Nordkapp, Norway

In our previous Blog entry, we ended with the cruise from Stockholm to Helsinki, but I would like to write a little bit about this journey.

Whilst we aren’t being particularly ground-breaking in our travels and probably lots of Aussies do the overnight journey from Stockholm to Helsinki, we have to admit that we were stunned to meet another Australian traveller on the boat. Why? What is so rare about that? Well, it turns out that Trish, who is a nurse, is an Army Reserve nurse and knows a good friend of ours in Oz. Yes, Trish was part of the second Australian contingent that went to Rwanda in 1995, as was our friend Connie! Talk about a small world!!!

The “cruise” was the usual sort of thing – plenty of food on offer at the buffet as well as free beer, wine or soft drinks, lots of drunken louts running around the corridors in the wee-hours of the morning. Ho hum! Same old thing!!

We arrived in Helsinki and went looking for our campground, only to discover that the information on the internet is not always reliable. We had an address to go to but when we got there, it was in the middle of suburbia with no signs of a campground. We managed to find some people to ask and they said that no, there wasn’t a campground anywhere nearby. They kindly made a phone call to the number listed for the campground and we discovered that the campground that was advertised as being in Finland is actually about 230km away and the address provided on the internet was the address of the registered company that owns the campground! Grrrrr!!! So, at the suggestion of MJ’s friend Anne, we stayed in a hotel near her flat. In the end, this turned out to be good because we were only up the road from Anne and we could easily meet to explore Helsinki.

Some great things about Helsinki (& Finland) – a lot of Finnish people speak English and are quite happy to talk to you in English, they have a 24-hr transport ticket that you can buy on the bus and this well get you across to Suomenlinna provided you catch the right ferry, you can catch a bus from the Central Railway Station to the Seurasaari Open-Air Museum (No. 24). If you don’t have a local to help you explore Helsinki, then you might not learn these things so – Thanks Anne! Another great thing about our weekend in Helsinki was that it was great weather! After almost two weeks of rain from Lübeck, through Denmark & Sweden, it was nice to find some great weather! We even dug out the shorts and we didn’t have to worry about scaring the Finns with our white legs – Finnish legs that only see sunshine for a few weeks are TRULY white!!!

Apart from exploring downtown Helsinki, visiting the old Fortress on Suomenlinna and the Open-Air Museum at Seurasaari, we encountered Restaurant Day (Saturday) and Museum Day (Sunday)! Restaurant Day is best described as one of two days in a year when anyone can put up a stall and sell food that they have prepared. It gives Finns a chance to try exotic foods, such as Indonesian, Thai, Mexican, Vietnamese, Swedish! And Museum Day is when the Museums are free! We also tried McDonalds in Helsinki (it’s the same as everywhere else) and Hesburger, which is a Finnish burger-chain, similar to Maccas, but the menus aren’t in English and they sell more than burgers! Oh, and a REALLY annoying thing about Finland is that there are two official languages – Finnish and Swedish which means that all signs are in two languages. And, if you can’t speak either language and you’re trying to search for locations in Google, then you find that sometimes places are in the Internet with the Finnish spelling or sometimes with the Swedish spelling. That makes it difficult to programme the GPS because you are looking for Vasa and she is looking for Vaasa (for example). But we did survive.

After a great few days in Helsinki, it was time to get some kilometres under our belts and head north towards Nordkapp. We had decided to drive up the west coast of Finland, along the Bay of Bothnia and we stayed at a couple of campgrounds in Vasa and Oulu. The drives weren’t too long and the campgrounds were in great locations and were very well set up. We did a bit of exploring on our bicycles in Vasa and we are happy to report that it is relatively flat! We also did some cycling in Oulu, but the campground is right on the coast (aka, the beach) and it is incredibly windy, so if you have to cycle into a headwind, then you get nowhere pretty fast!

Next stop on the agenda is Rovaniemi, which is in Lapland and only 8kms south of the Arctic Circle. It is also home of Santa Claus Land which is where post offices around the world send letters that are posted to Santa Claus, c/- North Pole. There are lots of souvenir opportunities there (how unusual), but you can also meet Santa! They have reindeer there normally, but it is currently calving season, so the reindeer are off in the forests having baby reindeer. Also, whilst at Rovaniemi, we had dinner at McDonalds (yes, I know) so we can now say that we have eaten at the most northerly McDonalds!

After 2 nights in Rovaniemi, it was time to head for Norway. Over the next two days, we some leasurely driving (I merely passengered) and saw some astounding scenery. We got some great photos of frozen rivers & lakes, kamekazi reindeer, and also had the chance to stop and chat with locals in a number of different locations. On our last day in Finland, we stopped at a roadside tourist stop and had a great chat with a woman whose two daughters had just come home from spending about 6 months in Australia. We spent about 90 minutes chatting with her and hearing about their life. It was one of those special chance-meetings you have when travelling.

After crossing the border, and having a customs check done on the car (groan!) we were in a new country! Finally – Norway!!

Originally we had planned on stopping overnight at a campground not far from the border but it was cold and raining when we reach the town and only 2:30 in the afternoon. After looking at the map, we decided that we would hot-foot it to Nordkapp (North Cape). After a time change (gained one hour), driving about 500kms and at the end of an 11 hour day, we passed Honningsvag and decided to stop at the Campground, which put us about 27kms south of Nordcapp. The downside of this campground was that it was set up for cabins or Campervans – nowhere for tents. Or maybe there was – we just couldn’t see it for the SNOW!!! Yes, that right – SNOW! Less than 1 month until Midsummer, it was still snowing!!!!!!!

We down back down to the campground, which was rather scary because of the aforementioned mist and went to bed, after closing the block-out curtains, which really didn’t make any difference because it was like someone had left a light on outside our window! After “sleeping in” to 9am, we got up and prepared to head back up for the daytime experience! We took Duggy with us on the second trip – but he whinged and moaned about the cold! With good cause – it was colder on the second trip (in the middle of the day) than it had been on the midnight trip! It was snowing and still very cloudy but not quite so much mist so we did manage to get some good photos.

So now Nick and I are not in agreement – reaching Nordkapp was one of the primary targets of this trip, so I’m saying that we can go home now!! But, he isn’t agreeing – so it looks like we will be here for a while longer. We still have so much of Norway to see, as well as finishing in Sweden & Denmark… and England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales… not to mention Poland, Czech Republic, Italy, Austria, Switzerland…

Ok, so we will be here for a few more months, at least!