Narvik
14th of April, 2006
At 68 degrees north and 17 degrees east, only 2420 kilometres south of the North-pole, is where you find Narvik. A small town in the northern parts of Norway with close to 11 000 citizens. The city of Narvik lies above the arctic circle with scenic surroundings. On one side is Fagernesfjelelt (Mount Fagernes) watching over the city with its 1 200 metres above sea level, on the other side is the wide open sea.
Over 90 per cent of the municipality area of Narvik consists of mountains. The highest mountain, Storsteinsfjellet (Big rock mountain), has the record with a total height of 1893 meters above sea level. The vast number of mountains in addition to the cold climate makes for a perfect home for more than a hundred glaciers. One of them, Frostisen (the frost ice) are among the 15 biggest in Norway.
The city of Narvik was founded in 1902 and already then it had more than 5 000 inhabitants, the vast majority of them were working with the extraction or shipping of iron ore to the rest of the world. Already from the beginning was Narvik a city dependant on industry. In recent years the city has made a huge switch towards more technology intensive industry and is less dependant on the steadily declining iron ore industry.