Surrounded by mountains and fjords, Bergen is a city of almost 300,000 people on the southwestern coast of Norway. It’s a perfect mixture of stunning natural beauty, coupled with world class museums and wonderful places to eat.

If you’re planning a visit to this amazing city, here are the 20 best things to do in Bergen.

Best Things to do in Bergen Norway

Many lucky visitors come to Bergen via the Oslo to Bergen train, one of the most beautiful train rides in Europe.

Bergen is called the “heart of the fjords“, and it manages small town charm, while being the second largest city in Norway. There are so many places to visit in Bergen, from day trips to the fjords, exploring the historic downtown and museums, and more.

Mount Floyen and the Funicular

The view of Bergen from easily accessible Mount Floyen (320 meters above sea level) is spectacular. It’s likely one of the most popular attractions in Bergen, simply for the stunning bird’s eye view over the city.

The base of the Funicular is conveniently located downtown, and the ride to the top is just over ten minutes.

Bryggen Hanseatic Wharf

Bryggen is the historic center of Bergen. Also known as Tyskebryggen, Bryggen is one of the oldest port cities in Northern Europe. It’s packed with colorful homes, businesses and hotels, situated on narrow, winding streets.

This historic quarter of Bergen is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Hanseatic Museum

Hanseatic Museum and Schøtstuene is a museum in the city center of Bergen. It highlights how the Hanseatic merchants lived and influenced Bergen over the course of 400 years.

Bergen Fish Market

The fish market in Bergen dates all the way back to the 1200s.

The Bergen Fish Market is one of Norway’s most visited outdoor markets. Bergen is a UNESCO City of Gastronomy. There’s plenty of fresh seafood here, but be sure to try persetorsk, a traditional steamed cod dish from Bergen.

Fun fact about Norway: Norway is the largest exporter of salmon in the world.

If you’re not a seafood lover, the fish market also sells fresh fruit, vegetables, handicrafts and souvenirs.

Mount Ulriken

Ulriken is the highest mountain surrounding Bergen, which sits at 643 meters above sea level.

The Ulriken Cable Car makes it easy to reach the peak, and take in the panoramic views of the surrounding islands, sea, mountains and fjords.

If you’re the energetic type, you can hike to the top with the locals. You can even zipline or paraglide from Ulriken.

Tip: The tourist bus to the base of the mountain is faster than the cheaper local bus.

Stoltzekleiven

Stoltzekleiven is a steep paved trail with stairs that lead up to the top of Sandviksfjellet mountain.

There are over 900 steps on this trail and it’s one of the most popular trails in Bergen.

The mountain is on the east side of the city in the neighborhood of Sandviken, just north of the mountain Fløyen.

Bergenhus Fortress

The Bergenhus Fortress is one of the best preserved stone castles in all of Norway. Dating back to the 1200s, it housed both Kings and criminals alike for centuries. The Rosenkrantz Tower is one of the major sights in the Bergenjus Fortress and is often considered one of the most important renaissance monuments in Norway.

Byparken

Officially called Julemarked Byparken, this beautifully manicured park surrounds a small lake near the train station. There’s a charming gazebo with flowers and plenty of green grass and trees. 

Bergen Tourist Information Building

The Bergen Tourist Information Building is near the Fish Market in the city center. It’s a handy place to book activities, fjord tours, get information on Bergen sightseeing, and buy Bergen attractions tickets or the Bergen Card.

Tip: You can buy a Bergen Card at the Tourist Information Building, online, and at some select hotels and stores. The Bergen Card gives you free entry or discounted admission to museums and attractions, events and sightseeing tours, plus discounts on restaurants and parking. A Bergen card gives you free travel on buses in Bergen and the region, as well as the Bergen Light Rail between Bergen airport and the city center. You can buy the card in 24, 48, 72 and 96 hour versions. Prices start at 300 kr (adult) or 100 kr (children 3-15 years of age).

Fantoft Stavkirke Church

Fantoft Stave Church is a reconstructed stave church in the Fana borough of Bergen. It’s a striking building, with its black color making a distinct contrast to most European churches.

University Museum of Bergen (Universitetsmuseet i Bergen)

Bergen is well known for its university. The university, in turn, houses many impressive museum collections.

The University Museum of Bergen (Universitetsmuseet i Bergen) includes the Natural History Collection, the Cultural History Collection, and the Seafaring Museum.

Troldhaugen Edvard Grieg Museum

Famous composer Edvard Grieg (1843–1907) spent his days creating music in Troldhaugen.

It’s a living museum with an exhibition center, shop and cafe, concert hall, composers’ cabin and Grieg’s villa. Guided tours are available, and you can also listen to a concert in the museum’s concert hall.

KODE Art Museums of Bergen

The KODE Museum is made up of four museums, KODE 1, 2, 3 and 4.

• Kode 1 is the museum of craft and design, and it houses the restaurant Bien Centro.
• Kode 2 is home to temporary exhibitions, as well as a large bookstore with information on architecture and design.
• Kode 3 houses the collection by Edvard Munch and the Golden Age of Norwegian Art. Munch is famous for his painting “The Scream”.
• Kode 4 is currently closed for major renovations to the buildings.

The Bergen Maritime Museum

The Bergen Maritime Museum is one of Norway’s oldest museums. It’s packed with replicas of Viking ships as well as other maritime memorabilia.

VilVite – The Bergen Science Center

VilVite is the place to explore technology and science, whether you’re a kid or adult. There are plenty of hands on activities, and exhibits on water experiments, robots and globes, making it one of the most fun things to do in Bergen with the family.

Enjoy the Aquarium

The Bergen Aquarium is Norway’s largest aquarium, and one of the city’s most popular tourist attractions. There’s plenty of entertainment here, including sea lion shows and penguin feedings, making it a must for kids of all ages.

View the Street Art

There’s spray-painted street art all over the city of Bergen, much of it from world-class street artists.

Make sure to check out Skostredet, which is Bergen’s famous shopping street, and an ideal starting point for a self-guided street art tour.

Catch a Concert

Bergen is well known for its successful musical bands and artists, like Kygo, Aurora and Röyksopp.

Even if you can’t catch a big name artist in the time of your visit, there are plenty of music venues throughout the city with excellent up and coming acts.

Day Trips from Bergen

Bergen’s day trips largely focus on visiting the gorgeous nearby fjords and mountains. Bergen is the most popular jumping-off point for visiting Norway’s most famous fjords. While you can visit Norway by bus, it’s usually much easier to have your own transportation, or take a tour.

Fjord Cruise

Bergen is perfectly nestled between the two biggest fjords in Norway, the Hardangerfjord and the Sognefjord. This makes the city an ideal starting point for fjord excursions.

You’ve likely seen Hardangerfjord’s Trolltunga on social media. Trolltunga is a rock that juts out 700 meters above Ringedalsvatnet lake, making for a stunning photo.

A lot of people join in the popular Norway in a Nutshell tour, which lets you enjoy Norway’s UNESCO fjords and mountains. The tour also includes a ride on the Bergen Railway and the Flåm Railway.

Vidden Trail between Mt. Fløyen and Mt. Ulriken

The hike between Ulriken and Floyen takes just over four hours. It’s a well marked trail, and popular with tourists and locals alike.

Flåm Railway

The Flåm Railway is often described as one of the most beautiful train journeys in the world. It’s certainly one of the steepest as well. The train runs from the end of Aurlandsfjord, a tributary of the Sognefjord, up to the high mountains at Myrdal station.

The journey takes around two hours.

Best Things to do in Bergen Norway

Do you have anything to add to our must see attractions in Bergen? Let us know! We’d love to hear your thoughts.

Thinking about traveling around Norway by bus?

Buses are a great way to see Norway on a budget, without having to drive. Norway has an extensive network of bus routes, connecting almost every settlement on mainland Norway, making seeing this beautiful country largely by bus a real possibility.

See Norway bus tickets on Busbud now.

Norway by Bus

Generally, public transport in Norway is excellent. Buses, trains and ferries tend to run (mostly) on time, and cover most of the country.

Express buses connect major airports to nearby cities or ferry terminals, while long-distance coaches between cities often have more luxurious seats, and more space for luggage. The railroad also connects to bus lines, with every end station connected to bus routes to more remote towns.

If you’re traveling off the beaten track, the good news is that Norway’s public buses generally travel to even more remote areas of Norway. However, many buses on remote routes only run once or twice a day.

You’ll need to be organized, and plan your route carefully in advance if you want to take the bus in more remote areas.

For extremely remote wilderness areas, it may be a good idea to bus between major cities, and then rent a car for the more remote legs of your journey.

Whenever possible, try to book in advance. This is important in Norway mostly because you can save a lot of money. Most bus companies offer huge discounts for tickets reserved online.

Bus services (both local and some long-distance bus services) can have reduced hours on the weekend and the lower (non-summer) months of September to May. Some buses on mountain routes are suspended during winter months as well, so do your research before you travel.

Norway buses

There are countless bus companies in Norway, and they’re known to be reliable and well serviced. Generally, they all offer WiFi and air conditioning or heating (but check before you book, just to make sure).

Vy bus (also often called Nettbuss) has routes that cover large parts of southern, western and inland Norway. The Vy Express service services large parts of Southern Norway, connecting to larger cities. Vy bus has one of the largest networks in Norway, and includes Vy bus4you, TIMEkspressen, and Nettbuss Express and others.

Lavprisekspressen bus line is often your cheapest option.

Many remote local bus lines only operate in a single county.

Nor-Way Bussekspress AS has an extensive network of nine different bus companies, which cover most of Southern Norway. See their routes here.

Most bus lines offer discounts for children and seniors and students, and some have low season discounts. If you have an InterRail or Eurail pass, you may also be able to get a discount.

Getting Around by Bus in Norway

Because there are multiple bus lines in Norway, it can be difficult to find your best route or timetable options, especially if your itinerary requires you to change buses and coaches several times. That’s when a third party bus booking site that deals with multiple bus companies comes in handy.

Busbud is a bus-booking website that is easy to use and that makes paying for your reservation equally easy.

Book your next adventure with Busbud here!

To find the tickets for your bus in Norway, just type the name of the departure city and the name of the destination, then hit enter. Then you’ll instantly see all your options in one place.

From there, you can refine your search to find the fastest, the cheapest, the earliest or the latest bus for your travel.

After selecting the best ticket, Busbud walks you through the check-out process, where you pay by credit card. You can either save your digital ticket on your device or print it out. Busbud tells you the boarding requirements, and the amount of luggage you’re allowed to bring on board.

Busbud also has a mobile app that you can use from anywhere in the world where you have access to the internet.

You can use Busbud on international bus trips as well, like the well traveled route from Copenhagen to Oslo. Busbud works with over 4,500 bus partners with over 3.8 million bus routes in 84 countries, and serves over 21,000 cities around world.

You’ll also find tickets for major routes like from Oslo to Kristiansand (the capital of Southern Norway), or more remote routes.

If you’re visiting the fjords, Western Norway is the place. Grab a bus from Bergen to Alesund. The port town of Alesund is on the west coast of Norway, at the entrance to the Geirangerfjord. From Alesun, you can also visit Trollstigen.

See bus tickets on Busbud now.

Do buses in Norway take credit cards?

Generally, you can’t use a credit card or debit card to buy tickets from a bus driver (other than from some airport and some long-distance buses). So, if you want to use your credit card, you’ll need to book in advance.

More helpful Norway resources

The country’s official travel app from Visit Norway is incredibly helpful for planning your trip. It’s available for iPhones here or on Google Play.

The national trip planner Entur can be helpful for planning routes. Unfortunately, it’s in Norwegian only, and we also found the site to be extraordinarily slow.

Want to catch the Northern Lights? Check out the Northern Lights app for iOS and on Google Play.

Looking for more? Check out our fun facts about Norway.

Even more fun, did you know that the Colonel-in-Chief of the Norwegian King’s Guard, Sir Nils Olav, happens to be a King Penguin?

Read on to learn more quirky and fun facts about Norway.

Fun Facts about Norway

Lutefisk, one of Norway’s most iconic traditional dishes, is literally gelatinous, salted fish that was made with lye. Today, Scandinavians rarely eat lutefisk and there is more lutefisk consumed in the United States than in Scandinavian countries.

The Guard mascot of the Norwegian King is a king penguin named Brigadier Sir Nils Olav. He doesn’t live in Norway though, his residence is in the Edinburgh Zoo in Scotland, where he receives regular visits from the King. No, we’re not joking. Here’s a video of the Majesty the King of Norway’s Guard paying a special visit to the RZSS Edinburgh Zoo to bestow his new title of Brigadier Sir Nils Olav to the resident king penguin.

Alcoholic beverages that are stronger than 4.75% (mainly cider and beer) are sold only in specialized government owned shops called Vinmonopolet (which literally translates to Wine Monopoly in English). Each city has a few such shops and there are no Vinmonopolets in the Norwegian countryside.

Norway’s iconic Freia chocolate was an important food source for Roald Amundsen, who led the first party to reach the geographic South Pole on December 14th, 1911.

The Norwegian national drink is a spirit called akevitt or aquavit. It’s a strong beverage (up to 60% alcohol) that’s made from potatoes and flavored with caraway, sometimes dill, orange peel, star anis, cumin and other spices.

The Lofoten archipelago in Norway is north of the Arctic Circle. However, due to the unique and unusually warm climate of Lofoten, it is home to the world’s largest deep-water coral reef, called the Røst Reef. Lofoten is also the most northerly location in the world with above freezing year round temperatures.

In other fun facts about Norway, the country’s capital city, Oslo, has provided the huge Christmas tree for Trafalgar Square in London since 1947 as thanks to it’s WWII efforts on it’s behalf.

Norway’s Public Roads Administration is proposing the world’s first floating underwater tunnel. It’s a whopping $25 billion project that would allow vehicles to travel under the Norwegian Sea, avoiding driving around the country’s more than a thousand fjords and the amazingly long 21-hour drive and 8 ferry crossings along the Norwegian coastline.

Norway is one of the safest, most peaceful and richest countries in the world. It also ranks first on the list of the World Happiness Report.

Do you know those crazy Instagram photos you’ve seen with someone balancing on the edge of a cliff jutting out from a mountainside? They’re likely taken at Norway’s Trolltunga (or Troll’s Tongue in English), which is 2,300 feet (700 metres) above the north side of lake Ringedalsvatne.

The Norwegian coastline is 15,626 miles (25,148 km) long, and its territory includes thousands of islands along the coast.

Norway has over 450,000 lakes, but most of them are fairly small. Of those, only about 200 of them are larger than four square miles.

Norway also has an impressive collection of waterfalls, with the 6 highest waterfalls in all of Europe. Norway’s highest waterfall, Vinnufossen is 2,820 feet (860 meters) tall and is the sixth highest in all the world.

No fun and offbeat Norway travel guide would be complete without mentioning the Atlantic Road in Norway, one of the world’s most unique stretches of highway. It was voted Norway’s Engineering Feat of the Century in 2005, and is made up of eight bridges over 8,274 meters overlooking the Atlantic Ocean.

Norway has one of the world’s deepest underwater tunnels, the Eiksund Tunnel of Norway. It’s almost 8 km long and it runs 287 meters under the surface of the water.

The rugged coastline is comprised of fjords, long and narrow inlets lined with steep cliffs, which are the number one attraction for nature-loving tourists from all over the world.

The largest glacier in continental Europe is also in Norway. The Jostedalsbreen glacier covers a territory of almost 500 square km.

Norway is the largest exporter of salmon in the world, but the country’s national dish is Fårikål (mutton stew).

For those of us who love both chocolate and cool facts about Norway, this next one is a winner. As previously mentioned, Norway is also well-known for its chocolate. One of Freia’s most famous factories that makes hot chocolate, inspired Roald Dahl to write his famous book, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

Do you have any cool facts about Norway? Let us know in the comments below!