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Just some pictures from the last couple days riding, not a vast ride report thing. Have been through the outer west coast between Bergen and Molde, an area which I've visited and traveled through before, but not properly biking the small and squiggly bits. The annoying vignette in the upper left corner of some pics is my deteriorating leather phone case, sorry didn't notice before. Didn't bring my proper camera as I wanted to prioritize riding and enjoying over stopping and shooting, but the pics add up a bit regardless. The links I've added should be fairly pro, IMO. I've not added too many. This dude was the founder of Reykjavik and according to legend, the first settler of Iceland. Iceland is a fantastic nation, don't you agree Englishmen?  If I retire to a farm some day, this wouldn't be a bad place. Farmland, forest with deer and mushrooms, a calm fjord with a sandy beach, the proper sea a few minutes away, high mountains with skiing and hiking a few minutes in the other direction.  My AirBnB. Nice lawn mowing.  Practical glove drying rack inside. Took an evening trip out to a famous lighthouse. This video is a good introduction: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TN3DTTKX91s  The road there was fantastic. The exposed nature of the area has helped in two ways: A wind farm installation came with upgraded road surface and the barren, wind-swept vegetation means visibility through the corners is great.  I am going through a serious bout of agricultural nostalgia. I cry when I see cows.  The lighthouse and the setting sun behind it. The concrete around it was so clean you could eat from it. The front door is the strengthened steel kind you have on ships, with two levers. Says something about what this place is like on a bad day.  Even on a perfectly quiet June Tuesday the ocean swells cause some stir.  Mind-boggling to ponder the fierce pounding these rocks have taken through the ages.  Something-something deposit geology, slightly hidden from the weather. Sandy beaches, good farming, the cows oh god boohoo the cows bohoo.  Found a rare type of road for Norway. Wide sweeping switchbacks, one lane each way with a yellow line between, good view through them, beautiful landscape. So many Norwegian farms are abandoned or industrialized now and so the landscape doesn't look like it used to. Either grown over or huge monochrome fields. But in this particular area it's quite different. A lot of people are hobby farmers while retired or working shifts at sea, so they don't bother replacing the old tractor or turning to more modern ways of corralling cattle or drying hay. So the fields, the animals, the houses and the gardens all look so old school, personal, quaint and beautiful. Who knew you could fog up a helmet on a sunny day with emotion alone? Had to catch a ferry so didn't go up and down again, a reason to visit again.  Pertinent information aboard the ferry, not really relevant to bikes. Just pass whenever you want.  Monument to a viking battle which took place in the 900s, involved every IT guy's favourite king, Harold Bluetooth.  A better pic, stolen from the web. The English wiki article is very short and not very informative, but the Norwegian version google translates pretty well, it's a pretty entertaining story if you like that sort of stuff.  Out to sea.  And out to the island of Runde, famous for its bird life and an 18th century shipwreck.  Loads of the free space on the beach! Just throw your towel anywhere! Water beats stone if you give it enough time and force. A slightly prejudiced PS. This area is known as Sunnmøre and people from Sunnmøre, like Scots, are known to be frugal, penny pinching, you know what I mean. So I giggled a bit at the Runde museum which cost $10 to enter but contained two sparse rooms of display. To be fair, I didn't wait around for the movie.  Risso's dolphin skeleton, known as "scar dolphin" in Norwegian. GIS it if you want to go "aha, so that's why".  The gannet is a badass bird. I consider this area harsh and unforgiving, it considers it a rich, comfy buffet. Look at that dive! It's a fierce MF though, don't come near it when it is nesting. They say it doesn't hesitate to start pecking at the softest bits of shipwreck survivors either.  A model of the boat that sank. It was on its way from Holland to Batavia, present day Jakarta. But since the English channel contained loads of pirates, and the ship was loaded with cash, it detoured north around Shetland, but a storm hit and it was carried across the North Sea and smashed into Runde. Everyone died, the treasure was scattered everywhere. Legend has it some locals found some coins, but it wasn't until the 1970s when three divers came upon the main loot, worth millions and millions.  Just like today, Dutch people were all about eating and smoking.  A haul of ducats. You have now seen $5 worth of the museum. Lots of bikers visit the Atlantic road further north, which is a well marketed tourist area, even featured in many bike and car ads. Google Street View link While I wouldn't discourage anyone from going past it on the way somewhere else, I don't think it's worth it as a destination alone. Runde and the area around has much more character and at least as impressive bridges. This Google Street View link drops you on a breakwater with a road on top leading to a narrow, steep concrete bridge of which there are many. Such an amazing place.  The bumpy concrete bridges gave me some issues with structural integrity.  Thankfully it happened next to a friendly local who had some baling wire in his basement. You're looking at an IRL authentic baling wire fix. Probably better than the mysteriously vanished bolt. It's still on the bike, debating leaving it as it is.  Went on a ride today with my dad (Harley) and his friend (900 Diversion), one of the destinations was this dairy farm.  Which sells award winning artisanal cheese!  Produced by *sniff* lovely cows. These are the young calves who just yesterday had their first free romp outside the barn. *collapses, sobs uncontrollably*  The second waypoint of the ~200 km trip was a wine shop which had one bottle left of this Hungarian elixir, perfect with blue cheese.  Pretty good summer holiday so far! Ola fucked around with this message at 11:28 on Jul 1, 2016 |
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Jun 30, 2016 23:15
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| # ? Apr 18, 2024 09:56 |
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Oh my god, an Ola photo post. That takes me back! But I feel something's missing... did you happen to take a picture of your boots? e: V. nice cows and gannet of course.
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Jun 30, 2016 23:41
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Phy posted:did you happen to take a picture of your boots? Summer holiday not over, let's see if one might happen...
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Jun 30, 2016 23:53
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Owns.
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Jul 1, 2016 00:55
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Your photos of European riding have given me a dream honeymoon destination. Too bad I won't win that fight. Your country is beautiful. It has actual green in it.
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Jul 1, 2016 02:43
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Well done.
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Jul 1, 2016 22:46
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Your trip posts always make me want to ride through Norway, drat it's so beautiful there.
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Jul 3, 2016 14:20
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Thanks guys, more to come. Did 250 km today in a scenic quest for the best strawberries. Wednesday is 600 km south to meet gf and in-laws.
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Jul 4, 2016 00:46
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Looking good! I just took a trip on the exact opposite side of the scandinavian peninusula but I didn't cry when I saw cows and did not take any interesting pictures either. Thanks for the destination tips though, I've been planning a norway trip for years but it always gets postponed for some reason.
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Jul 6, 2016 13:13
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Thanks guys! Came home on Monday, trip ended with some rainy days annoyingly. Here are some pics from my stay near Molde.  It's a bumper crop for redcurrant this year.  Went to Trollstigen, which is always a treat. The new tourist installations are excellent, you should put that on your destination list makka-setan! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trollstigen    A bit further south, in the valley called Valldalen, there is another tourist installation:   A famous hotel called Juvet is nearby. Ex Machina was filmed there. http://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2015/04/ex-machina-location  Valldal is famous for its strawberries, so make sure you visit in season!  Easily the best berries of the season. You can tell it's picked properly ripe when the stalk twists off easily.  Rear tire was a bit overdue, my dad treated me to a new one. Got 22 771 km out of it! More than half way around the Earth.  Doing string alignment since my chain marks are so poor.  Meeting some locals.  COWIE WOWIE WOO  So I guess I'm saying I want to be a farmer.
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Jul 16, 2016 00:31
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A good post, a good onesie.
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Jul 16, 2016 00:43
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 I want to see those valleys
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Jul 16, 2016 20:16
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Last batch! The ride from Molde to Kongsberg was about 650 km, slugged it out without stopping much. Only when passing some nice farms.   Finally got to see a reindeer flock:  They were crossing the road, maybe 20 animals had got over, but the quickly gathering crowd made them change their mind.  This was on Valdresflya, a mountain crossing in mid Norway well worth visiting if your into mountain hiking. Kongsberg, where my girlfriend grew up and her parents live, was founded due to silver find in the 1600s. (Kongsberg means the King's mountain.) So we had to visit the mine. It was cool, literally and figuratively. 6 degrees C, 2 point something km into the moutain, 300 meters of rock above us. Got to borrow a good camera as well.   This blew my mind. This shaft is 700 m deep, mostly filled with water. A man made hole, mostly dug in a preindustrial society that now is deeper water than most of Norway's coastal waters, bar the odd fjord.  Cool light installation showing the map of the mine with the Eiffel tower in there for scale. We are at the intersection between the long green horizontal line and the orange structure. You will not be surprised to learn that we visited the museum for farming and folk culture as well.  Where they OF COURSE have wittle bunny wabbits.  And this small, adorable breed known as a Telemark cow.   1700s building style. One of these (moved here from their original site) housed a family whose American descendant had visited the museum just a few days ago. An old school building had this AMAZING poster from the mid 30s.  Check this out in full size, the globe as all sorts of historical events happening across it. Brilliant! I'd love to have this on my wall. A bit unfair on the Germans perhaps, but hey this was the 30s. Too much later history to fit the map. The final trip home was loving miserable.  My waterproofed gear was no longer proof to water and I hated life and motorcycling. I daydreamed about touring comfortably in the Tesla Model S 90D we test drove in Molde.  A shrimp sandwich in this classic hotel didn't help much.  A view from the dinner table of the hotel I slept at. It's know as the "Energy Hotel", built next to a hydroelectric plant with a very distinct architectural style from the 60s. Very popular with architecture tourists. Someone else has taken more pictures than me: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVHM5_D9u7Y The UFO at 0:45 is the power plant control room. On the final day, the weather was just good enough that I completed a planned detour, but not so good that it didn't turn worse than the day before and I got home properly soaked.  A single pic from the top of Sauda - Røldal road. The water level is lower due to some work. The road begins with a great valley I'd really like to hike some day, they've built a tourist installation there called Almannajuvet which looks great. Someone has helpfully put a complete video of the road on youtube in 16x. I had to put the speed down to 0.5 to calm down the motion sickness. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xwkMFCjAAk And that was that. It ended on a sour note due to the weather. It's so annoying to have paid good money for good gear, only to have it deteriorate. Actually the gloves are very new, cost $100 on sale and were poo poo in the rain from day 1. Oh and the bike is back to using shitloads of oil. Oh and the zipper on the leather jacket decided to gently caress itself and the jacket blew open the other day. So yeah, me and motorcycling are going through a rough patch at the moment.
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Jul 19, 2016 22:24
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Nice trip! Too bad about the weather but that's to be expected in Norway I guess. I've started using both rain gear and goretex underneath that if the trip is longer than just to and from work.
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Jul 21, 2016 15:14
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Thanks! In Norway we love to say: "In Norway we love to say: there's no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothes", The annoying thing is that my expensive gear was totally waterproof a few years ago, while their marketing claimed superior technology, but now they are not. It's sad, both the money out the window and the false state of technology. And no, it wasn't a typo, we love to talk about what we say.
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Jul 21, 2016 23:43
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Ola posted:"In Norway we love to say: there's no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothes" Ah, again our countrys are very alike, my western brother with a funny accent. The saying should be a part of international motorcycling doctrine too, save for the Norway part maybe. Too many a young rider stay indoors cowering at the first sign of a rain cloud. Riding through puddles is the adult version of kids jumping in puddles. Embrace the splash.
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Jul 22, 2016 07:27
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A small but nice PS. A friend invited me to his family's summer house in the south of Norway. The weather looked good so I said yes (even bullied my way to arriving a day early to avoid rain).  Beautiful place right on the sea, which you may only get a small understanding of from this pic. Also learned that my bike can carry enough shopping for four grown men drinking and BBQing + breakfast. Very nice to retire to a roaring fire (burning up an old roof which got replaced recently) in the boat house when the sun goes down. Also found out where my oil was going, was easy to notice when one leg was shinier than the other. I knew the threads to some head cover bolts were bad, just didn't know quite how bad. One had backed very far out and oil was escaping. Snugged it up so it didn't leak during the trip, but a permanent fix will mean machining and Time-Serting. Which is annoying because the cover bolts screw into the tops of the cam journals... Oh well, the trip home had great weather and since I had good time and went over some old mountain passes I had missed before. They are all tunneled under now, so it's a very quick and easy detour if you ever go along the E-134. Just pull over before the tunnel.  The old old Haukeli road seems to be blocked...  The old new road visible underneath. You can see a concrete tube and a mushroom, champagne cork looking thing next to it. That's the tunnel of the new new road.  Røldal road, skiing resort in winter, bike/sheep resort in summer.  Awesome looking switchbacks on the other side. So I got to end the summer touring season on a very positive note! Bike ran great all the way home. Now for a change of life situation - in less than a month I start anew in university! Having been a CJ for the better part of a decade, it's time to get some proper skills. It means a big cut in income of course, so no Tracers or Teslas in my near future. So even if I do need to fix even more, the old GSX proved itself just in time. As a registered veteran vehicle (30+ years) I now get very cheap insurance and road tax, but with a mileage limit (5000 km pr year). A good student bike!
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Jul 25, 2016 22:32
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"Summer house in Norway" is going to be the name of my all accordion Beck cover band.
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Jul 25, 2016 23:15
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A lot of your pictures would make fantastic desktop backgrounds, but especially this one of your bike pulled over before the tunnel. That is breathtaking.
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Aug 16, 2016 03:21
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Cinematic. Idyllic. Bucolic. Epic. Nordic. This absence of graffiti, garbage, one stop vape/hoverboard/payday loan shops, porch sofas, vehicle husks, and anger...it's a little disorienting, like vertigo. Excellent as always. Oh, nice Vei Kong.
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Aug 25, 2016 13:57
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| # ? Apr 18, 2024 09:56 |
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Thanks Marv!  Without going beyond my already Goebblish tourist marketing, you do have a good point on anger. The US probably has more surface area of visit-worthy landscape, but Norway has an astonishingly low rate of road rage videos on youtube per capita, particularly when you adjust for technology access.
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Aug 25, 2016 15:34
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