My review of the Pulpit Rock guided hike with hotel pickup
Verdict: the same 4.8 as the terminal departure, across 433 reviews, an hour longer, and it collects you at your accommodation in Stavanger. Small group, and it uses a quieter route rather than the main tourist path, which is the real reason to choose it over the other one. If you are sleeping in the city rather than on a ship, this is the booking I would make. The extra hour is mostly the pickup round, not extra mountain.
What the extra hour buys
Not more walking. The seven hours covers a pickup round that calls at more than one address before it leaves the city, and you get that time back by not having to find a meeting point in a strange town at an unsociable hour. On the hill it is the same mountain as every other guided option: about 8 km, roughly 350 to 500 metres of climbing depending on how you count the dips in the trail, four to five hours for an average walker. How long it takes has the breakdown.
The quieter route deserves a precise sentence, because the listing’s wording invites a hopeful reading. Quieter does not mean shorter, flatter or easier. It means fewer people for part of the way. The main path carries roughly 350,000 walkers a year and rising, and in July that is visible from the car park onwards, which is the subject of the crowds page.
Included
- Pickup and drop-off at your accommodation in Stavanger
- A guide with the group throughout
- A small group
- A route that avoids the busiest stretch of the main path
Not included
- Any ticket for the trail, which is free and open to anyone
- Boots and waterproof layers (what to wear)
- Food and water
- Any guarantee of a view from the top
What recurs in the reviews
Across 433 reviews the recurring note is the route and the guiding together rather than separately. Sara calls it a unique experience and credits the guide, Syria, with taking the group on an exceptional route through the forest. That pairing is the product: a guide who knows a way in that the queue does not use. You cannot buy the route without the guide, because the route is the guide’s knowledge.
The practical thing no review needs to tell you is arithmetic. A vehicle that collects at several addresses spends time collecting at several addresses, and whoever is picked up first sits in it longest. I raise that as a consequence of the format, not as a fault anyone has complained of.
What the 4.8 does not settle is the ground, exactly as on the terminal departure. Two tours can share a rating and still be four to five hours of uneven walking each.
What works
- Collected at the door, so no early navigation of a city you do not know
- 4.8 across 433 reviews, second only to the terminal departure for evidence
- A quieter route for part of the way, which in July is worth something
- Small group, and a guide who shapes the day round it
Worth knowing
- Seven hours, and the pickup round is part of that
- A quieter route is not an easier route: same distance, same climbing
- A poor fit against a ship’s day in port
- Pickup is in Stavanger; a Sandnes address belongs to the back-country tour
- Weather on the plateau is nobody’s to promise, on any route
Who it is for, and who it is not for
For: anyone staying in Stavanger itself. Anyone who would rather not work out a meeting point before breakfast. Anyone who would sooner walk behind eight people than eighty, and who accepts that the quiet part is a plan rather than a promise.
Against: cruise passengers. Seven hours plus a pickup round against a ship’s call is a worse bet than the six-hour departure from the terminal itself, reviewed on this page, and the reasoning is on the excursion page. Also against: anyone hoping the quieter route is a gentler one; and anyone who wants the emptiest option on this site, which is the back-country route reviewed on the hidden trail page, longer again and capped at eight people. Between November and March, the winter hike is the one to read.
Ask where the quiet stretch actually runs when you get into the vehicle, and treat the answer as weather-dependent. Forest and marsh take water badly after a wet week, and this is an oceanic climate: around 1,310 mm of rain a year over about 162 rainy days, with October the wettest month. Hiking it in the rain is the page for that, and weather and rain for the pattern.
Frequently asked questions
Where does the pickup happen?
At your accommodation in Stavanger. The vehicle calls at several addresses, so whoever is collected first spends the longest in it.
Is the quieter route easier than the main path?
No. It avoids the busiest stretch, not the climbing. Reckon on about 8 km round trip and roughly 350 to 500 metres of ascent either way. See how hard is it.
Is this better than the tour from the cruise terminal?
Better if you are sleeping in Stavanger, worse if you are sleeping on a ship. Both are rated 4.8; the difference is where the day starts. See which tour to choose.