On Sunday we found a lovely spot for lunch and had a nice chat with an elderly couple from near our home.
We only looked for a place to sleep in the evening around 8pm.
At the beginning of the week, we arrived at my girlfriend’s house.
After a warm welcome and cheese spaetzle 😍for dinner, we went fishing together by the sea.
Alex finally caught his first fish. Martin showed him how to gut them on site and how to process them at home. The gutted mackerel were allowed to soak in salt water overnight and were smoked before dinner.
I, on the other hand, fished for crabs with my girlfriend and her son. Something is attached to a mini fishing rod to attract them. For us it was ham. They are collected in a bucket of salt water and then released.
Disc golf is a Frisbee sport game in which you try to hit the Frisbee basket with as few throws as possible. Similar to golf
, there is a course with different holes, whereby the length of the different holes varies depending on the level of difficulty. It can be between 40 and 250 meters.
There are many of these disc golf courses here in Norway. You can use them free of charge. All you need is your own Frisbee disks and off you go.
We also had some fun for a short pastime.
Unfortunately, our friends had to work the next day. We then walked to the nearby beach with their children.
What a beautiful way to get there.
Everyone clearly had fun.
After lunch, we spent time together. We were allowed to do our laundry, shower and replenish our water supplies.
After 2 nights we moved on.
Thank you so much for the wonderful time with you!
We arrived back in Sweden near Gothenburg at the end of the week.
We used the free ferry to stay on the island of Björkö for 2 days on a paid but nice and, above all, safe parking space.
We like to use the Park4night app or look for parking spaces on GoogleMaps. In the Gothenburg area, there were too many reviews saying that the motorhome had been broken into and robbed, sometimes on paid pitches. We have no desire for that. But we feel safe on the island and the pitch.
Personal impressions of Norway:
How was the trip to Norway for us?
You hear and read so much about the Lofoten Islands, but are they really that much more beautiful for us personally than the rest of Norway?
Yes, the landscape is beautiful. The mountains, the fjords, the small villages and the great views are really beautiful. But we can also say that about the rest of Norway. Even if the landscape does change, for us personally it was beautiful almost everywhere on our route, from Andenes to the south. There are many hiking opportunities, but with the cold temperatures, the wind and the rain, we personally just don’t enjoy it and so we may have missed one or two beautiful places, but that’s not what matters to us. We have to feel comfortable and not bend over backwards. Besides, we’re not into sightseeing. We prefer to listen to the locals or expats tell us their personal stories about their lives.
As we left the polar region again, the weather got better and better. We really enjoyed it and were able to go for a walk here and there and get a feel for the area.
Norwegians are different from Swedes and southern Europeans. If you don’t say hello, nobody says hello here. That’s very unusual for us. We don’t know that to this extent, not even from Germany 😉
People are very withdrawn and you get the feeling that they don’t want to be approached and left alone.
It’s generally like that. Not only towards strangers, but they are also very distant towards other locals. At least that’s our observation.
But when we have contact, everyone has been nice, friendly, courteous and helpful.
We saw an incredible number of hikers, cyclists and car travelers sleeping in tents.
We have huge respect for that. After all, it’s constantly uphill and downhill. Most cyclists are on the road without an e-bike.
You also get the feeling that Norway is somehow only made up of tunnels, bridges and ferries. At some point we stopped counting them
Financially, we know that Norway is an expensive country.
We had brought a lot of long-life food with us from Germany and therefore only sometimes bought fresh produce such as vegetables, fruit and rarely meat and fish.
Once we stayed at a café in the courtyard for 12 euros a night. We just had to make ourselves comfortable at this rustic cafe and paid 17 euros for a cup of tea, as much coffee as we wanted and two sweets.
There are virtually no other washing facilities here (if you don’t want to wash by hand) except on official pitches or campsites.
We spent 4 nights on a beautiful campsite for 133 euros including a washing machine.
The fuel costs were just under 2 euros per liter of diesel. In addition, there were all the ferry and toll costs. The exact amounts for these are still outstanding.
Fuel, tolls and ferry costs were the most expensive for us.
All in all, the costs are within reasonable limits and, knowing the expensive prices here, are ok for us.
We had a new experience at pitches along the coast.
Do you know what can give you a terrible fright at night and seem a bit scary at first?
When a bird suddenly lands on the motorhome roof and starts walking around on the roof 😂 The worst are the seagulls.
The first time this happened, it was night and we were lying in bed. It was only when we realized that it was a seagull that we could fall asleep again. The birds kept waking us up rudely and it was sometimes a bit scary when they kept running across the roof from front to back for hours 😂
We are very happy and grateful that we were able to make this trip. That we were able to get to know Sweden and Norway in our own way. That we found many beautiful places. We met great people and had many unforgettable moments and experiences. And although it was really wonderful, Alex and I agree that Norway is absolutely not our country.
Sweden, on the other hand, we can both imagine visiting again at some point.
Now we are enjoying the last few days in Sweden before our ferry to Germany on Tuesday.