The kilometer amounts google shows are bit different because of different road selections, detours and other misc driving.
Sunday, July 18, 2010
36. Day
From: Övertorneå
To: Rovaniemi
Distance: 115km
Total: 3545km
Started early as battery of my phone was totally used and couldn't set up alarm for the morning. Thus waking up very early and then going to bathroom as I though its quite late already to only notice its 06.30 in the morning. Last day went rather speedy in very warm weather and got to Rovaniemi rather early to finish the whole trip.
35. Day
From: Avafors
To: Övertorneå
Distance: 105km
Total: 3430km
Started early as the sun heated up the tent to unreasonable tempeatures, and once again I was low on the water. Continued the cycling and reached Överkalix early, and waited hour for shops to open to get some additional food. As I was moving early I reached Övertorneå early and had time to relax and watch the world cup final on camping site's restaurant - Gratz Spain!
34. Day
From: Kåbdalis
To: Avafors
Distance: 170km
Total: 3325km
Day started with me having low water, and the local small shop was opening late so didn't stay around to wait it open. The small road I took was gravel road and had to do 45km on it, bit slowing down as didn't dare to drive so fast on it in fear of breaking up my bike. Weather was getting cloudier and by the time I got to Harads it started to rain. By the time I got to Boden I was totally wet but the sky seemed to start clear up and after Boden it became sunny and I was able to dry up in the wind while cycling and by the time I camped up all but my shoes were dry. Made stealth camping site on some sandpit with some reindeers grazing on the edges with hopes that they won't bother me in the night.
33. Day
From: Slagnäs
To: Kåbdalis
Distance: 145km
Total: 3155km
It was another hot day. Swedish roads are just so fast to drive, at least these bigger ones and traffic is not that bad here on the remote areas. Made my way to Arvidsjaur took a stop and ate properly and carried on. Bad side of taking breaks here in north on a windless day is that you'll have swarm of insects around you right after you stop, and thus keeping breaks is something you want to avoid. Didn't find suitable accommodation from Kåbdalis, not gonna pay 800SEK for a cabin, so decided to camp on lake shore, not in very stealth style though.
32. Day
From: Umnässjön
To: Slagnäs
Distance: 115km
Total: 3010km
This was quite uneventful day, stopped in Sorsele to eat and buy some food with me. Then continued some 30km to Slagnäs for camping site, there was roadwork of 15km before Slagnäs with muddy road because of earlier shower and my legs got bit muddy also in the process of cycling through it. Camping site was good and my tent got some test of wind in the evening as thunderstorm generated quite high winds.
31. Day
From: Hattfjelldal
To: Umnässjön
Distance: 130km
Total: 2895km
The climbing continued right from Hatfjelldal and lasted until the swedish border, sometimes steeper, sometimes rather flat - but generally all the time up. After the border the road became larger and started to head down. Weather was good for the whole day and all the way I made in Sweden was generally slight downhill following the rivers and lakes. After visiting 'Turistbyrå' (kind of turist information office) in Tärnaby it was obvious there wasn't any camping sites in next almost 150km, which meant stealth camping night on the shores of Umnässjön. Found a good spot by the lake and setted up the tent, and gotta say it was best stealth camping site on this trip.
30. Day
From: Tosbotn
To: Hattfjelldal
Distance: 85km
Total: 2765km
Weather good, check. Going inland, check. Possibility of uphill 100%, check. As starting to go inland on norwegian coast, uphills are inevitable. Road started the uphill and went some 5km quite steep uphill, then there was entrance to a tunnel that was NOT marked on my map. Tunnel was 5.9km long, and as I came closer the entrance I felt the cold breeze coming from it and the tunnel continued upwards and no way around the tunnel, at least marked one. I had used to cycling in tunnels so going in one wasn't that big deal, the cold headwind and smell of gasoline were quite annoying though. The tunnel went on 5-6% uphill all the 5.9 kilometers, and thus took quite a bit to cycle through and staying in those dark things isn't exactly fun. As I came out of the tunnel the cold breeze got explained as the exit was high up with snow covering the ground every here and there, but I was able to see that it was also the "summit", so that road would only go downhill after the tunnel for the next 10km or so. Rest of the day was less eventful and got quite cheap room, in norwegian standards, from Hattfjelldal camping site. The valley had odd hat looking mountain next to it, thus the name.
29. Day
From: Holm
To: Tosbotn
Distance: 105km
Total: 2680km
Day started with ferry crossing to Vennesund, road was good to cycle and sun was shining. After some 20km the south-western sky turned dark from clouds and they started to approach fast, soon the whole area was covered by the clouds and more and more showers started to land on the hillsides. I got bit wet by couple showers, but not totally drained. Reached camping site in Tosbotn, which was in the end of the fjord and in totally windless deep valley. As I was putting up the tent I realized the huge amounts of insects, we finns call them 'polttiainen', and if you stayed in one place too long breathing came hard as you always inhaled so many of them. Good amount of these insects made their way inside the tent, but luckily they lost their 'mind' if they got inside and just went to roof trying to find a way out without bothering me.
28. Day
From: Namsos
To: Holm
Distance: 150km
Total: 2575km
It was another freaking sunday, and of course I had totally forgotten about it, and as its Norway all shops are closed on sundays and those that open - do so very late. This basically meant that I got no breakfast before after the ferry trip to Hoflesja after 55km of cycling. Felt good to get some food in and totally felt the additional energy I got from that food. Weather had been good for whole day and it stayed good till the end of the day. I tried to get camping site before Holm, but one I found was pretty suspicious, with nobody there and services seemed quite meh, so I decided to carry on to Holm. The decision to go Holm was definately a good one, the camping site was just awesome - cheap, free showers, all good services and they even served food which came in BIG portions - also it was first camping site with small library in it.
27. Day
From: Namsos
To: Namsos
Distance: 15km
Total: 2425km
The camping site was some 7km from the city centre and so I decided just to make 1 longer trip there. It was bit bigger city with all kinds of services - the local shopping mall was also accessible by boat which was quite interesting for me as mostly inland dweller. The day was easy going and made some serious eating and football watching in the evening.
26. Day
From: Åfjord
To: Namsos
Distance: 140km
Total: 2410km
Morning was sunny and warm, packed up my things and headed to local grocery store to buy some breakfast before setting off. Met Tony, the guy from britain in front of the shop while eating and he got some 15-20min head start in front of me. After some 25km I reached him on one steeper uphill and passed him. Made my way to Osen and took longer break and ate up some more food. Some 30 kilometers before Namsos I spotted Tony on one camping site and we changed few last words as it was apparent that we wouldn't see each other anymore as I had planned to keep rest day in Namsos. Camping site in Namsos was pretty good one, with all imaginable services available, also the price was bit high for my taste. Interesting location they had chosen for camping site right next to airstrip, which fortunately was a quiet one.
25. Day
From: Orkanger
To: Åfjord
Distance: 110km
Total: 2270km
In the morning rain had stopped, the sky was still very grey and it seemed like it could start raining at any moment again. I noticed another cyclist near my tent that was packing his stuff and went to change few words with him. He was from Britain and was doing trip from the most southern tip of Norway to Nordkapp. Talked with him for some time, finally someone I could talk english properly, and our route seemed to be same for few hundred kilometers, his speed was bit slower than mine it seemed with some 80km per day. He left before me and I had to go town to buy some food and a new book.
Weather started to clear out after a while of cycling and by the time I reached Valset - Breakstad ferry the sky was totally blue. Rest of the day on Fosnes side was good going. Made my way to Åfjord and checked in to local camping site and noticed that the same guy I met in the morning had also checked in on the same camping site. Had some more talks with him during the evening in the Åfjord and he seemed quite funny guy.
24. Day
From: Rennebu
To: Orkanger
Distance: 60km
Total: 2160km
Weather had changed totally during the night that I was able to sleep undisturbed - some farmer started driving his tractor quite early, but didn't really get too disturbed by it. More disturbing was the all the time pouring rain that had no breaks at all. Slowly I packed my things up trying to not get my things wet. Good thing about this rain was, compared to rain on 12. day from Sveg to Särna, that it was warm and the coldness wasn't such big factor, but still unpleasant to drive in. I made my way to Orkanger and decided to camp up there as there wasn't any bigger centrums within reasonable range on my way. Found decend camping site near the centrum and camped up there, putting up your wet tent while you're yourself totally wet feels quite miserable, but once you get in and get some dry clothes - it all becomes so much better.
23. Day
From: Dumbås
To: Rennebu
Distance: 135km
Total: 2100km
Day started with steep uphill for some 5km and then it was up on the mostly treeless highlands where the road came rather flat. After some time of cycling, prolly some 40-50km there was sign about the road being over 1000 meters from sea level again with quite nice view to mountain Snöhetta. After the sign there was some 25km of slight downhill - very fun to ride. I was afraid that E6 is gonna be hell whole day, but traffic wasn't that bad - though far from light either. After Berkåk I took smaller road and did some 15km on it before camping up on local football field as the next camping site would have been like 40km ahead still. Evening had awesome weather and cycling was a lot fun in the valley full of farms and green fields.
Saturday, July 17, 2010
22. Day
From: Lom
To: Dumbås
Distance: 110km
Total: 1965km
Well, after doing the Jotunheimen climb it felt that there really can't be any real challenges left in terms of uphills on rest of the trip. The way to Dumbås was easy yet annoying as I had to cycle on E6 which had a lot of truck traffic - infact road was forbidden for cyclists, but I really didn't see any alternative to ride on. There was quite tough uphill before Dumbås, but rest of the day was just flat, and only thing I had to do was to evade thunderstorms roaming around.
21. Day
From: Fortun
To: Lom
Distance: 80km
Total: 1855km
So day started with slight climb, or well can I say started as the climb took 3.5 hours - but made only 15km during that time, though I came 1400 meters straight up also. A lot of sweat was left on that uphill and 2 litres of water was enjoyed during, with leaving me very short of water for rest of the day. Was nice to follow the terrain change around me as I climbed from very thick deciduous tree forest to land of glaciers, though it was quite warm up there with sun shining and wind being at its minimum. Reached the highest spot of that road at 1434 meters from sea level and started to descend slowly. Met some norwegian bikers who told that the route is much easier to ride from another direction and people usually do so, like they were, well guess it was more challenging to come from the sea side - but well done what done. Rest of the day was rather easy with the descend all the way to Lom. Met couple danish hikers on the camping site and we had good time comparing experiences between cycling and hiking the mountains.
20. Day
From: Sogndal
To: Fortun
Distance: 65km
Total: 1775km
I knew this was gonna be easy day as my goal was in Fortun and knew that I can't go climb Jotunheimen just yet today. Easy day was also good to put the flu further back and recover more. Cycled quite lazily and took many longer brakes along the day. Road was good and quite flat in terms of Norway. Saw a nice waterfall with water dropping 218 meters in the air.
19. Day
From: Vang i Valdres
To: Sogndal
Distance: 110km
Total: 1710km
Night in a cabin really helped against my flu and I felt much better, not in perfect shape, but in shape I was positive I could take the climb ahead of me. Day started with cow herds on the road and the road started to climb upwards. Took a longer break in Tyinkrysset and bought first and only sports drink on whole trip and proceeded to continue the climb. Eventually I reached the mountain lake 1000 meters over sea level after hiding rain under edge of roof of abandoned building. It was cold up there with bits of snow everywhere, also cold wind and slight rain didn't make it feel any better. After some kilometers I reached the 1117 meters from sea level and started to descend, and good descend it was with serpentine in the end. My ears were seriously hurting right after, thanks to the flu and rapid descend, but the pain passed within few minutes.
I took long break in Årdal and tried find suitable accommodation from that valley without much success, so I carried on the cycling. It was getting late and it became apparent that I have to take the ferry to get Sogndal for accommodation. There were several tunnels along the route also from 500 meters to over 3 kilometers in lenght. Finally found quite overpriced camping site from Sogndal, but didn't really want to carry on so...
Friday, July 16, 2010
18. Day
From: Fagernes
To: Vang i Valdres
Distance: 40km
Total: 1600km
Flu had totally taken over me and from the morning I knew I could not make too many kilometers today, and climb starting after Vang would most likely not going to happen today. I cycled very slowly taking many breaks - weather was sunny with some showers. Just 5km before while riding between cliff and lake shore - one of the clouds decided to crush on that cliff and rained on me just awesome amounts of water, whole road was like a small river. Even though the rain lasted only about 5minutes, I was wet from top to feet. And as camping site came in Vang, decision came easily. Asked place for a tent, but the girl in reception said that they have also single man cabin with same price as tent, we went to check out the cabin and it was just perfect for me, small but had roof and bed.
Thursday, July 15, 2010
17. Day
From: Dokka
To: Fagernes
Distance: 55km
Total: 1560km
I felt really bad at the morning, throat was aching and I was coughing and some liquid coming from nose. I decided to take it easy and keep a lot breaks. First 20km were not much of problem cycling the river valley. But then started the 15km climb to 750 meters from sea level, and that was hard - had to take a lot of breaks during the climb and then froze on the downhill on the other side. This must have improved my condition a lot, let's see what tomorrow will bring. Evening was very warm again and found good camping site from Fagernes and watched Germany's match with bunch of germans.
16. Day
From: Hamar
To: Dokka
Distance: 85km
Total: 1505km
When it gets to populated as the Hamar - Lillehammer and whole Mjosa lake area, you can't take the shortest (biggest) road as it was motorhighway, but try to navigate through smaller roads. It was a lot navigating until I got out of the valley again and on road 249, which was 30km of slight uphill. Small ache in my throat made me concerned. Finally reached Dokka camping site and it was very warm evening yet I felt myself bit sick.
15. Day
From: Trysil
To: Hamar
Distance: 120km
Total: 1420km
Day started with uphill off from the valley, road was okay thanks to roadwork and controlled traffic. Took longer pause in Elverum and went find a new book which took quite a while. The road after Elverum was the most undersized one compared to amount of traffic on it - made me feel miserable cycling on it. Finally got to Hamar which was rather big city and total missing of camping site signs made me really angry and cycle over 10km in hilly city - finally got to the camp site after asking directions by thousandth time, and it was on top of the largest hill around, which made it have awesome sights from it. Enjoyed rest of the evening watching Spain's match with couple portuguese people, and had like 2 hour chat with them after the match ended - made it great evening.
14. Day
From: Särna
To: Trysil
Distance: 110km
Total: 1300km
Day was sunny from the morning till the evening, road was good to drive and I had some good energy after 2 nights inside and taken rest day. Moved to Norway and road profiles changed to slightly more hillier, near the border there was old timber rafting canal and some people reconstructing it as it had not been in use for decades and grown sealed. After few detours in Trysil I found the camping site. One unfortunate thing I noticed in the shop was that prices had gone up quite a bit despite currency becoming more valuable towards euro (1€=9.5SEK - 1€=7.8NOK roughly).
13. Day
From: Särna
To: Särna
Distance: 0km
Total: 1190km
As most of my clothes were still rather wet in the morning and it was still pouring outside, I decided to take another rest day. I had very limited amount of dry clothes and Särna is rather small place so I dedicated to watch the world cup from the TV and finish reading my book. Also the social area had rather good kitchen so made some proper food with proper equipment.
12. Day
From: Sveg
To: Särna
Distance: 90km
Total: 1190km
The night had one of the strongest thunderstorms I've ever been, or lying in the tent with ground shaking makes moderate thunderstorm feel like a strong one. By the morning the weather had totally changed, tempeature was under +10C and it was raining all the time. Tried to get my things packed as dry as I was able to, tent ofc was totally wet and the laundry I had drying outside was... well wet. I pulled on my waterproofs and started to depart despite some thai woman telling me that its not possible to drive in weather like this.
After some 30km I was totally wet and only thing keeping me warm was the heat from muscles working on cycling - breaks became very cold and I tried not to take em. Most of the road was on the high lands with nothing than the road there, finally I reached Särna with all the energy gone and the coldness creeping in despite now much less intense cycling. I had all my underwear wet, thanks to failed attempt on drying the laundry last night and had few odd pieces of cloth still dry in my panniers. So the decision to look for a cabin for the night was quite easy one. In Särna I found the camping site and asked for cabin, they had some free, but they also had some rooms that were cheaper than the cabin so I took a room. It felt awesome to sleep inside after so long time spent in tent.
11. Day
From: Åsarna
To: Sveg
Distance: 110km
Total: 1100km
Decided to take smaller yet more hillier route to Sveg and day started with a first real up hill that forced me to take a break during the hill. But as there's uphill, there'll be awesome downhill also. On the other side there was Klövsjö ski resort. After the resort there was another hard uphill and some 10km of road up on the fjell with very hard headwind and another ski resort (Vemdalsskalet) and best downhill thus far. Rest of the way was rather flat along the river valley (with couple more smaller ski resorts).
Sveg camping site was situated perfectly in the centrum and was easy to find and very close to shops and other services. Kitchen also had microwave so I was like forced to buy some easy micro food.
10. Day
From: Östersund
To: Åsarna
Distance: 80km
Total: 990km
Departure took a bit of time because of few reasons; my sleeping bag had been losing feathers last few nights and had become rather cold, so I had to buy a new one from Östersund. Also my rear tyre had its inner fabrics coming out so had to replace that also. But all the shops in the centrum opened at 10.00 local time and I had to gtfo from camping site before 12.00, and camping site is few kilometers from the centrum, so I need to be quick on this one. In the end I was checking out 12.15 but the receptionist didn't fortunately make me pay for 2 nights. Also getting out bigger town usually means a lot stops and possibly few detours, and Östersund wasn't an exception.
The road after Östersund as just awesome going through farming land with lake on the side with views to fjells. Camping site in Åsarna was rather poor and expensive - well what can you expect from a ski resort village.
9. Day
From: Strömsund
To: Östersund
Distance: 105km
Total: 910km
Not much to mention about this day, weather was good - road had more and more traffic as I came closer to Östersund, which was quite a big city. I was amazed though that there was no proper road for light traffic earlier than 2km from the centrum - not that I like to cycle on those too much anyways. Always bit hazzle to find camping site in the bigger towns and Östersund wasn't an expection, my GPS getting no signal didn't really help here either.
8. Day
From: Åsele
To: Strömsund
Distance: 120km
Total: 805km
Thanks to last evenings problems with finding place to sleep, I had forgotten to refill my water reserves and was forced to use some water from nature before reaching Dorotea and being able to get refill. Met also interesting guy there as I was eating breakfast on bench. We did talk... or well he did most of the talking, anyways it was odd conversation, topics ranged from structure of gas tanks on Snovit natural gas field to possible conflict between Egypt and Libya over some under ground fresh water resources.
Rest of the day was good cycling on bit higher traffic road than previous days and catching couple mild showers, which dried up fast in the speed. Strömsund camping site was very decent, and there actually was someone on the reception as I arrived!
7. Day
From: Lycksele
To: Åsele
Distance: 95km
Total: 685km
Sunny day at first, but started to gather thunderstorms in the evening and rain. Road was quite hilly compared to earlier days. Had some other longer range cyclists pass me coming from opposite direction, didn't have chance to talk with them though. Åsele camping site was totally abadoned outcluding two boys leaching electricity for their laptop, who were I think german and we couldn't find common language to communicate with each other. Carried on some 10km after Åsele and found rather bad stealth camping site (too close to road and a lot insects) and slept the rainy night there.
6. Day
From: Lycksele
To: Lycksele
Distance: 20km
Total: 590km
This day was my first "rest day", had my tent up on Lycksele camping site and went out to the town with unloaded and pretty much checked out pretty much everything in the town - not that there was that much to check out; small centrum, rain station, zoo, one decorative dam etc. Weather was good, windy by the evening.
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
5. Day
From: Jörn
To: Lycksele
Distance: 130km
Total: 570km
Day started with short 5-6km of gravel road and heard story about Tiger Woods spending christmas in one of the local villages with his swedish girlfriend. Weather was sunny and roads were small, was really nice day to ride - even the wind did blow from behind at times. Camping site in Lycksele was yet again unmanned, what wrong with these lazy swedes, got contact with phone though and was told to just take place there.
4. Day
From: Älvsbyn
To. Jörn
Distance: 120km
Total: 440km
Day was sunny and nice. Wasn't really sure about road selection as map showed all roads going south as minor roads and just decided to cycle on and keep eye on them. Then there was promising one and it had police patrol writing a ticket to some unlucky motorcyclist, asked the other officer about the road and is it paved all the way to Långträsk. He told me that the road is paved but in quite bad condition, so I decided to take it.
There was one roadwork on the road that he hasn't mentioned but I made through it succesfully. Took brake in village of Koser and met a guy walking his tiny dog and had good conversation with him, he even asked me to coffee with him, which I had to reject as I was planning to get in Jörn not too damn late. He told me though about large windmill park being constructed nearby along the road I was going to cycle.
Made it to Jörn quite late only be told that camping site is another 7km away. I cycled to the camping site and it seemed abadoned - after while I met a guy there who told me its okay to camp there and he'll let someone know that I'm there.
3. Day
From: Töre
To: Älvsbyn
Distance: 95km
Total: 320km
Started from my stealth camping site and decided not to take the gravel road and headed back to E4, which had grown even larger with E10 connection - was not really much fun to drive till I turned to road heading to Boden. Met some nice swedish people in Råneå and some talks with them on the communal centre, got also some support from them in form of food and 100SEK.
Rest of the way was good with Boden being bigger town and needing to navigate a bit through sights and stores.
2. Day
From: Kemi
To: Töre
Distance: 115km
Total: 225km
Weather was changing from morning's sunshine to some showers later in the day. E4 road was pretty boring to drive and busy with traffic. Did some stealth camping in the forest near Töre.
Monday, June 7, 2010
First Day
From: Oulu
To: Kemi
Distance: 108km
Total: 108km
Going to 'easy' night as got indoor sleeping possibilities at friend's apartment in Kemi.
Packed up bike on a break near Olhava.
Tomorrow to the Sweden, and hope there's some internet possibilities over there to keep this blog up to date.
Sunday, June 6, 2010
Preparation
Plan is to generally try to lack definite objectives or quotas for each day's cycling, or at least nothing I would need to start stress for. Basically calling it a break whenever I feel like it or if there's something on the side of the road I want to take a closer look - even if its just 200 meters apart.
Wrapping the bike up on late sunday evening. Everything should be there - and those few things that are missing (consciously or not) are going to be picked up on the road.
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