Day 36: Talvik to Solvang

August 6, 2024

Second Half Rest Day

“That’s a nice bridge,” Rachel says looking across the bay at a bridge that looks to flat. “A bridge you don’t hate,” Patrick says, then continues “that goes to the tunnel cyclists are not allowed to ride through. We have to go around.” And Patrick explains this is the fjord where the battleship Tirpitz was holed up for a while.

We fix oatmeal and coffee for breakfast and head out. We are too early for the shop in Talvik to be open, but we stop at the gas station to use the WC. Today is a pleasant ride, the sun is shining, low seventies and the climbs are not too steep. There are three long tunnels, the first one we have to go around, then the longest at 2.5km that we are allowed to go through, and one more of 1.2km is a little harder because of an incline. We go through the same ritual of blinkie light on the back of the bike, and taking off our sunglasses.

At the supension bridge we turn off onto the old road around the fjord. Passing an interesting church, we stop for a food break. There’s a table and bench and before we leave we refill our water bottles at a spigot in the back of the church. A cyclist who had passed us on a downhill had also stopped. He is German. Then we hit the short 8% climb. We are back into forests and eventually rejoin the main road where we find a bikepath that takes us all the way to Alta.

Patrick checking for the junction to the bike path

At a junction, two cyclists come up and stopped to talk. As we talk about where we are all going, Patrick mentions how we had just been talking how cyclists don’t stop to talk anymore and that today Rachel and I probably wouldn’t have met. “Let me guess you met on a bike tour,” the man says, “as we did in 1987.” “Got us beat, we met in 1993,” we say, and soon they are off.

Patrick checks on the tablet if Alta has a Thai Restaurant. We are in luck, and find the restaurant behind the Northern Lights Church. We have only about 8 kms to camp and decide to have our big meal of the day now, and across the street pick-up a subway sandwich for dinner. There’s also a REMA 1000 grocery store that we pick up supplies for tomorrow and the next morning. At the store there are two girls touring from the French part of Canada. We chat a bit, they are just starting their day and plan to go 90km. They too express how because it’s light for so long, rhythms change.

We get to the Solvang campground around 2pm. There’s a nice spot for the tent with a shared picnic table. Since we have been so lucky with the dry weather we feel we can’t complain, but it sure is nice to have the shade of the trees to relax in. Even though it is only in the mid-seventies, the sun feels strong. It’s interesting that the toilets are divided by gender and there is a code to enter to use. We’ve been used to staying in campgrounds where the facilities are unisex. Next to the campground is a big area that looks like day trippers come to hang out and swim, so that might explain the locked facilities.

We are on the map…we saw an EV sign with Nordkapp 236km!

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Today's ride: 48 km (30 miles)
Total: 1,789 km (1,111 miles)

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