23rd and 24th August 2023

Wednesday was our move camp day.

However, today it was from our last camp to the hotel, which we've secured for six nights for a great deal.
It works out to approx. $150 per night and that is for a suite.
It's a great sized room ( see attached pics ) on the second floor of the Enter City Hotel, in the centre of Tromso.

It doesn't have a view, except onto the street, but is on the spot for everything, including the bus to the airport on Tuesday.  It is cosy but so much more spacious than a tent.

Anyway, woke to what we have come to expect in Tromso since we've been here, a dull, overcast, expect rain at anytime kinda day.

We spent the morning, after we'd eaten, organizing our gear, writing and generally on our phones doing stuff.

The weather was 10 C and not a beach day.

Packed up and rode away, having left Vango, our trusty tent, on the table in the cabin, with a hand written note.

It explained that he was free to a good home.

Then we were gone. Down to the service station for a burger and fries.

I can't believe I'm so good to Julia.

Boy, she got lucky when she married me!!!

Moving on. After an hour, with no change in the weather, we rode over to the hotel.

It was 1pm when we checked in to be met by Eva, (pronounced Ever) who had seen us previously and Carolina, (pronounced Caroleena) who was in training.

Took our bikes downstairs to a secure room and unloaded them before settling in.

The afternoon was spent mainly pottering around the hotel and city centre and buying food.

Did watch some of the World Championship Athletics for a while.

Nothing else to watch except some older English speaking programs, which did nothing for us.

On Thursday we woke to an overcast 10 C day, yet again.

Hotel is fine, but you can hear traffic noise.

Fine if the window is shut, but if you open it, not so good.

You may wonder why you'd want the window open on a 10 C day, but I have bedroom window open all year at home.

Up and into some stretching and exercise, which has not been the norm on the trip, as we have so many things to do as well as riding.

Stretching has been more of a semi regular pastime and included over a lunch break or at a campground.

After showers we ate breakfast and once again filled in the time before heading out around 11am.

Today, we were going to look at the big shopping centre out by the airport.

This gave us two choices.

Cycle, with a chance of rain, or catch the bus.

Around the corner, we caught the number 42 bus which would take us out there.

What we didn't expect was to pass through the 2675 metre Tromsosund tunnel, with a gradient of 7.8 and reaching 287 metres below sea level.

It has roundabouts and multiple roads entries and we were totally surprised by it.

Opened in 2011 at a cost of 250 kr million, it is open to cyclists.

We were particularly pleased that we hadn't cycled it ( although, we would have used an alternative route, above ground, as it was long and dark, even with lighting and took at least ten minutes on the bus to complete.

The fumes were terrible in there and we've also noticed that walking/cycling over the bridge here, it's difficult to get any fresh air.

The low cloud cover wouldn't help, but we are very grateful for where we live.

Out to the airport to check on our flights, boxes etc.

Total waste of time.

The only person there that offered any form of conversation was a blunt female baggage person who told us that if the boxes weren't the right size, we would have to cut them down.

No information booth there for anything.

We have a thirty five minute connection changeover at Oslo, for the trip to Stockholm, which means passing through security and customs again.

Don't know how we're going to achieve that, especially if the plane is delayed at all.

Walked from there about two kms to their big 130 store shopping mall. We spent a few hours there wandering around shops, which for the most part seemed to cater to the younger age group.

A lot of low quality mass produced stuff on display, the same as anywhere in the world, but the better standard stores, didn't offer anything different.

After lunch at one of the many cafes inside the complex, we decided to go and pick up the bike boxes, a day early.

It was just around the corner.

Our quoted price had been 200 nok or $32.

Our pick up price was 400 nok or $64.

They've got you over a barrel.

None of the other outlets had boxes.

Even though we rang them before we left NP and have been in contact three times since we got here, they can charge what they like because they know you have no other option if you want to ship your bikes.

It's the only time we've ever paid for boxes.

Once we had them, we had to transport them on the bus, which was a hassle.

Got the wrong bus, which did get us back, but took forever and charged us more.

By late afternoon, the boxes were safely stored in the apartment.

Also by that time, the cloud had lifted and we decided that it would be the best time to cross the bridge, on foot and climb the mountain which gives a great view of the city.

The gondola also goes up there, but we wanted the exercise.

On the way over, down by the harbour, an outdoor music festival had started for the weekend, so we strolled past.

Sounded great, really upbeat and the good thing was that we could hear it from over the water, up the mountain, all night.

1203 big stone steps later ( and that was after the pathway leading to it from the base, which was 1.3 kms,and the 4kms we walked from the hotel, we poked our head over the top.

Let me tell you, the sweat was running even though the temperature up there was colder than the 10 C at the bottom.

We'd packed warm gear in our small backpack, which was gratefully donned.

Here comes the mist.

Can you imagine what happened as we reached the top.

Oh yes... 1.3kms and 1203 bloody steps later....and the freaking mist begins to creep closer.

We got some shots as the sun was going down, at which point, it was getting very cold, but we wanted the street lights on for really good effect.

By 10.00pm, lights weren't on.

We didn't want to come all this way for nothing, so we stayed for another half hour by which time the mist was really in.

Finally as we get to the bottom of the cable car ride, the lights of the city become more visible with the increasing darkness.

By 10.30pm, it hadn't improved, so we took what we had and came down on the gondola, as the steps would have been dangerous in the dim light and mist.

As it was, we got some shots as we walked back to the hotel in the central city.

Back at the apartment, we got stuck into some bacon and avocado buns with a cup of tea, before falling into bed, too tired to even shower off the sweat from the climb.