Art and grit in Alesund

Norwegians generally consider Alesund to be their most beautiful city, says Norman Miller in the Times. The "charming" townscape was largely rebuilt after a fire engulfed the city in 1904, and it is dominated by the fashionable style of the day, Art Nouveau. Everywhere there are "graceful gables, pointy turrets and ornate, pastel-hued façades".

Nonetheless, Alesund retains the "grit" of a working port, and has plenty of sophisticated modern culture, too, including two glass-fronted contemporary art museums, the Kulturhus and KUBE. Its crowning glory, however, is its setting, stretched across a hook-shaped peninsula and surrounded by islands in a "stunning" amphitheatre of snow-capped peaks that "demand exploration". The "jaw-dropping" Geiranger fjord lies among them, a short ferry journey away.

SAS (0871 521 2772) flies to Alesund from £236 rtn. ·