Things to do in Trondheim
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Havfruen
This elegant riverside restaurant specialises in the freshest of fish. The quality, reflected in the prices, is excellent, as are the accompanying wines. The short menu, from which you select between three and eight courses, changes regularly according to what’s hauled from the seas.
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Sushi Bar
The name says it all; the house speciality is sushi in multifarious forms. To savour the flavours, go for the 16-item sushi moriawase selection (Nkr198). It also does takeaway.
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Nidaros Cathedral
Nidaros Cathedral, constructed in the late 11th century, is Scandinavia’s largest medieval building. Outside, the ornately embellished west wall has top-to-bottom statues of biblical characters and Norwegian bishops and kings, sculpted in the early 20th century. Within, the cathedral is subtly lit (just see how the vibrantly coloured, modern stained-glass glows, especially in the rose window at the west end), so let your eyes attune to the gloom.
The altar sits over the original grave of St Olav, the Viking king who replaced the Nordic pagan religion with Christianity. The original cathedral was built in 1153, when Norway became a separate archbishopric. The current tra…
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Folk Museum
West of the centre, the Folk Museum is one of the best of its kind in Norway. The indoor exhibition, Livsbilder (Images of Life) in the main building, displays artefacts in use over the last 150 years – from clothing to school supplies to bicycles – and has a short multimedia presentation. The rest of the museum, with over 60 period buildings, is open air, adjoining the ruins of King Sverre’s castle and giving fine hilltop views of the city. Houses, the post office, the dentist’s and other shops splay around the central market square in the urban section. There are farm buildings from rural Trøndelag, the tiny 12th-century Haltdalen stave church and a couple of small m…
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Archbishop's Palace
Admission to the cathedral also includes the complex of the adjacent 12th-century Archbishop's Palace, commissioned around 1160 and Scandinavia's oldest secular building. In the west wing, Norway's crown jewels shimmer and flash. Its museum is in the same compound. After visiting the well-displayed statues, gargoyles and carvings from the cathedral, drop to the lower level, where only a selection of the myriad artefacts revealed during the museum's construction in the late 1990s are on show.
Take in too its enjoyable 15-minute audiovisual programme.
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Museum of Natural History & Archaeology
The Museum of Natural History & Archaeology belongs to the Norwegian University of Science & Technology (NTNU). There’s a hotchpotch of exhibits on the natural and human history of the Trondheim area: streetscapes and homes, ecclesiastical history, archaeological excavations and southern Sami culture. More ordered is the small, alluring section in a side building devoted to church history and the fascinating everyday artefacts in the medieval section, covering Trondheim’s history up to the great fire of 1681.
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Ringve Museum
The Ringve Museum is Norway’s national museum for music and musical instruments. The Russian-born owner is a devoted collector of rare and antique musical instruments, which music students demonstrate. You can also browse the old barn with its rich collection of instruments from around the world. The botanic gardens, set within the surrounding 18th-century estate, are a quiet green setting for a stroll. Take bus 3 or 4 and walk up the hill.
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Dromedar, Nørdre gate
Dromedar, Nørdre gate, This longstanding local self-service favourite serves light dishes and very good coffee indeed, in all sizes, squeezes and strengths. Inside is cramped so, if the weather permits, relax on the exterior terrace bordering the cobbled street. There's a second branch (%73 50 25 02; Nedre Bakklandet 3), similar in style, also with a street-side terrace, that serves equally aromatic coffee.
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Munkholmen
In Trondheim's early years, the islet of Munkholmen 10:00-16:00, 18:00 beside Ravnkloa fish market) was the town execution ground. Over the centuries it has been the site of a Benedictine monastery, a prison, a fort and finally a customs house. Today, it's a popular picnic venue. From mid-May to early September, ferries leave at least hourly between 10:00 and 16:00 or 18:00 from beside the Ravnkloa fish market.
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Rick’s Café
The original Rick’s burnt down (at least one major conflagration over the years is almost a rite of passage in Norway) and this slick reconstruction is all edgy stainless steel on the ground floor while upstairs, more for quiet cocktails and lingering wines, it has sink-down-deep leatherette sofas and armchairs. The weekend nightclub in the basement has two zones – one for rock, the other playing house.
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Macbeth
Homesick Scots will feel at home, Geordies with nostalgia can weep into their draught Newcastle Brown, and the rest of us can watch big-screen football or car racing (don’t get yourself into the corner where the committed race-goers sit, though, or you’ll be persona-really-non-grata). Absolutely everyone can enjoy a dram or two of its more than a dozen single malt whiskies…
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National Museum of Decorative Arts
The permanent collection of the splendid National Museum of Decorative Arts exhibits the best of Scandinavian design, including a couple of bijou Art Nouveau rooms. A whole floor is devoted to the pioneering works of three acclaimed women artists: the tapestry creations of Hannah Ryggen and Synnøve Anker Aurdal, and the innovative glasswork of Benny Motzfeldt.
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Dromedar
This longstanding local self-service favourite serves light dishes and very good coffee indeed, in all sizes, squeezes and strengths. Inside is cramped so, if the weather permits, relax on the exterior terrace bordering the cobbled street. There’s a second branch at Nødre gate 2, similar in style, also with a street-side terrace, that serves equally aromatic coffee.
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Vertshuset Tavern
Once in the heart of Trondheim, this historic (1739) tavern was lifted and transported, every last plank of it, to the Sverresborg Trøndelag Folk Museum. Tuck into its rotating specials of traditional Norwegian fare or just peck at waffles with coffee in one of its 16 tiny rooms, each low-beamed, with sloping floors, candlesticks, cast iron stoves and lacy tablecloths.
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Dokkhuset
In an artistically converted former pumping station (look through the glass beneath your feet at the old engines), the Dock House is at once an auditorium (where if it’s the right night you’ll hear experimental jazz or chamber music), restaurant and café-bar. Sip a drink on the jetty or survey the Trondheim scene from its roof terrace.
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Ramp
Well off the tourist route and patronised by in-the-know locals, friendly, alternative Ramp, both bar and restaurant, gets its raw materials, organic where possible, from local sources (its veg man, for example, calls by each morning). It’s renowned for its juicy house burgers (Nkr100) filled with lamb, beef, fish or chickpeas.
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Kristiansten Fort
For a bird’s-eye view of the city, climb 10 minutes from the Gamle Bybro to Kristiansten Fort, built after Trondheim’s great fire of 1681. During WWII the Nazis used it as a prison and execution ground for members of the Norwegian Resistance. The grounds are open year-round, whenever the flag is raised.
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Baklandet Skydsstasjon
Within what began life as an 18th-century coaching inn are several cosy rooms with poky angles and listing floors. It’s a hyperfriendly place where you can tuck into tasty mains, such as its renowned bacalao (cod stew or fish soup) for Nkr145, while always leaving a cranny for a gooey homemade cake (around Nkr50).
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National Military Museum
The adjoining National Military Museum, in the same courtyard, is full of antique swords, armour and cannons; and recounts the days from 1700 to 1900, when the Archbishop's Palace served as a Danish military installation. On the top floor is the Hjemmesfront (Home Front) museum, devoted to Trondheim's role in the WWII resistance.
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Ørens Kro
This characterful bar and restaurant was once a boat repair workshop. Tools of its former trade are arranged around the walls while part of the large external terrace straddles a former slipway, its rusting pulleys and hawsers still taut below. The menu’s Norwegian and mainly fish, as befits its long waterside history.
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Trondheim Microbryggeri
This splendid home-brew pub deserves a pilgrimage as reverential as anything accorded to St Olav from all committed øl (beer) quaffers. With up to eight of its own brews on tap and good light meals (around Nkr150) coming from the kitchen, it’s a place to linger, nibble and tipple.
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Chablis
The Chablis is beside the river, indeed, part of it’s on the water; reserve a table on its floating pontoon. Alternatively, the interior of this brasserie-style place is light and appealing and from the kitchen emerge the most delightful dishes, both Norwegian and international.
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Grønn Pepper
Bright Mexican blankets and – ’fraid so – sombreros add colour and life to the Pepper’s architecturally staid interior. The food’s Tex-Mex and you can slam down a tequila or two. Monday’s special is four tacos with rice and salad (Nkr120).
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Bruk Bar
Inside, candles flicker and designer lamps shed light onto the 30-or-so-year-olds who patronise this welcoming joint. The music is eclectic, varying at the whim of bar staff, but guaranteed loud. Outside, the street-side terrace, just off Torvet, is ideal for people-watching.
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Stiftsgården
Scandinavia’s largest wooden palace, the late baroque Stiftsgården was constructed as a private residence in the late 18th century. It is now the official royal residence in Trondheim. Admission is by tour only, every hour on the hour.
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