Bodø, at night and at day

The ferry from Lofoten arrived at Bodø pier after midnight with some delay so I got to explore Bodø when almost nobody was on the streets. Calm and quiet it seemed. The camp site near the airfield however has ceased operations so I rode past it to the sea and pitched the tent on some rocks that protrude into the sea near a museum. I had an undisturbed night there and a public restroom only 500 meters away, so comfort wise it was just below an actual camp site.

Before eight in the morning I had vanished from there and rolled into town to get a replacement shirt. The sports shop I had scouted the day before only opened at 10:00 h so I went grocery shopping first and had a second breakfast in next to a helicopter at the Norwegian airflight museum. It was worth waiting though as the shop did have a selection of merino stuff and the clerk even procured a shirt not only in the right size but also in a much more pleasant shade of blue than the old one.

Mainland Norway

After two days of rolling in "easy mode" through mostly flat Lofoten riding the mainland coast means that climbing is again regular part of the day. Which also got me what I was missing these last few days, stunning panoramas of the countryside viewed from above. These fjord vistas only get better the higher up you are.

What also seems to have changed is the crowd on the road. So far it has been predominantly bike travelers from Germany heading towards the Nordkapp who I met on the road, with a few Swedes, Italians and Frenchpeople mixed in. Today however I only bumped into southbound Norwegians. Besides sharing the wind I also got some pressing questions answered regarding topics like Norwegian phonetics and price differences at supermarket chains (gist: Rema 1000 probably the cheapest, Spar with the most potential for savings).

Riding time got cut short a bit today by waiting for shops to open and ferries to embark but in the end I still totaled 142 km on the bike with more than 1600 m of elevation gain, the hills making a difference.

Weather wise it got decidedly drier today and sunnier too, but still not sunny enough to leave the gilet in the bag. In related news I now have painful sunburn at the most unlikely piece of my skin, the backs of both hands.

Amøya, Isle of Winds

The delays killed the plans I had for today and since I was yearning for a shower already I decided to try the camp site closest to the Vassdalsvik ferry terminal, the one in Åmnes on the island of Amøya. Amøya is located off the coast, reachable via a battered road that passes over a bridge and a number of causeways.

The campsite lies to the north of the island, ensuring an optimal view on the midnight sun for the last time before crossing the arctic circle again. The campsite is a bit basic though. The showers require coins to operate which took me by complete surprise as up to this point I hadn't seen anyone handling cash in this country. The showers being like 95 % of the reason why I came to the campsite, I bought four 10 NOK coins at a whopping rate of 1.25 : 10 from the proprietor so I could actually use them. FFS, just raise the camping fee a bit and stop the silly coin business!

Reaching that far into the Atlantic the campsite is exposed to strong winds. As in intensely strong, so much that for the second time since I own that tent I had trouble pitching it -- the first time having been the actual first use the tent ever saw in action up in Stromness three years ago. Before I managed to peg it to the ground the tent was hard to hold onto and I'm fairly certain one of the poles made a worrisome cracking noise at some point when I tried to handle it. Let's hope the pole will last for the night, I'm not keen on returning to that shop in Bodø to purchase a new tent.

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