Better late than never (PicdØmp)

by "Rustholes-Are-Weight-Reduction" (rustholes-are-weight-reduction)
Published 02/14/2017 at 03:42

Tags: TRAVELOPNIK ; DENMARK ; SWEDEN ; NORWAY ; PICDUMP
STARS: 8

About a year ago, I wrote about a road trip I was planning with a friend of mine trough Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland. In the end, we were way slower than we thought, and ditched Finland altogether. I promised to post the pictures, but never did. Here you go:

Our first stop on our way north was the port of Hamburg

While we were waiting for the ferry from Hirtshals to Kristiansand, we took some time to go driving on the beach

The roof rack is custom made, the goal was to literally keep it low profile: the height limit for cars is 1,9m on most ferries, it gets a lot more expensive if you go higher. The roof tent can be removed with 4 quick release screws and rests on a support affixed to the trailer hitch. My dad and I put a lot of energy into it, and I think it’s a good concept. The tent can me removed and stored or put back on again in about 10 minutes. It’s not meant to be driven on public roads like that, it’s just for the ferries.

If you want to enter Norway with a pet, it has to get a tapeworm treatment 24 to 72 hours before you enter the country. As we went through customs, we were taught that the entry in the dogs passport wasn’t sufficient anymore, since a lot of vets didn’t fill out the date and hour in the passport, so the owners could put whatever they wanted. There is now an international database, which didn’t have an entry for my dog. This meant she had to be put in quarantine for 24 hours after a new treatment was given to her.
So we lost a day on our already very tight schedule. And Kristiansand didn’t have much to offer besides a huge old canon and some dirt roads we found while roaming around.

McD’s, classy as fuck:

Our first destination was Lysefjord. We drove for a while under the rain until we stopped for the night, on the next morning, some friendly Norwegian guy brought us some coffee while we were folding the tent under freezing rain. He explained us that the road was closed a few kilometers away and that the fjord wasn’t accessible, damn. We drove back for two hours until we could get onto another road and headed north.

Roadside cooking, Norway has some really great amenities.
We used the occasion to let the tent dry.

The little city of Odda, on the way to Hardangerfjord.

Tunnels, a lot of tunnels, bridges, and ferries. sometimes a tunnel ends and a bridge begins, just to get into a tunnel again after the bridge.

Feeling small yet?

Ludicrous speed!

The Briksdal Glacier, sadly, it has seen better days.

She’s definitely more photogenic than I am.

This is where the road to Geirangerfjord was supposed to be. At this point, we decided to slow the pace, and to head back home.

Some old American iron on the way:

We stopped in Oslo

All in all, it was a great trip, even though we did mostly have bad weather, and several problems along the trip. We did learn a lot, and the car had no issue at all on a 5000 km round trip in 10 days, so I consider it a success.

Replies (13)

"Agrajag" (Agrajag)
02/13/2017 at 18:56, STARS: 0

Fantastic photos! Thanks for sharing.

"Monkey B" (monkeyb)
02/13/2017 at 19:15, STARS: 0

beautiful photos...looks like time well spent with doggo.

"Cé hé sin" (michael-m-mouse)
02/14/2017 at 04:50, STARS: 0

I was in Norway a few years ago and your pictures bring back memories of tunnels, bridges, ferries, more tunnels, more ferries and gloomy fjords.

Oh, and stave churches.

Thanks for sharing!

"pip bip - choose Corrour" (hhgttg69)
02/14/2017 at 05:08, STARS: 0

awesome pics!

"KnowsAboutCars" (knowsaboutcars)
02/14/2017 at 05:09, STARS: 0

Looks like you guys had a nice trip. Some good photos too.

"BvdV - The Dutch Engineer" (dutchengineer)
02/14/2017 at 07:45, STARS: 0

Awesome, I really need to go north some day, it looks so nice, despite the weather.

Nice photos by the way!

"Rustholes-Are-Weight-Reduction" (rustholes-are-weight-reduction)
02/15/2017 at 04:11, STARS: 0

You’re welcome!

It really is quite beautiful. I think it would have been even better with a little less rain. I guess we should have gone a month later. But it’s definitely worth a trip.

"Rustholes-Are-Weight-Reduction" (rustholes-are-weight-reduction)
02/15/2017 at 04:15, STARS: 0

Thanks! I picked the better ones, I took way too many pictures, most are terrible.

It is definitely worth a trip, but we didn’t anticipate the really long drives. Most of the time you can’t go over 60-70 km/h

"Rustholes-Are-Weight-Reduction" (rustholes-are-weight-reduction)
02/15/2017 at 04:18, STARS: 0

Thanks! Yes it was great, despite the few difficulties we encountered.

"Rustholes-Are-Weight-Reduction" (rustholes-are-weight-reduction)
02/15/2017 at 04:21, STARS: 0

Thanks! Definitely. I am planning the next trip with her. She doesn’t really mind the long drives, which definitely helps.

"Rustholes-Are-Weight-Reduction" (rustholes-are-weight-reduction)
02/15/2017 at 04:22, STARS: 1

Thanks! You’re welcome.

"Rustholes-Are-Weight-Reduction" (rustholes-are-weight-reduction)
02/15/2017 at 04:22, STARS: 0

Thanks!

"BvdV - The Dutch Engineer" (dutchengineer)
02/15/2017 at 05:22, STARS: 0

Sounds familiar, last time I went on a trip to the Nürburgring I came home with 700+ pictures of which only 80-100 where decent, and only 25-ish were really good.

Ah I see, at least you could camp where you wanted with the roof tent. I can imagine that the low speeds do give you more time to enjoy the scenery, which could be seen as a benefit.