Having picked up a pilot about midnight to guide us during the night through Norway's longest fjord we woke up to the ship in port at Flam at the very tip of a side arm to the main fjord. It was a cute little town of only 450 people with sheer cliffs rising each side of the calm waters of the fjord. The main attraction here was the Flamsbana railway which is the steepest non rack railway in the world. The tours from the boat were quite pricey so we decided to just see if we could get on one of the first trains up which we easily did. At $69 return the tickets weren't cheap but we were soon discovering that nor was anything else in Norway as a small bottle of water was going to cost $5! The train departed at 9.45 & every seat was taken. The ride up was very scenic with views over the steep sided green valleys, many with waterfalls running down to rivers below. The train passed 8 small stations, one of which we could get off for 5 mins to view the Kjos-fossen waterfall which thundered down just above our heads sending water spray over the gathering tourists & the train. After about an hour we reached the top from where we had decided to hike down the old construction road & catch the train back from 2 stations down. The walk was about 2.5 km's & not particularly well signposted but we managed to find our way. The train was once again full from Reinunga to the bottom but still offered the same spectacular Nordic views. Back down in Flam we went back to the ship for some lunge feeding at the buffet. The ship was literally parked in the centre of town which was very convenient. After refuelling we squeezed through the tourists in the little museum with historical items from when they built the Flamsbana and then had our jaws drop at the prices in the Aegir Brewery. A tasting paddle of 5 x 100ml was 125 kroner ($22) and a pint about $17!! The brewery itself was in a kind of reconstruction of a Viking house with giant chunky wooden chairs, reindeer skins on benches to sit on in front of the sunken fire pit & lots of wood carving. After tasting the beers (which weren't too bad luckily) we headed back to the ship to see her set sail back out of the fjord. The sky was so blue against the rocky peaks & below we got glimpses of porpoises spouting water from the calm water of the deep fjord. Some twitchers were excitedly pointing out birds & the porpoise in front of where we sat on the side deck which we has chosen well as we did a lap of the ship before heading in & found the other side quite windy. Walking through the buffet to check out the options we decided on the restaurant again for dinner & asked for a table for two which we were granted after a very quick wait. Another 5 delicious courses later we stood up only to be suddenly weighed down by food- promising to limit ourselves to only 3 courses we returned to the cabin to change before the comedian only to fall asleep, once again comatose by food, delicious food!!