This morning we left Geiranger and set off for Kristiansund on the west coast of Norway. The initial drive away from Geiranger was a steep climb for what seemed like miles. There were 11 hairpin bends before we reached the top and the road levelled out. We stopped on the way up to photograph Geiranger behind us and which had another huge cruise ship in port. Lynne was worried about the smell of burning rubber but I thought it was pretty normal for the engine to get hot after such a long climb in low gears! The view was spectacular and the sun seemed to break through the clouds just at the right moment and lit up the whole scene!
After about 25 miles we came upon the first ferry of the day, the Eidsdal to Linge ferry. I never know when to expect these ferry’s. The sat nav just says with very little warning, “please board the ferry” and that’s the first you know of it. That brings us back to blindly following ‘sat nav lady’. We did enquire about the Fjord1 ferry card which would save us 50% on most ferry trips but the guy selling tickets advised against it. It costs 3400 NOK (about £318) too so we decided to give it a miss. This trip cost us around 130 NOK.
The passing landscape had changed quite dramatically since leaving Geiranger and now reminded me more of our own Lake District but without the mental traffic. It has to be said that generally, driving in Norway is a pleasure. In almost 2 weeks of driving through the country and some of it’s towns I don’t recall seeing any of the kind of boy racer antics that we’ve come to expect at home. There’s been a couple of occasions when I’ve had traffic behind me and I’ve pulled over to let them go only to find that they seem to go slower than I was once they’re in front! It seems to me that as a rule most people appear to adhere to the speed limits which rarely go above 80kph (50mph). We saw this interesting old house along the way and actually did a u-turn just to go and photograph it. The only trouble was, when I turned around I lapsed into twat mode again and drove down the road for a good 3 or 4 hundred meters on the wrong side till a car coming the other way started flashing his lights at me. Oops!! Anyway the old house looked like a bit of a project but Lynne decided, and I could see her point, that when we saw the photo it looked like the kind of place that might have a ghostly face at one of the windows. Can you see anything? I hope not!
We had one more ferry to go before reaching Kristiansund. The Molde to Vestnes ferry. This one was 204 NOK so we asked again about the Fjord1 card and this time we decided to get one. So considering it was supposed to save you 50% I couldn’t quite work out why the crossing still cost us 119 NOK. When we reached Kristiansund we immediately decided it didn’t look nice at all. What didn’t help was getting lost and driving through some pretty desperate looking areas. Also the parking I’d looked up and set the GPS (got fed up with sat nav) to didn’t seem to exist when GPS lady told us we had arrived at our destination. If I’d taken the left turn as instructed we would have found ourselves in someone’s front room!
So having taken a dislike to Kristiansund without even stopping we agreed to carry on towards Trondheim and see if there was anywhere we fancied wildcamping along the way. That’s how we find ourselves in a large parking area a good distance from the road overlooking the sea. There’s a small beach within a few seconds walk and we appear to have the place all to ourselves. I stood and watched a heron catching small fish for ten minutes before he flew off screeching all the way. It seems like a good place to spot Otter and there was a lot of movement in the water but I think in the end it was just a lot of hyperactive fish breaking the surface every now and then. After a week or more of having powerful waterfalls within earshot of wherever we’ve camped, the silence in this place is deafening! Getting here wasn’t straight forward though, we had to take our 3rd ferry of the day, the Halsa – Kanestraum. Even for Norway that has to be some kind of record. I did wonder though had we set the GPS for Trondheim in the first place would we have missed one or even two of those ferrys out?
Wandering Wildman 