June 30, 2023
Down Day in Kristiansand
Stumbling into Scandinavia's biggest Frat Party
I woke up at my Airbnb in Kristiansand around 8:00 glad to be dry. My ferry was leaving Kristiansand at 5:00pm, but I had to be at the ferry terminal by 3:30. I looked more into the Palmesus festival. Some big names were playing: Deadmau5, Black Eyed Peas, Martin Garrix. The website said 60k people were here for the event. I decided to make my way downtown and see what was up.
Sure enough, it was as if the entire city was a giant frat party. This put Cal Poly's St. Fratties Day to shame. It was similar to St. Fratties Day, but with about 30 times more people. At 11:00am, crowds of people were drunkenly stumbling around, people urinating in public, people vomiting their guts out onto the sidewalks. I walked with the crowds of concert goers, dodging puddles of vomit as I neared the festival grounds. I was hungry so I stopped at a bakery and got a Norwegian croissant sandwich. I sat next to a young woman who was working at the festival as part of the film crew. We chatted for a bit, then she headed out. It also seemed like many apartment rooms around the city had music blasting from their windows, and young people hanging out on their balconies. Everyone going to the concert was dressed as if they were going to a Frat formal, so they were easy to tell apart.
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The concert tickets were completely sold out, so I found a grassy hill in a park overlooking the concert stage. I sat there for a while and watched the performances. No big names played while I was watching, some Norwegian language performers.
I then made my way towards the ferry terminal, stopping at the fish market on my way out. There I bought some cooked shrimp in the shell, and ate them for lunch. At this market, I met another bike tourer from the UK, who was solo-travelling similar to me.
He had ridden a big loop through france, Denmark, and Sweden, only to return by Norway and the ferry. By now, it was about time to board the ferry. I was instructed to follow the road as if I were a car, and board with the cars and motorcycles.
Here in the auto-line, I met several other solo travellers on bikes. The same guy from the UK, and also a young man from Germany. We chatted as we boarded the boat, then hung out on the top deck drinking a beer as the boat sped out of Kristiansand Port.
This ferry was more like a cruise ship than a ferry. It had an all you can eat dining hall, a casino, arcade, and a live entertainment venue. I had booked the buffet with my ticket, and it was delicious. I filled up on Salmon and beef Goulash.
The one problem was that the internet was down for the entire ship. There was wifi, but no internet service through it. A worker told me they had just switched to Starlink and were having issues. I headed to bed as the ship rocked back and forth in the 2m high waves. There was a storm approaching, and whitecaps on the North Sea.
Today's ride: 10 miles (16 km)
Total: 438 miles (705 km)
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