The Arctic CoastHelgeland to Lofoten.

Anita's Sjømat in the village of Sakrisøy is a small seafood shop selling fresh fish cakes (fiskekaker), fish soup (fiskesuppe), and shrimp from a window hatch on the side of an orange house. It has become one of the most visited food stops in Norway not through marketing but through the specific quality of the fish cakes — made fresh daily from cod caught in the surrounding waters, pan-fried and served with mustard sauce, eaten standing by the water. The setting — a cluster of yellow and red rorbuer on an islet connected to the road by a bridge, the Lofoten peaks rising behind — is the image of Lofoten in miniature. Arrive early; they sell out.

Henningsvær is the most characterful fishing village in Lofoten — a settlement spread across several small islets connected by bridges, with the specific density of a town that has more buildings than its geology should allow. The village has a thriving gallery scene (Kaviar Factory, a contemporary art gallery in a former fish factory, is among the finest in northern Norway), a climbing culture (the walls above the village are among the most challenging sea-cliff routes in Scandinavia), and a football pitch on a flat rock spit surrounded by water on three sides, visible from the air in drone photographs that have made it one of the most shared images of Norway. The approach road (10km of single-track bridges and causeways) is the most dramatic village approach in Lofoten.

The northern lights (nordlys) are visible from anywhere on this route between September and March when skies are clear — Lofoten and Vesterålen sit between 68°N and 69°N, well within the auroral oval. The lights appear as green (and occasionally red, purple or white) curtains and ribbons of light caused by solar wind particles interacting with the upper atmosphere. They require darkness (so the midnight sun period, May–July, makes them invisible) and a clear sky. The correct approach: check the KP index (spaceweather.com or the Aurora Forecast app) for solar activity, drive away from any light pollution, and wait. Displays range from a faint green shimmer to overhead curtains that fill the whole sky and make noise audible to some people.

Narvik was the site of two crucial naval battles in April–May 1940 — the First and Second Battles of Narvik — in which British destroyers first stumbled upon and then systematically destroyed the German destroyer fleet sent to capture the port and its iron ore supply. The German navy lost 10 destroyers in Narvik; this was the largest German naval defeat of the war up to that point and permanently crippled Germany's surface fleet. The town itself changed hands multiple times in land fighting between Norwegian, French, Polish and German forces from April to June 1940. The Narvik War Museum documents the battles with original equipment and accounts from all sides.