On a ship doing 18 kts down a fjord there’d be other tasks to attend to, time to the next turn might be the most urgent task, next course, whatever turning marks are to be used, parallel index or whatever.
Also they may have been navigation lights to identify or shore lights to sort out. Other tasks in the wheelhouse.
The immediate traffic would have looked simple, three ships port to port. It’d be natural to shift attention to navigation.