taraabit

Sunday 30th April 2023

We started the day with a brisk walk on the beach, the wind is still very strong bringing an uncomfortable wind chill factor.

Yesterday whilst on the beach a Danish lady suggested I release my inner viking spirit and have a swim, I told her my inner viking spirit doesn’t even come out in the Mediterranean in August. However this morning guests from the luxury hotel next to the campsite decided they would brave it. They got out of the heated swimming pool, ran across the beach and approx 6 out of the 20 actually went in above knee height, perhaps they weren’t Vikings😂

We left Layla in Homer and walked approx a mile to Kronburg Castle which we can see from the campsite,

Frederick 11 built this castle in order to establish himself as the most powerful king in Scandinavia. He surrounded himself with artists and scientists and threw grand parties at Kronburg. In 1572 he married his young Queen, Sophie, their marriage is known as one of the happiest royal marriages in Europe. This wasn’t their main home when they weren’t in attendance everything was packed away and stored in the main ballroom and walking gallery.

Most of the history meant very little to me although there was some marriage into the UK royal family. It is known around the world as Elsinore the castle where the drama about Hamlet written by William Shakespeare is based. It was amusing to hear people of different nationalities saying out loud “ to be or not to be” and “ alas poor Yorrick” there were T shirts and other tack in the shops with this on.

Close to the castle were some converted warehouses that are now exhibition centres, over the weekend there had been a classic car show, unfortunately only a few were left when we looked in.

One other hall is used as an indoor street food market, there were approx 20 stands selling food from around the world, a bar with about 30 different beers and loads of seating so you could go and enjoy your purchases. The smell of all the food was amazing and the whole place had a great vibe, if we hadn’t left Layla back in Homer I would have been tempted to have lunch.

We walked back into Helsingor in the afternoon and it was quite busy especially with groups of younger people having a great time, many groups laden with drink seemed to be heading off to some function but I couldn’t ascertain where they were off too.

We move on again tomorrow but I would happily return here again especially in warmer weather, Layla will miss the beach we haven’t long returned from another walk on it so she could play and go wild.

Sat 29th April 2023

Well we managed to spend 2 days in Sweden without using any real money(SEK’s as it’s known in Sweden) not difficult in this cashless society we live in😊 the stopover for the night was paid remotely by app.

We drove south today virtually door to door on the motorway heading to Helsingborg where we had booked the ferry to Denmark, these ferries aren’t cheap and are turning out to be one of the largest costs of the journey, but when needs must.

There’s no waiting about to get on and off these ferries, they sail every 30 minutes and the crossing was only 20 minutes long. It was a short drive from the port to tonight’s proper campsite.

I wanted a break from driving and this site has good laundry facilities so we decided to take a two day stay, catch up on chores and chill out, it has the added bonus that we are 10 m from the beach which Layla adores.

Friday 28th April 2023

The past two days have been dedicated to putting some mileage on the clock , our strange route in Norway took longer than we expected mainly due to most roads being A class roads, very little chance of overtaking and a 50 mph limit. So yesterday we drove to Horton in Norway where we managed to get the last parking space in the dedicated motorhome parking zone. We had a lovely view over the harbour.

We chose Horton because it has a ferry across the inlet to the south of Oslo and cut off a lot of driving for us, the ferry took us to Moss which was still in Norway, it cost rather a lot of money for a 20 minute journey.

Today after taking the ferry we drove south on the motorway soon entering Sweden, the speed limit was 70 mph so we were able to cover a longer distance on a relatively empty motorway. We are Kungalv a city on the river Gita alv to the north of Gothenburg. The site is next to the river and in the shadows of a very impressive castle.

Wed 26th April 2023

As we got up this morning there was a heavy hail storm followed by flurries of snow, thankfully by the time we left it had stopped. However as we drove south it became evident we had been on the edge of a snowstorm that covered the scenery for miles, thankfully the roads were clear just very wet. We were heading for Egersund which we had heard was an attractive town.

There were two routes from Egersund we could take which would lead to tonight stopover. I chose route 44 as it looked more interesting and was closer to the sea. WOW, WOW andWOW again, what an experience , what a drive, it had everything. We went up and through mountain passes descended again to sea level before going back up and over a mountain pass again, this happened more times than I can recall. On all sides were surrounded by stark scenery, imposing mountains, huge lakes, fast flowing rivers every minute the scenery changed, it was difficult to take photographs.

The road was often narrow down to one cars width in places and as to the hair pin bends well we often stared into our own exhaust pipe as we went round them.

Thanks to Michelle for attempting to take photos as we went along, not easy when there wasn’t a straight road.

Of course we had to have the obligatory tunnel, thankfully not many and quite short.

At one point to give my arms a rest we pulled into a picnic area part way down one mountain road on the corner of a hair pin bend. It turned out to be historically interesting.

We were above the hydro electric plant that was famous in WW11 for making “heavy water” a substance used in the development of nuclear fission.In 1942 a number of Norwegian saboteurs were parachuted onto the plateau high above the plant and managed to enter the plant and explode bombs which caused serious damage to the production, through careful planning they all managed to escape with their lives.

When we eventually came to the end of 44, we joined a much larger main road and made good speed, Norway is currently turning the road into a motorway, once on your on and that meant paying tolls.Tonight we are on a campsite in Lillesand at sea level, we are watching the tide going out as I write this, a beautiful view again.

Tuesday 25th April 2023

Today we walked from the campsite into Stavanger and back again, including walking around town we walked 7.5 miles in total, all three of us are weary tonight.

Stavanger is the 4th largest city in Norway with a cathedral that opened in 1125, unfortunately for us it is undergoing renovation so was inaccessible. The original area of the town near the docks has a large number of 18th and 19th century wooden buildings painted in bright colours.Most of these are now shops, cafes, restaurants and bars.

Stavanger is known as the oil capital of Norway and has many connections with the oil and gas industries, it has a large and active harbour.

Norway has strict rules on alcohol, there is a limit that you can bring into the country with you and you can’t purchase any in supermarkets. Instead you have to visit the Vinmonopolet, colloquially shortened to Polet. It is a government owned alcoholic drinks retailer and the only place you can buy alcohol with an alcoholic content higher than 4.75% Stavanger is one of the rare places that has a Vinmonopolet so it seemed rude not to visit and help the economy by purchasing a bottle of whisky.

We very quickly found out that dogs aren’t allowed in any cafes, bars etc so we ended up sitting outside a very nice cafe ( cushions and blankets provided) where we enjoyed a hot drink and pastry each.

As you can see it was a sunny day with bright blue sky but unfortunately there was a rather cold wind blowing in off the North Sea that made it a little uncomfortable at times and certainly meant you kept moving.

Mon 24th April 2023

Today Trondheim had a one inch snowfall and who knows how much on the mountain roads to it so we feel vindicated about our difficult decision last night, these motorhomes are not designed for those conditions.

When we left the campsite this morning we immediately began a steep climb out of the valley up a road with numerous hair pin bends, 2nd gear necessary, we soon ran into cloud then rain, sleet and finally snowfall. Thankfully we eventually levelled out and drove into a very long tunnel, emerging at the other side what a change there was, only drizzle and very little snow lying on the ground. We began to descend which went on for a long time, the road we were on was leading us to a ferry, however en route we went through 19 tunnels.

Yesterday when we went through tunnels they were very crudely cut through the rock, most had no illumination, no white or yellow lines and no reflectors at the side of the road. I struggled at times to make out the edge of the road as there was no curb Then this morning whilst lying wide awake before time to get up I had a 💡💡💡moment, I realised I hadn’t put beam deflectors on the headlights so they were pointing the wrong way. It certainly helped by putting them on before we left this morning although most tunnels today had some illumination.

Before leaving the UK I registered on line with a Norwegian company that collected the tolls for the government, this worked equally well with the ferry, the fees will automatically come out of my bank account and I will receive an email copy.

It wasn’t far from the end of the ferry crossing to the campsite, here again we experienced some difficulty in registering and paying to stay ( we never did pay last night, there was never any one in reception) at this site the office was empty and locked. There was a man working on one of the gardens so I asked him what to do “ he replied phone the number on the door, I will answer and text you details of everything you need😵‍💫”. I dutifully phoned him even though he was only metres away, he indicated he’d sent me a text, however it wouldn’t register on my phone, eventually we managed by using whatsapp. Why he couldn’t give me a piece of paper I’ll never know. After reading their web page it appears that it is part of their out of season procedure.

The site is on the edge of a huge park and lake, there is a swimming centre about 30m away from us with two outdoor heated swimming pools that have been in constant use since we arrived, I’ll keep my coat on and watch 😊

Sunday 23rd April 2023

We have driven 146 miles today amongst stunning scenery, it’s difficult to put it into perspective or have enough superlatives to describe it. The roads are in very good condition and being a Sunday very little traffic perhaps one car every 5 miles, at first there were patches of snow then it became more widespread, deeper and deeper especially as we hit the plateau in the Telemark region where it covered everything metres deep. You could see roofs of cottages poking out of the snow and the roof would have a metre of snow on it.

As we drove along we found most lay-bys under snow, wild camping spaces inaccessible and the majority of campsites under snow and not open.

There are only a handful of LPG filling sites here in Norway and non within a hundred miles of us so we are trying to conserve what we have and not use it for heating if possible, so electric hook ups are desirable.We have descended a little from the height of the deepest snow and here in Roldal there are two campsites open, we are pitched on one with no owner in sight, we have hooked up to the power and will pay if he turns up.

We have done a lot of soul searching over the past few hours, our aim was to reach Trondheim before heading to Oslo but the weather forecast for the next two days is poor and if the conditions worsen then finding somewhere to stay will become even more difficult. We have therefore decided to descend from the mountains to the west coast and enjoy the scenery around the fjords. For once I’m going to follow the mantra “ it’s better to be safe than sorry”.

Sat 22nd April 2023

We filled up with fuel this morning, really cheap here it was less than £1.50 a litre, as we left the town we turned left instead of right and found ourselves on the ferry to Norway😂😂🛳⛷⛷

In truth we nearly didn’t get on the ferry, the road sign took you to the booking office and not the check in area, Michelle managed to get a map from the office and we tried again. Problem was there were three roads side by side with barriers in between we went up and down all three twice trying to find the slip road into the check in area, eventually we found it off the middle road that went under the right hand road.

There was a cursory glance at our passports no stamp, Norway isn’t in the EU so we should have had an exit stamp, they didn’t bother to look at Layla’s passport and we had paid almost £80 at the vets for her to have a worming tablet as was required by Norway, we needn’t have bothered😖When we left the ferry in Kristiansand we just drove straight out of the harbour, again they were supposed to be very strict about checking how much alcohol you were bringing in. I needn’t have hidden our cache so well😂The passengers on the boat were staggering out with huge packs of coca cola rather than beer!!

As you drive across the EU there are no physical barriers just a welcome in the local language, slowly you notice changes, road signs, speed limits, car number plates, architecture, agricultural crops, etc but nothing major. So it was a pleasant surprise when we got off the ferry to immediately notice the difference, our road was through a valley with forests to each side and streams running along side us. We passed many small lakes the majority of which still had ice on them, here and there snow is still lying on the ground. But of course the other difference was we began to climb and climb and climb, we have gone from sea level to 185m in a short distance.

The stopover is at the base of a winter downhill ski run and the forest around us is set up with trails for cross country skiing, it’s newly set up and needs a little TLC it costs 250 Norwegian Kroner per night( about £20) you are supposed to pay via an app that only Norwegian Bank account holders can access, so we haven’t paid.

Fri 21st April 2023

This morning was the first occasion since we left the UK that wind hasn’t been blowing strongly, just a gentle breeze, what a difference, also today we have had to drive up and down hills ( well more like rolling countryside) a first again in 11 days.

Tonight’s campsite couldn’t give us a much more beautiful coastal spot to spend the afternoon and evening. Firstly we were given a very warm welcome by the site manager who commented they rarely get English visitors, he was an avid Man Utd supporter, even had the initials tattooed on his arm, he was upset because they lost 3-0 last night.

After lunch we went for a walk along the beach to the fishing port and on into town, there is very little in the way of commerce in the town but the fishing port was huge with some very large fishing vessels both moored and on dry dock being repaired.

As we were connected to the mains electricity we took advantage of using the microwave to cook a lasagne and jacket potatoes which we finished off in the oven. As it was such a beautiful evening after our meal we went for a walk in the opposite direction towards a lighthouse that towered above the camp site.

Time for a night cap🍷

Thursday 20th April 2023

The day started with a visit to the local Netto, I was pleasantly surprised with both the range of goods and the quality, you have to take a deep breath when shopping here in Denmark and ignore the prices, apart from diesel which is cheaper than back home.

We drove onto the town of Holstebro, stopped there for no other reason that it was a good time to have a break. We were very impressed with the town, it was quite large, the only drawback was it had lots of shops😵‍💫I didn’t foresee that. Having said that I enjoyed walking around, there were lots of sculptures and modern buildings which I enjoy looking at. We went in one shop and I bought a small leather purse for Michelle. The assistant got into a flap when I proffered a note, there were no coins in the till and she had to get a bag with change in it from a hidden place. She explained no one used money anymore only cards.

After two nights without paying any fees we have treated ourselves to a nice campsite with very good facilities in a wonderful location. The staff are super friendly ( even saying they like English people) Michelle took advantage of the washing machines and driers and did two loads of washing. The site is situated on the edge of a huge inner sea, we are miles from the coast but we are surrounded by a salt water sea with white sand beaches.