17th July 2023 (rain on and off, windy, cold) 53km

After the best nights sleep on tour so far, I woke at 6am to some blue sky and cloud.  Gave Julia a nudge and suggested that we should leave, as the weather was coming in at 8am and didn't look brilliant again until 4pm.  Packed up a sodden tent as the sun, what there was, hadn't touched the tent and I'm picking by the state of it, that we'd had some rain in the night too.

Yolanda and Willem were just downing some bread and jam, before they took off.  Said goodbye and gave Willem our e-mail address. They are such nice people, so I hope we stay in touch.  They'd been out in NZ, twenty years ago, so maybe time for another trip.  If not, maybe we can visit them in Holland.

Took off at a great speed and made really good time to Spillum, a small community with just a garage/shop.  Sat in there with a coffee and baguette and some yoghurt we'd bought there.  

Managing to dodge the worst of the rain at this stage.

At 8.53am we left there under dodgy skies.  Tried to outrun the weather, but got caught and by the time we found somewhere to put on our wet weather gear, we were pretty wet.

Admitting defeat and donning the full wet weather regalia.

Wildflowers appear to be a valued part of the ecosystem as there are large swathes of them between the agricultural land. 

However, donned that and rode another 10kms into Namsos, the next major town and the rain subsided to nothing, by the time we arrived.  Another gas station was visited, for sausage in a bun and two more coffees.  That's the only thing about using gas stations to shelter, you have to purchase stuff and it's double the price on some items.

About 11am, we started looking at weather forecasts for different places. It's ridiculous to be settling into a campground in the middle of nowhere, if there's any option to ferry somewhere and be cycling.  With that in mind, we picked an outer island, called Vikna and the ferry port of Rorvik.  According to the weather forecast the sun was supposed to be shining out there.

Called in at the supermarket to pick up some lunch before cycling to the ferry terminal, picking we could make up some sandwiches on the ferry.  Here we met a very nice lady in her sixties who gave us information on some of the possibilities of cycling those outer islands.

The weather certainly looks better for the next two and a half days in that area, so it would be nice to experience it.  On board, the tickets cost us 443 nok, or about $38 each for the one and a half hour trip.  These speed ferries always cost, but are smooth and efficient.  On the down side,  it was not a car ferry, just passengers and nowhere we could make our lunch.  So we just settled on a muesli bar each.  The weather on the way changed from light skies, to very dark clouds, so hopefully by the time we arrive, we'll have blue skies??? 

Did I say blue skies...?  Not exactly.  Wind 36 kph.  Grey skies and cold.  Off the ferry and to the campground......which didn't exist.  Apparently Covid put that one out of business.  We did meet an 88 year old German guy, who helped us and took us to the former owner to explain. She spoke no English either, but we got the gist.  He was lovely, on holiday here with his wife in their camper, which he drove from Limburg....dicey I'd say....

There was another campground 11km back the other way which would mean a very pointless ride into a headwind to just stay at a campground and then return to the town to cross the bridge back to the mainland in the morning.

So we decided head back into the township for lunch first and foremost because by now it was 2.30pm.  On the way we came face to face with a startled deer who just stood frozen in a driveway looking at us before darting off into the forest.

The only place that had a bit of shelter from the howling wind was the ferry waiting area, so we made ourselves at home and finally had lunch.  As we were finishing two local ladies came to wait for the bus and we had a nice chat with them, before packing up to find the next campground 22km away.

Apparently these buildings in the primo part of town have been left for the seagulls to nest on.

Crossing that big bridge out of Rorvik was very dicey. They had a wind sock on top of the bridge and it was standing straight out.  It was that strong that we ended up walking the bikes from about halfway as we were worried we might get blown into the traffic.

Noticed some cows trying to get themselves marooned from the advancing tide.

A bit of blue sky at the end of the day.

From then on the road to Kolvereid was great riding and fast, but very busy.  We noticed we had a tailwind but neither of us mentioned it as all cyclists know as soon as you mention a tailwind,  it will magically turn into a head wind for the rest of the day.  Rolled into camp around 5pm and immediately knew it would be trouble.

What I haven't gone on about too much in these blogs are the midges.  Anywhere you have trees and water, there are midges.  And Norway has a lot of trees and water.  These things are intense. So much so that tonight while we were setting up, even Julia was pissed off about them.  They fly into your eyes, ears, nose and hairline and go to town on you.

We took our pre dinner nuts and beer up to a table and chairs well away from the tent area, up to the open space and relative luxury of the campervan area.  Even though it was blowing a gale and cold, rather that than suffer those little bastards.  Soon though, the wind drove us back to the tent,  because this camp has crap kitchen facilities and no lounge area.  But I'd rather stay in the tent than be bitten all night.

The ground here in parts is sodden....not a good sign, but we have found a decent pitch.  Weather at 7.10pm  is windy, cold and overcast. Oh, for those Kristiansand days.  Met a French cyclist we'd seen this morning and then again when we'd come into camp.  Her name was Guillermete and she is cycling for five months.  She has done some smaller trips, but this is her first big outing.  Good luck to her.

Then came two Dutchies, Annameka, a mother of ten year old twins and her friend Doreen.  They are riding a Honda 500 and a KTM 750 up to Nordkapp.  They had met a speedy Austrian cyclist on the ferry, so we knew that was bound to be Alex (from the night before last) and he rolled up shortly afterwards.

Lucky for us they had all done their homework on this campground and knew there was a kitchen as they had seen it on the website.   It was in a cabin which looked like all the other cabins, so not easy to spot, so all the tent dwellers migrated there for the evening away from the midges.

Had a good old chat until 11.45pm, just talking about where we had been and where we were going and discussing all sorts of other things as well.  Another really great evening with a lot of laughs.  We feel so grateful that they all speak English so well, except for poor Guillermete who was struggling to keep up with the speed of the banter.

We have started taking antihistamines every night to lessen the itching effect and it really works.  Bonus is, they induce drowsiness and by god we sleep really well.  We were only woken by the sound of consistent rain throughout the night, but not enough to keep me awake.  Tomorrow we think we may stay here as the forecast is rubbish, but we'll reassess in the morning.