Norway’s Fjords with Kids: A Luxury Family Adventure

Oslo is a good city to arrive into with children. It is compact, easy to navigate on foot, and the museum district on the Bygdøy peninsula can fill two days without repeating itself.

The Viking Ship Museum houses three ships that were buried as funeral vessels over a thousand years ago and were excavated from the Norwegian soil in the 19th and early 20th centuries. They are among the best-preserved Viking ships in the world and the scale of them, seen in person, makes an impression that photographs do not prepare you for.

The Fram Museum next door houses the original polar vessel Fram, the ship that carried Fridtjof Nansen and Roald Amundsen on their respective expeditions, and tells the story of the Norwegian polar age through the ship itself.

In the city center, Vigeland Sculpture Park covers 80 acres of Frogner Park and holds more than 200 works in granite, bronze and cast iron, all created by Gustav Vigeland as a single commission. The park is free and open at all times.

The Opera House on the Oslofjord waterfront was designed with a roof that slopes down to the water so that you can walk up and over it, which children tend to find more interesting than the building itself.

For families who want to cover more ground, Do Not Disturb arranges a cycling tour of the city following the path of the Akerselva River to the Mathallen indoor food market, where the city’s restaurant scene is concentrated in one building.

A two-and-a-half-hour drive from Aurland, following the fjord road west, brings you into Bergen. The city was founded in 1070 and for several hundred years was the largest in Norway and the main port of the Hanseatic League.

The colored wooden buildings of Bryggen, the old wharf district, have stood in various forms since the 14th century and are now a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The fish market at the harbor runs each morning and is one of the more memorable places to eat in Bergen, particularly for children who have not eaten fresh crab bought off a boat before.

Your private guide covers Bryggen and the Hanseatic Museum before continuing to Troldhaugen, the former home and composing studio of Edvard Grieg on the shore of Nordåsvannet lake south of the city.

The funicular up Mount Fløyen departs from the center of Bergen and takes five minutes to reach the top, where the view takes in the harbor, the surrounding mountains and, on a clear day, the outer islands beyond. There are walking trails at the top and a cafe at the station.

For families wanting more time outdoors, a hike up Mount Ulriken at 643 meters gives a longer day on the mountain with views out to the open sea.