It was an early start to the day with 400 kms to travel and Kev doing all the driving. We'd honestly forgotten how beautiful the drive up was with stunning lakeside and valley views. What kept our main interest though was our collective efforts (H when not driving obviously) to challenge "stick man golf" on our tablets - courses that included such wonderful names such as " Magnetic Land", "Icy Land" & " Stickier Land" - you can see what travelling for long periods does to your brain !
After 9 hours, endless tunnels and endless breaks to deal with H's endless appetite, we rolled back into Bergen during peak hour finding our way eventually to our new Air BNB host Rosie a Geologist from Bristol now working and living in Norway
With good company we spent a fair bit of time discussing Norway, Climate Change, Immigration and why the Bulldogs will win the flag (H snuck that one in) before deciding that we should hit the sack and take advantage of the 2 & 1/2 hours remaining before we had to get up again !
As good a host as Rosie was the accommodation provided was borderline crap - a single bed + another pull out bed that blocked the entire small room meaning a) the door could not be closed b) all of our gear had to be put in the kitchen & c) there was a very real danger that I could cop a size 10 foot on my head should H decide to pay the bathroom a visit during the night !
I need not have worried as what seemed like 30 minutes later we were getting up at 2.15a.m to pack and drive to Bergen Airport taking some of Rosie's kindly cooked Norwegian Waffles which at that time of the morning tasted like they had the same consistency as Norwegian cement !
Starting the car in our Zombie like states we realised that neither of us knew the name of Bergen's Airport to programme into our GPs !
With visions of having to hire and follow a taxi we resorted to our back up Nexus Tablet which at least gave us some idea of general direction until we picked up the airport signs.
With loaded trolleys we finally walked in to the terminal almost totally devoid of life other than a dozen or so sleeping backpacker like travellers. Waiting around for a good 45 minutes before staff opened up we finally checked in and took a quick rest before our 6.00a.m. flight back to Oslo.
What had taken us 8 days to cycle took us only 40 mins to fly which was a damned relief given our sauna like 737-700 !
After a 2 your wait in Oslo we were on our way to Reykjavik Iceland passing the Faroe Islands. After what seemed like a short "dribbling" period we arrived to this "other world" place that for me at least has held a life long fascination !
With no passport checks, loaded with thousands of Iceland Kroner and a 4wd Skoda that could have fitted another 4 people plus our bike boxes if they weren't currently winding their way back from Copenhagen (yes you read correctly that's where our bikes ended up !) we headed off to Laugarvatyn on Icelands famed Golden Circle route first of all stopping to shop for supplies for our 2 night apartment stay.
As far as first impressions go driving to Laugarvatyn was like going back in time with a featureless and largely flat volcanic landscape evident.
With H almost doing a sleeping "Chevy Chase" impersonation we finally arrived at our apartments around 3.00p.m. just south of being totally buggered !
With our own apartment each we crashed meeting later on for dinner where once again we were confronted by bloody induction hotplates that for reasons unknown to us keep turning on & off despite having the appropriate saucepans in place !
Throwing H out at 8.00p m. I reckon i was asleep before hitting the bed barely having a chance to consider the trill of being in Iceland !
Hey Mike I see you have picked up an Irish lilt.. the "trill" of being in Iceland..LOL!
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