Alta
Northern Norwegian town in Finnmark
Alta is the largest town in Finnmark and offers northern lights and midnight sun, mountains, sami culture and reindeer. It is above Tromso, near Hammerfest. It is visited by the Hurtigruten ships, sitting on the fjord. It also has the Sorrisniva Igloo Hotel to visit.
Alta is also a gateway to Norwegian's famous fishing rivers such as the Lakselv - home to lodges and tucked away retreats.
There is very famous rock art in Alta (Helleristningene i Alta), located close to town. Since the first carvings were discovered in 1972, more than 6000 carvings have been found on several sites around Alta. The largest locality, at Jiepmaluokta about 4 kilometres outside of Alta, contains many thousand individual carvings and has been turned into an open-air museum. The site, along with the sites Storsteinen, Kåfjord, Amtmannsnes and Transfarelv, was placed on the UNESCO list of World Heritage Sites on 3 December 1985. It is Norway's only prehistoric World Heritage Site.
Alta has good climatic conditions, with little precipitation, pleasant winters and warm summers. During the winter nights here, you can often see the northern lights dancing across the skies. The blue season in Alta lasts from November to January, after which the days get gradually longer. May to August have midnight sun and 24 hours of daylight.
Alta has three centres: Bossekop, with old trading and market traditions, Elvebakken in the east, with airport and harbour, and the town of Alta itself, as the newest of the three, with pedestrian shopping precincts and shopping centres. The town is one of Northern Norway’s largest educational and research centres and is home to Finnmark Municipal University, with approximately 2,000 students.
