BERGEN.  We landed in Bergen, Norway’s second largest city, in the early afternoon of June 1st.  Plenty of time to get our rental car from the agency located inside the airport and drive to our hotel, which for the first two nights of our trip was staying at the Clarion Hotel Bergen, located right in the neighborhood of Bryggen (pictured above).  After checking in and freshening up, we headed out for our first day of exploration.  First, we wanted to get a layout of Bergen from above, so we took the Floibanen funicular up to the top of Mount Floyen, which rises 1,050 feet (320m) above Bergen.  This gave us a great view of the town below, and an opportunity to talk about the areas we wanted to walk around.  Instead of taking the tram back down, we decided on the very pleasant walk back down through trees, an impressive neighborhood, through the fish market and back into Bergen’s most photographed area of Bryggen.  As we walked through Bryggen, we continued until we reached The Rosenkrantz Tower, the most prominent renaissance building in Norway.  The towers oldest sections date back to 1270 and completed in its present form in 1563.  We continued onward and walked the beautiful grounds around the Bergenhus Castle, the oldest and most preserved fortress in Norway.  The rest of the evening was spent just walking along the waterway beside the Bryggen area before calling it a day.  (Enjoy the photos below, in the order they were taken.  You can always enlarge by clicking on them.)