The Update #20 – The Road South

Today was the day of nearly getting on a whale watching tour. As “instagram influencers”, we managed to get a free (normally 260 euros) spot on the boat. But of course that meant that we could only get on the boat if there was still room left. Soon in the morning the boat turned out to be fully booked, which was not really a surprise because they have not been able to sail for the past 4 days due to the bad weather. We were still on the waiting list if people didn’t show up, but just before the boat left we were told that there really would be no room for us. We had already taken this into account, but of course we were also looking forward to this trip. In the first place, of course, because we could see whales, but secretly part of the fun was that we thought it was really cool that we could possibly join for free. Unfortunately it wasn’t meant to be. We thought the trip itself was a bit too expensive for us at the moment and we wanted to keep the money in our pocket for other adventures. We have both seen whales before and we are going to visit many more places where you can see them too. And we don’t have unlimited amounts of money, so we have to make choices. Anyway, because the whales didn’t go through, we drove on to the island of Senja. So there was still a boat trip on the program and that boat trip was an adventure in itself. There were quite a few waves, we both felt quite seasick and especially I had to keep looking out the window so as not to get too green in the face. After 2 hours we were happy that we reached the other side, here we found a camper place with a lot of luxury an hour’s drive away. There was very good wifi and we were able to provide the car with power again. But above all, we could do laundry here for “free” and have a lovely shower. So we made the best use out of this luxury.

We really made the most of the facilities of the campsite in the morning. After washing all our clothes yesterday, we immediately put our bed sheets in the laundry in the morning. So that we have a wonderfully clean bed again and especially without sand in it. Just a little later than we supposed to, we checked out at the camper place around 12.15 pm and headed for the walk we wanted to do on Senja. Along the way we made a lunch stop with a nice view after which we continued on our way to the start of the hike. The hike we were going to do was to the Hesten top where you have a view of the Segla mountain. This would only be a relatively short hike but again with 500 meters of incline. Especially I wasn’t to happy about the incline, but we really wanted to see this view. Especially because we already got a taste of the fantastically beautiful views here on Senja. The whole way that we have driven so far on Senja was really beautiful! We hardly expected that we could encounter even more beautiful things here in Norway after all the beautiful things we have already seen, but we were really surprised. Fortunately, the walk went very well. We had to go up a lot, but we were already at the top within 45 minutes and the view was more than worth it. Unfortunately it got a bit cloudy during the day and it also started to rain a bit, however we could still see Segla really well. After some time at the lookout point we also got some nice views of the other mountain ranges. In this short moment it was also dry and we quickly flew the drone and took photos and videos. It was really very impressive. The cliffs to the fjord were super steep and where there would be fences in many places in other countries, this is not the case here in Norway. What a great view we had, mind-blowing. Pretty soon it got cloudy again and we got cold so we went back to bob and on our way to Tromsø. Tromsø turned out to be just a bit too far away so we slept in a parking lot on the way there and made fresh pasta and last week’s update.

The next morning we drove the last part towards Tromsø, this was still 2 hours and we arrived around 12 o’clock. After having parked the car in a free parking lot, we walked to the town. For this we had to walk another 3 km, which of course we had to climb up again. But luckily we are used to that by now, or you would expect that. The road was paved, which made a big difference. The center of Tromsø is not really special and we walked around and looked in various shops. We found a cheap Indian restaurant where we had lunch. And found a very nice clothing store that only sold their own designed clothing. Their symbol was the white reindeer because these are rare and often stray from the herd going their own way. That is their motto, be wild and don’t follow the herd. Here Jap found very nice clothes and we had a really nice conversation with the owner. So nice that Jap even got a pair of free socks and he wanted our picture for his “Hall of Fame”. I bought a set to knit typical Norwegian socks. We ended the day with a tasty Vietnamese snack.

The next day we started the trip from Tromsø to the North Cape. We doubted whether it was worth the effort to drive all this way north just to have been there. Because to be honest, there isn’t really much to do along the way. But we have more than enough time, so why not. And the idea of starting our cross Europe road trip at the North Cape also seemed very nice to us. And we are very glad that we did it anyway, because on the way we still saw a lot of beautiful things. But it was still a long drive, so we would split it up into pieces. The first stop we picked was a 4 hour drive. Along the way we mainly listened to podcasts and made a stop every now and then, especially to have a tasty snack. A lot of people wrote about the place where we wanted to spend the night that they had seen all kinds of aquatic life there. They had seen dolphins, otters, whales and even killer whales. We found a nice spot with a great view over the water where we could park the car. And we immediately went on the hunt for wildlife, binoculars and zoom lens at the ready. But apart from the many flies and mosquitoes we didn’t see much moving in the water except for some ducks. So we fled inside and often looked out through our windows. Besides the fantastic sunset, we soon heard dolphins swimming. We were able to take beautiful pictures and often ran outside because another group came swimming by. We had a lot of fun, but we didn’t see any wild life but this was already great.

The following day we had a perfect start, the weather was super nice and it was even quite warm. We therefore quickly decided that we would not continue driving but that we would continue to enjoy this weather. It would stay like this all day and hopefully we could spot some wild life. So we put the chairs and table outside and grabbed our books. It really was such a beautiful place where we were. Great views and really really quiet despite being right on the side of a road. We said to each other several times how badly we missed this wonderful sun. Jap even sat outside in a T-shirt! And with the binoculars at the ready, we have been sitting almost all day. We also did some exercise and in the evening we worked on the video of Sweden. We also heard through Instagram that people had seen the Northern Lights last night. And because the weather was so nice, we wanted to try that too. So we stayed up for a long time and looked outside very often, but unfortunately. We got up around 02:00 in the hope of seeing the green light. But it was already getting too light and the moon was almost full. After 40 minutes of being outside in the cold, we went back to bed without success…unfortunately. We are still just above the Arctic Circle so maybe we can see it another day….

The next day the weather was still beautiful but we decided to drive again. And the day started really well. I knew for sure! We were supposed to see reindeer today. Well I was absolutely right, we had only just started when we saw a whole group on the road. And this time there was also a safe place to stop and get off. We really had plenty of time to view and photograph them. And after a while a lot of people came running out of the forest. It was really fantastic!! So so so fun and beautiful. Because we still wanted to do something else today, we drove on after a while. But we would rather have stood there all day. For the rest, we went shopping, bought a nice loaf of bread at the bakery for lunch and, above all, drove a lot of miles and listened to the podcast. An hour from the North Cape we found a nice camper place and here we relaxed. We were a bit disappointed because there was a 95% chance of seeing the northern lights here. But it didn’t have to be cloudy for that. Well let’s just say that there are 100% clouds…. Well great…

The next day it was time to drive to the North Cape. It was still an hour to the north cape from where we had slept. Along the way the landscape became more and more moon-like and we sometimes had the idea that this is what Scotland, Wales or the Faroe Islands should look like. The North Cape is actually not much, what everyone comes for is to take a picture with the globe that is here. When we got here it was the weather was pretty good, except that it was very cold because of the wind. But in addition, a number of busloads of Germans had just been dumped. Everyone who wanted to be in the picture. So it took a while before we could take a quieter picture. We walked around here for a while but were quickly bored. After we had some lunch we started our trip to Spain. This was the symbolic start of our journey south. After 4 months of almost exclusively driving further north, we would now only go south until we reach the Canary Islands. For this we will cover many kilometers in the near future. And we immediately started well with a journey of 4 hours to Karasjok, the place where the Sami Parliament of Norway is located. We arrived here in the early evening. We walked here for a while and went looking for the Northern Lights, which we unfortunately did not find again…

That’s it for this week.

Much love from us.

Jap and Lon.

Menu of the week

Spendings of the Week

Budget per day €54 and per week €378 and per month €1700

Route

Driven kilometers: 1240