My travels - Norway on Bike 1997 - 5.day
7.August 1997
This morning I woke up as second. Olga didn't sleep all night, because camping was near of railway, and Olga whole night listened sounds of trains. After washing and breakfast, we left Olympic city Lillehammer.
Our next target was Romsdal. Part of way we spent in the car, but next part, more interesting, we spent on sits of our bikes. Why more interesting, we recognized in a short time. In valley, near of road we found our first waterfalls. We made a lot of photos. At that time we didn't know that we will see much more waterfalls. My physical condition wasn't still good. But I wasn't alone and we wheeled bikes in a group. Together we reached our camp near Romsdalen hills. Camp was situated to mountain valley, near a small lake. But watter was such cold, that nobody try it. But it didn't discourage local boys from jumping in it from near bridge. Together we prepared our meal and built our tents. Then on bikes we visited near village. No pubs was open there, and we returned and in camp we drank tea with plum brandy. It was present from foreign friends of Jarko. It wasn't bad, but Slovak plum brandy used to be more better. At being expected of difficult route we went to sleep rather.
Norway Links
Photos Norway on Bike 1997
Travel facts
Google map
Labels: my travels, no, Norway, Norway 1997, travel
posted by Juraj Svajdlenka @ 11:59 PM
0 Comments
I am first up at morning. Weather is beautiful. My stomach and my head reminds me alcohol orgy from yesterday. But socialization is also necessary on this kind of travels. I am walking slowly, and sun is shinning on my face. Sooner than others wake up, I wash myself and I make small excursion to near village. When I returned others were also up. We are a little bit nervous, today is our first bike trip. I am curious on Olga, because yesterday she confessed, she is doing triathlon with good results. After unmounting bikes from car, checking their status, we must prepare us, bikers. After preparation we start our trip. We form a small ruck. Today it was only small trip, for warming up our bodies. Peter supervises us, and it looks like we are going without problems. Driver Jaro, round around us with car in half hour after our start. 
Later we visited center of Lillehammer. Lillehammer is a small city with wooden houses and with nice surroundings. It is a few year after Olympic Games, but they atmosphere is still there. Souvenirs of all types from T-shirts to books and sculptures of trolls are everywhere around us. We were really surprised with quality of tourist information bureaus. Their services are excellent. After city exploration we go to near camping on bank of of Mjosa lake. We build our tents near of volleyball play-ground. At reception we lend volleyball ball and we prepare our sport evening. First of all, braver of us try the water. It took me 10 minutes to dive in such cold water. Slowly after me go Gabika and I try to splash water to her. I was surprised with her bad reaction. After swimming we start our volleyball match. Together with Gabika and Lucia we lost, because Olga as physical training teacher disrupted us with her funny speaking and advices. We play only to entertain ourselves, and result wasn't so striking. It was funny improving of our evening. We know with two young Slovaks crossing North Europe by trains. Peter helps them with possible interesting places here in Norway. We decide to visit Lillehammer in the night. We wanted to visit some local pub, but all pubs were closed at this time. In Norway it is a big problem to find open pub after 10 PM. I think they have some law, that pubs have to be closed to 10 PM. But on the other side night streets of Lillehammer were also beautiful. We wrote some postcards and sent them at home. When we returned Peter was already sleeping. We as a good team followed him in a short time.
At morning I get up as first. I am slowly leaving tent. We are still in 
We continue on our way. Flat is slowly changing to mountains. We are in
As rest place we choose place near of biggest lake of Norway, 
I wake up at 3:00 am. We are staying. Jarko tell me that we are here in Rostock on parking place near the port. I a little bit walk around, because my legs are stony-hard. At last I take mattress roll and sleeping bag and I lie down on parking place, near of car. Finally I am going to sleep. 
After good rest I wake up at half past 5. Near of me is sleeping Peter and on other side also Olga. About meter from me is on the ground used napkin a some fag-ends. It is OK, more important for me that I am good rested. All of us get up and we are preparing to go board to ship. But we come to know that departure is moved to afternoon. We have a lot of time now. We only wash in near toilet. As breakfast Peter prepared sausages with mustard and bread. They looks very good, and Lucia, vegetarian in normal life, eat also one of them. We have still enough time and we are going to walk to city. To city we are going by car, it is about 3 km from port. 
In a short time we are in internals of our ferry, together with van. Our ferry is a very big ship. It is a 3:00 PM and ferry is getting up anchor. We all wave from deck to going away ground. On Peter's we are going to shop to duty free shop. Prices are not as low as we expected. After long consideration I bought a bag of drops from Turkey. We all meet on deck, only Jarko lost somewhere. We are offering each other with our bought things. I open my drops and I offer all of them. Together with me, of course. But after couple of seconds I recognize that taste of drops is a very strange. They are very hot and salted. A am looking on others, and they are also surprised with strange taste. We all run to guardrail and our drops are falling down to sea. When I look on cover of drops now, I see words like Hot and Chilly. But Jarko is coming with smile. I want to be polite and I offer him from drops. Jarko tries one of them, and we all look at him waiting for his reaction. But Jarko doesn't look to be OK. From time to time he change position of drop in mouth, but nothing more. After 5 minutes and our question how tastes he discloses that it not so good. But he doesn't want to hurt me. After this small episode we found good places on we all relax. It is sunny day and I am reading some book. When it starts to darken we are getting closer to ground.
We land to 
To Zilina we arrived short time before time of our departure. After quarter of hour we found departure place. But we don't see no bus not even other people. Only empty square. We phoned to travel agency, and they informed us with actual situation. They go with van on gas station. What, van? We know that it was signed on 15 people on this travel. And 15 people plus 15 bikes plus big amount of luggage is impossible to transport with van. Square was situated near a travel agency office and in short time come some people from travel agency. We got to know that from 15 people we reminded 5. Plus our guide and driver. 7 people is good count for van, not for bus. We weren't very happy from this info, but later we were very satisfied with this situation. Van arrived and we are quickly became acquainted with rest of our group. Our next members are women Olga and Hela. We are also welcomed with our guide and driver. Our driver Jarko together with our guide and me lodge in our luggage into car. We don't have so much time, because we must catch our ferry in 
Our situation is next: We are going via Czech republic to Germany. Morning at 6:00 we must be in Rostock from where is going our ferry. During our way we become acquainted all together. It looks like, that here meet together a good group. And that was confirmed also many time later. We continue with comparing our previous experience with biking and I my optimism is decreasing. Our guide Peter compete on bikes. Olga, physical training and russian language teacher, took part in many triathlon competitions before. And Hela is also experienced biker. Opposite of me, because I spent a lot of time in my work and now my condition is very poor. We crossed Czech boundaries, and our driver Jaro is fast as wind. A few hours later we were in Prag, capital of Czech republic. Slowly is getting dark an we are near of German boundaries. We are going on E55 way to Dubi passage. We are together watching on poorly dressed girls(prostitutes) near a road together with shops full of gypsum dwarfs. Boundaries crossed without problems. Some time we were watching out on country of capitalism. We had only short stops for our necessary needs. First night we must spend in a car. Gabika lay down between seat rows and Lucia together with me sleep on back seat. Hela and Olga also settled to sleep. I am very tired and in short time I sleep. From time to time I am trying to change my position and my eyes are going down. Around us is a darkness and we are driving quickly to our next target, Rostock.
