any additional layers and snacks.
- Tripod: If you have a small tripod, bring it! The Northern lights pictures come out much clearer when you are using a tripod!
- Layers of socks: Your toes will be freezing, pack thick socks!
- Sunglasses: If the sun does come out, you’ll be glad to have your sunnies! With all the snow around everything seems extra bright.
- Sunscreen: Once again, even if you don’t expect it the sun might still burn you!
- Pocket hand warmers: In case it’s really really cold (I’m talking -10 degrees celsius during the day, you should have some of these pocket hand warmers.
- Snow boots: Please don’t be one of those people going to the arctic circle in sneakers. Bring snow boots!
- The usual rest: I’m not gonna list all the other regular things I’m hoping you’ll pack anyway, such as PJ’s, undies, toothbrush,…
ANNA’S PACKING TIPS:
- Bring a backpack, not a suitcase. I personally really loved this backpack, as it fits under the seat and will therefore qualify as free luggage for most budget airlines. It also has many pockets, which helps you to stay organized.
- Take packing cubes. Again, if you only have limited amount of space this is a GAME CHANGER.
3 DAY TROMSØ ITINERARY
Day 1
Afternoon – Welcome to Tromsø!
Today you’ll be arriving to Tromsø, wohooo! Use the afternoon to settle into your hotel, unpack and prepare for your following days.
If you plan to go Northern lights hunting already today (like we did), make sure to get some snacks. You could have a long evening ahead of you!
6 pm – Dinner
We had pizzas at Peppes Pizza, but the pizzas were just ok. Looking back, I would rather recommend Yonas, another pizza place right by the harbour. This looked much better!
After dinner, head back to your accommodation to layer up and get ready for a long night!
9 pm – Northern lights chase
Depending on when your flight comes in and the weather conditions, you could already choose to go on a Northern lights tour on your first day here. I would really recommend to do at least one guided tour, so choose wisely which day makes the most sense.
For us, since our flight arrived rather late a tour on our first night was not an option. That’s why we decided to try to spot them ourselves from the city. We walked up to the lake Prestvannet, which is located on a small hill above Tromsø. It’s about a 25 minute walk from the center. We were told this is a good spot because the light pollution is slightly lower than right in the city center.
After you arrive, you just need to have patience and wait. I believe after an hour or so we saw our first small strip of lights, which was SOOOO exciting!!! Even if it was quite a modest display, we were ecstatic at the sight!
In total we stayed around 2 hours I believe, until we were so cold we couldn’t stand there any longer. P.S. We didn’t have a thermal bottle, which is what I really regret. A hot cup of tea or hot chocolate would have probably helped to stay warm a little longer.
However, we were really lucky, because on our way home right in front of the hotel we saw another display of lights right above the city. It was magical!!
We went to bed at around 2 am, which explains the late start to Day 2.
Day 2
10 am – Breakfast at BACKSTUBE
We found this cute little bakery in the city center, which was our go to breakfast place for the next 2 days. The place is called Backstube, and you can choose from dozens of pastries.
11 am – Explore Tromsø
Time to finally explore the city! There is one main pedestrian street called Storgata with some clothing stores and souvenir shops. There is also a nice harbour front with some cute, traditional houses.
12 pm – Walk over Tromsø Bridge
Next, you’ll want to cross the Tromsø bridge to reach the Arctic Cathedral. This is a super modern, unique looking cathedral with views over Tromsø.
1 pm – Storsteinen Mountain
From there you can walk to the bottom of the Fjellheisen Cable Car, which takes you up to the Storsteinen mountain. Up there, on a clear day, you will have fantastic views of the city of Tromsø, the surrounding mountains and fjords. Spend some time up there, soaking in the views and walking in the snow, hopefully enjoying some nice sunshine.
If you need a little break, there is also a cute little café on top of the mountain!
2:30 pm – Walk / Drive back to the city
Depending on how tired you are, you can either walk back over the bridge to the city center, or take the bus from the ground station of the cable car.
Since our Northern lights tour starts at 5:30 pm today, it was time for a late lunch / early dinner. We ate at Kaia Bar & Bistro, a lovely place on the waterfront.
Evening – Aurora Borealis Tour
As I mentioned, our tour started at 5:30 pm. However, this will highly depend on the tour you choose and the weather conditions.
Unfortunately, we weren’t lucky today and we didn’t see any lights. Our tour guide tried really hard and even drove over 3 hours south for optimal viewing chances, but the clouds were just too thick. So after another (depressing) 3 hours driving back, we were exhausted. I think it is important to remember though, when you are booking these experiences, that the weather is just unpredictable and there is always a chance of not seeing anything. It’s not the tour guide’s fault.
Day 3
10 am – Breakfast
As mentioned before, we loved Backstube so much that we kept coming back 🙂 If you want to try something else, here are some nice cafés that we came across while walking around the city:
- Kaffebønna Stortorget
- Svermeri Kafé og Redesign
11 am – Explore the rest of Tromsø
Yesterday we explored the upper side of Storgata, today we explored the lower part. You’ll come across the Tromsø cathedral (not the Arctic cathedral), and many more gift shops. If you haven’t found a souvenir yet, you’ll definitely find something now 🙂 We really loved this place, because it was somewhat less tacky than most other tourist shops.
1 pm – Reindeer Sledding & Feeding with a Sami Guide
This was our favourite part of our trip!! We booked a tour for Reindeer Sledding & Feeding with a Sami Guide in the afternoon, which took us to a reindeer farm just outside of Tromsø. The tour included a lot of free time for just wandering around and feeding the reindeer, a short 10 minute reindeer sleigh ride (which is really enough time), a stew for lunch in their traditional tents, and a session with a Sami reindeer herder who told us stories about his life and the Sami people. It was overall a 10/10 afternoon and I would highly recommend this experience!!
6 pm – Dinner
Some people may judge us for this, but believe it or not there is a Hard Rock Café in Tromsø! And, unsurprisingly, it’s the most North HRC in the world. We had the Nachos (I’ve had better) and the Fudge Brownie (delicious, as always).
9 pm – Final Northern lights chase
If the weather is clear, I would go on a Northern lights chase again. Besides lake Prestvannet, I’ve also heard that the top of Storsteinen mountain is a good viewing spot. We didn’t personally get to find out though.
However, since it was snowing like crazy when we were there we took advantage of the free coffee and tea in our hotel and had a quiet night in looking at the snow through the windows.
Day 4 – Time to go home
That’s it, time to leave Tromsø again. As I’ve mentioned many times now, we had some very snowy weather. However, during the day it mostly cleared up. So, I don’t know if this is representative for all days, but in my experience it snows at night and clears up during the day. On our day of departure, our flight was at 11:35 am. Everything went fine for us, however all flights that should have departed before 10 am were delayed by up to 3 hours due to the weather conditions.
Therefore, I would recommend to anyone (if you are flexible), to not depart too early in the morning or too late in the evening.
That’s it, I hope this guide is useful for your trip planning to Tromsø! Let me know your thoughts in the comments below, I’d love to chat <3