Distance: 640 kilometres + the journey on Hurtigruten (The Norwegian Coastal Voyage) between Vardø and Kirkenes.

Kirkenes as starting point

With Kirkenes as your starting point, you can enjoy any number of excellent outings in Eastern Finnmark. In Kirkenes, you can see the mines at Bjørnevatn or take a thrilling riverboat ride on the Pasvik River to the Norwegian-Russian border at Boris Gleb.

Kirkenes - Pasvik

Visit Pasvikdalen - the frontier valley between Norway and Russia. The valley is well-known for its diversity of plants and animals. You will find Pasvikdalen National Park there too, described as the place where the Siberian Taiga (the world’s biggest coniferous forest belt) comes to an end, together with Norway’s biggest stock of bears. Pasvikdalen is also a very interesting place for ornithologists.

Kirkenes - Grense Jakobselv

From Kirkenes, you can take the road Rv 886 to Grense Jakobselv. Here you can see King Oscar II’s chapel, one of the few churches that survived the scorched earth tactics during World War II, and the frontier posts on both the Norwegian and Russian sides of the border.

Kirkenes - Neiden - Bugøynes - Varangerbotn - Vadsø - Vardø - Hamningberg - Kirkenes

Moving westwards along the E 6, you will arrive in Neiden, a Sami village with a number of interesting buildings. Proceeding along the E 6, you can take a detour to fascinating Bugøynes, a tiny Finnish-speaking fishing village that has retained its pre-war architecture. Here the locals fish for king crabs, which are also known as Kamchatka crabs.

If you carry on along the E 6, you will reach Varangerbotn, at the head of the Varangerfjord. Here you can visit the Varanger Sami Museum which documents the history of the local coastal Sami. 

From there you can proceed along the road Rv 98 to Vadsø, where you will find a fascinating museum of the Finnish (Kven) influences on Finnmark's cultural history. On route to Vardø, you will pass by the exceptionally beautiful island of Ekkerøy with its well-known bird rock.

In Vardø you can visit the world's northernmost fortress, Vardøhus festning, and enjoy the fantastic bird life there, before driving along the Arctic shoreline all the way to Hamningberg. Here you can enjoy the Arctic countryside at its most extreme – jagged cliffs overlooking the mighty Barents Sea.

We recommend joining a mini-cruise with Hurtigruten (The Norwegian Coastal Voyage) from Vardø back to Kirkenes, or westwards towards the North Cape.