Kirkenes trip planner

Kirkenes is a town in Sør-Varanger Municipality in Finnmark county, in the far northeastern part of Norway. The town lies on a peninsula along the Bøkfjorden, an arm of the large Varangerfjorden. The main church for Kirkenes is Kirkenes Church, located in the Haganes area of the town.The 2.15km2 town has a population (2013) of 3,498; which gives it a population density of. When the neighbouring suburban villages of Hesseng, Sandnes, and Bjørnevatn are all included with Kirkenes, the urban area reaches a total population of almost 8,000 people.HistoryThe area around Kirkenes was a common Norwegian–Russian district until 1826, when the present border was settled. The original name of the peninsula was Piselvnes ("Pis River headland"), but this was changed to Kirkenes (meaning "church headland") after the Kirkenes Church was built here in 1862. Kirkenes was a village until 1998. Then it got the town status.World War IIDuring the occupation of Norway by Nazi Germany, Kirkenes was one of the many bases for the German Kriegsmarine and the Luftwaffe's Jagdgeschwader 5, and apart from that, the area served as a main base for supplies to the Murmansk front (see Lapland War).