News from the port

Port of the Year Las Palmas · 16 September

The award went to a village port at the innermost point of the world's longest ice-free fjord, judged against two far larger fields of operation.

What the jury weighed is the operating model: a port that runs its own coach fleet and dispatch, builds its own shore infrastructure, and has grown from 22 calls to a forward book of 67 while keeping the excursion value chain in the valley that hosts it.

The port thanks the lines, agents and local operators who put the seasons together, and the people of Skjolden, who do the work the award is actually about.

Why this port →

The 2027 book: 67 confirmed calls

As of 23 October 2026, 67 calls are confirmed for the 2027 season with 164,211 lower berths booked. Confirmed bookings only. Excludes cancelled and provisional calls.

The book also says something about the ships. Arvia (P&O Cruises, 185,581 GT) — the largest cruise ship ever to call in Norway — has already been alongside here, and AIDAnova follows in 2027. The newest, cleanest tonnage in the Norway trade is choosing the head of the fjord.

Bookings are confirmed as far ahead as 2033. Beyond next season, the port does not publish volumes.

The full call list → · Live schedule →

The port keeps its own Viking ship on the fjord

Maria Suden lies about 450 m from the gangway, moored against the breakwater with her mast raised. She is in the water rather than on a plinth: the ship is rowed. Why a Viking ship belongs at the head of this particular fjord is set out on the heritage page.

Ken Stornes runs The Last Vikings from her — rowing on the fjord, supervised axe throwing and archery, saga telling, a horn-blown welcome and a Viking certification on completion.

A thousand years of pioneers → · Shore excursions →

10 King Long coaches enter service for the 2026 season

The investment is about capacity and control of the chain, not about emissions, and should not be read as anything else. A port that owns its coaches can commit to a departure time in writing instead of passing the question to a subcontractor, can keep drivers on a local payroll, and can hold a reserve for the days when a ship arrives late.

Vehicle assignment, driver rosters and dispatch run on a purpose-built operations platform, which is what makes a fleet of this size answerable to a single timetable.

Fleet and capacity →

The record now stands: 44 calls, 100,969 guests in 2025

The audited figures for the 2025 season are final: 44 calls sailed and 100,969 guests counted across the gangway. Against 2024 — 22 calls, 44,347 guests — the season doubled the calls and more than doubled the guests.

These are counted guests, not berth capacity. The port reconciles every call against the tally taken at the gangway, which is also the basis on which fees are settled — a smaller-sounding number than lower-berth arithmetic, and the honest one.

The average ship also grew, from 85,665 to 91,921 GT: newer, larger tonnage choosing a port built to receive it.

Season by season →

The last ocean liner returns: Queen Mary 2, twice in one season

Queen Mary 2 is not a cruise ship. She is an ocean liner — the last one in service anywhere in the world — built to hold speed in North Atlantic weather, which gives her a deep, slender hull unlike anything else afloat. At 345 m she is the longest vessel this port has ever handled, and she has now done it twice in one season: 18 May and 8 August 2026.

That hull is also why she gets here at all. Drawing 10.3 m, she needs the depth this fjord holds to its head: both approach passages carry a minimum of 50 m, and the cruise berth itself holds 12 m alongside. The Sognefjord is one of very few places in the world where an ocean liner can sail 205 km inland and still find that kind of water.

For the port, a repeat call from Cunard's flagship is its own kind of reference: the most demanding vessel in the Norway trade measured the head of the Sognefjord in May, and came back in August.

Berths and depths →

Cruise pier widened along its full length; third ISPS flow in operation

Length decides which ships can berth; width decides how fast they can work. The new width allows multi-door gangway rigging on the longest ships, and separates three ISPS flows — guests ashore, guests returning, crew and service traffic — where the pier carried two.

The difference shows on days with a full morning and afternoon programme, where the same gangway has to clear two waves of guests.

Technical port information → · Access and security →

Access gate with plate recognition, and expanded coach staging

Registration plates are loaded into the gate from the bus list the operator sends before the call. A vehicle that is not on the list does not pass.

The purpose is accountability rather than volume: only accredited operators, named drivers and listed vehicles reach the quayside, which is the condition for an official excursion programme with a known chain of responsibility. The same works added marked passenger lanes and expanded coach staging.

Access and security → · Shore excursion deadlines →

Skjolden Explore begins operations at the pier

Skjolden Explore is the locally owned operator that delivers shore excursions in Skjolden. Whichever channel a tour is booked through, it is executed by the same dispatch team at the pier, under the same chain of command — the delivery layer does not change with the booking channel.

The guide pool stands at 50+ certified guides, of whom 20–30 work in English.

Shore excursions →

New mooring boat in service

The water-jet removes the risk of fouling a propeller on mooring lines and gives the manoeuvrability that line running at this pier needs. A fold-down wheelhouse lets the boat pass beneath low-hanging lines.

Outside line handling she is available as a patrol craft. Line handling is a port service; ships do not arrange their own.

Mooring and nautical information →

Three midi coaches for the mountain roads

Tindevegen and the road towards Berdalsnosi carry a 10 m length limit that a full-size coach cannot meet; the MD9 can.

They are not a substitute for the main fleet. They exist so the high-mountain tours can run at all — dispatched from the pier like everything else.

Fleet and capacity →

New service building at the pier

Sanitary capacity at the gangway is the constraint that decides how a large-ship day feels ashore, and 16 cubicles at the pier head is the answer to it.

The building sits inside the controlled area, so guests and crew reach it without leaving the ISPS perimeter.