Trondheim… sounds like Sondheim… but they haven’t made a musical of this sweet Norwegian town. Not yet, anyway.
Trondheim is the third largest city in Norway (after Oslo and Bergen — I just knew you were going to ask).
Population is 216,000. But when our ship pulled in, it swelled to 216,690.
There’s a downtown pedestrian street, filled with cafes, bakeries, and one-off shops….
The biggest Trondheim attraction is the Gothic Nidaros Cathedral, which will celebrate its 1,000th birthday in 2030. They’re going to need one extremely large birthday cake to hold all those candles….
The Cathedral (below) is the largest structure from the Middle Ages still standing in Norway. The church was built on the site of a former shrine recognizing the first King of Norway, Olav Haroldsson, who converted the entire state to Christianity.
The interior of the Cathedral…
A close-up of details in the cement ceiling…
I couldn’t figure out the symbolism of this mermaid (below), checking herself out in a mirror.
It is a marble inlay on the floor of the Cathedral, half-way down the length of the church. Sort of like an early Christian cheerleader on the church’s 50-yard line.
We only had a few hours off the ship to explore Trondheim as we push off early this evening to head to our next port of destination.
For what it’s worth, in case you get asked this in a game of trivia…. the fjord leading to Trondheim is the third largest fjord in all of Norway — 78 miles long!
More when it happens….
Jim