During my final years in the police I must admit that shift work, particularly nightshift, was starting to take its toll. That was at 50 years of age, so now, approaching 66, it shouldn’t come as any surprise that my midnight sun shift arrangement has taken some coping with.
But finally I feel recovered from my night owl exploits and rather feeble fell walk, and feeling refreshed I reassess my situation.
Continue reading “Seeing the light”It doesn’t get better than when you expect something to be good and it exceeds those expectations. This trip has done that in spades, and although I leave the Lofoten Islands reluctantly, I also know that more stunning scenery awaits, even if the weather will be more typically Norwegian!
Continue reading “Just what I’m looking for”Time’s cracking on and I’m up early in the morning so just a quick update.
The many tunnels south of the Arctic Circle visitor centre at least gave us some respite from the persistent rain being being thrown upon us. Yes ‘us’, because now I have acquired a riding buddy, or to be more precise he acquired me.
Continue reading “Just a quick one”Any of my blog followers of any repute will recall Seville Gav, who I met on my first bike trip abroad, he recently told me to “Go to Hell”, not a phrase you would immediately associate with somebody with whom ( still can’t fathom out who and whom!) you considered to have a friendly relationship with. However, being ‘easily led’, Jacob and I rode the road to Hell, and what a nightmare it was! Arriving in Trondheim we both agreed that this has been our worst day’s ride of both our trips! Not just the rain, the cold, the ridiculously low speed limits, the traffic, but apart from one rather impressive waterfall, no decent scenery at all of any note. And despite all the warning signs for moose, not even a snifter of one, even Sven was tucked away in the pannier!
Sorry to say Gav, we never actually went to Hell, there were roadworks and the only Hell we endured, other than the ride, was the tunnel of Hell.
The plan was for me to spend today with Richard and Claire, how bizarre you may think? But they are on a cruise and were due to arrive at Alesund this morning. I’d booked last night and tonight there so we could be together, that was until I received a message from Richard yesterday morning.
Continue reading “When the boat comes in……or not!”
What a brilliant day, if riding in rain and cold could ever be brilliant? We spent a lot of time in tunnels, about 25 in total, ranging from short stuff to generally three, four, five or six milers. The world’s longest road tunnel (Lærdal) at 15.23 miles is mainly as you would expect, fairly boring, however it is broken up with brightly lit areas every four miles or so. Rache and I had driven it in 2015, but understandably Jacob had to do it!
Continue reading “Water Falls”Another hard one at the office!
We didn’t arrive at our hotel until 7.10pm whereupon we were told that “If you want to eat in the restaurant tonight then I’ll book your table for 7.30”. Well we certainly needed to eat and as there is nowhere else then it was a quick dash to make it on time. Of course Jacob with his fully loaded BMW GS has sufficient time to unpack and have a shower before 7.30, me on the other hand spends all the time pfaffing on with luggage and straps. On the plus side he got the beers in which were well deserved after a very full day in the saddles.
I haven’t time to gather all the media together from our epic day’s ride, but just to keep you wolves from the door here are a few hastily cobbled together photos.
After yesterday’s hard but enjoyable ride, we had time to kill today before our 4.30pm ferry back to Denmark. I suggested to Jacob that as we had both (separately) been to Norway’s most northerly point, maybe we should visit its most southerly? A fairly minor diversion taking us just over two hours, followed by a 90 minute ride to the ferry port.
Continue reading “Coincidence”Timing, chance meetings.
When Andy and were partners on the police traffic department we would set off on nights and joke that our lives could change if we decided to turn right instead of left.
Who knows what lay ahead for us then, and who knows what lies ahead for us now?
Continue reading “Sliding Doors”