Preface General Information

Cruising in Norway, Svalbard and Jan Mayen – Available Online

The former Volume 1 of the Norwegian Cruising Guide is now free and online, exclusively on this web site.

You can print or download individual chapters with the print button at the top of the respective chapter. Note that there are some technical limitations to the print layout. The Google Chrome browser seems to work best.

We update these pages frequently so better to read the most up to date information here.

If you have questions or corrections about anything in this section, please send us an email.

Site Navigation

Table of Contents

Depending on your device the Table of Contents in the side bar or at the bottom of the screen.

Internal And External Hot Links

There are numerous links within the chapter pages and also to external sources.

Grey boxes are Notes

Blue boxes are Tips

Pink boxes are Alerts

Formats Used in This Chapter And in The Guide

Text

Italicised Type

Indicates the names of vessels, publications and words (other than names) in any language other than English.

Bold Type

Refers to places that have their own entry in the Guide and an entry in the Index.

Norwegian Alphabet

Due to a bug in the Adobe Creative Suite, the Index in the books does not recognise the Norwegian characters of Å/å, Ø/ø and Æ/æ. They are treated respectively as A/a, O/o and Symbol/a. We apologise for any confusion this may cause.

Measurement Standards

Nautical miles are indicated by nm and speed in knots by kt. Otherwise, all distances, depths and weights are given in metric (a metre is indicated by m, a kilometre by km, etc.) and temperatures are given in degrees Celsius. Norwegian money (kroner) is indicated by kr.

Courses and Bearings

Courses and bearings are given true unless otherwise noted.

Navigation Coordinates

The coordinates for harbours and anchorages are in WGS 84 degrees and decimal minutes (DD° MM.dd’) format and are given to help you find them on the chart. They are approximate, unless otherwise stated, and should not be used for navigation.

Names

The format for naming harbours and anchorages is as follows:

  • The name of a harbour or anchorage is taken from Norway government cartography, Den Norske Los (The Norwegian Pilot) and local information when we have access to it;
  • If there are conflicting names for the same anchorage, they are denoted in the title with an”or”, for e.g. Kjøvangen or Kjøvangbukta;
  • If an otherwise unnamed anchorage is located between two islands, for e.g. between Løvøya and Mellomøya, it is denoted as Løvøya/Mellomøya, with a slash between the islands.
  • If the anchorage or harbour is unnamed or has the same name as the island it is on, it may have the side of the island it is on in brackets after the name; for e.g. Haramsøya (SE) means the anchorage or harbour on the SE side of the island of Haramsøya.

Sources of Information

General Cruising Information – Online

Written by Hans Jakob Valderhaug and Daniel Gerber. These pages are updated regularly as and when required.

Book Volumes 1 – 4

If an entry uses the first person, the information was collected either by Hans Jakob Valderhaug and Eli Husum or Kathrin and Daniel Gerber.

Though the majority of information was collected by Hans Jakob and Eli, cruisers other than the four of us and particularly also Phyllis Nickel and John Harries have contributed over the years. In those cases we refer to “our contributor” or some such.

Kartverket

We use the online version of Den Norske Los as a reference when compiling harbour and anchorage information. Sketch maps and Coastal Danger Areas information is from Kartverket under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) license, allowing commercial and non-commercial use with proper attribution.