Friday, 10 June 2011

Island hopping...

What a week!

Grim weather to start us off out of Tromso; a headwind that stopped us dead more than once and just about enough sideways rain for the truly lovely Kine and Atle to bring us hot chocolate as we waited for a ferry near their home, ended up inviting us to stay for a wet and windy night in their caravan......win! Since then the weather's been on the up and has now been boiling for a few days whilst we've ridden down the stunning Lofoten Islands... this place is unreal!

Thanks to everyone who's helped us already, it's been so much better for it!

Here's just a few to get you started:
 


Granny's burgers...

The sight (and smell) of the North



Our first self-caught meal!

Bedding down in a school playground hut... thank you very much!


Crazy girls, you would't believe quite how cold we were at this stage!

Boiled fish, rice, cheese and the almighty stock cube in Gryllefjord


Not so Bleik!




Camping in Sortland (11pm)

Hot pain-au-chocolat, living the dream...

...?!

Warming up in Melbu

Welcome to Lofoten, where the sun (nearly) always shines...


Our first wild camp


Not a car in sight, traffic has become an event!

Eco-day!




One angry crab! Video to follow...

Arctic swimming, no problem!


Travellers diet; bread, cheese, salami.

Beer was invented for this night... nearly £20 for a 6 pack though!

Scorching by the sea

A busier road down Lofoten



1am in Å, ready for the Bodø ferry in the morning.

So all is well for now, we're heading down the number 17 road for the next 10 days of so into Trondheim so will check in again there.

Hope the weather brightens up for you at home!

J&A

Thursday, 2 June 2011

One long day...

"It's like the world has broken and forgotten what to do!" - what happened to night time?!

We ran to meet Thomas at 10.45 last night with the sun still well above the horizon... a 20 minute drive later we were greeted at his fjord-side house by his lovely wife and other colleagues ready to watch the eclipsing midnight sun:



Thanks for the filter Thomas!

On the dot of midnight


Packing up at 1am

Takk så meget!!!

Catching up on Tromso harbour


If Carlsberg did boats...


So tomorrow we leave Micka and Tromsø to ride the coastal route with a few short ferry rides towards the Lofoten Islands and Bodø, where we will check in again in a week or so.

See you then!

(Day 2, 11.6 miles)

Wednesday, 1 June 2011

Tromso!

We're here! other than having to cut the bike box down a bit to fit through the x-ray all was fine with our flights and the scenery here is something else. Just a sneaky peek for now though, more when I'm not using a french laptop!

not at all frantic...

Oslo countryside


The far north

Jonas, our very useful fisherman friend!

That's our road!

all good after a calzone, sorted.


I hqte foreign keyboqrds&&&

We're also told tomorrow is a bank holiday and nowhere will be open so off to get food shortly, then getting a lift with our hosts boss to hopefully catch a glimpse of a midnight sun solar eclipse, does it get any better than this?!

Ciao for now!

(day 1, 2.65 miles)