Baltic Sea Circle Day 8
We were within striking distance of Nordkapp, the North Cape, the most northerly place in Europe accessible by road. That had been my objective when I thought up this crazy idea, and today we would try to get there.
The night had been restless once again, with the sun not setting in Alta. We had eye masks with us and those helped, but we still woke up several times before 6am, checking our watches and trying to get back to sleep. After consuming our daily granola and coffee we packed up the tent and gear, checking the roof rack for tightness and checking the engine oil and coolant. Both needed a top up; the car had consumed a litre of oil so far and about half a litre of distilled water was needed for the coolant.
The key turned in the ignition, the lights popped up and we set about the last portion of our journey northward. The area north of Alta became even more rural and tundra like, with snow covered mountains, no trees and the odd reindeer crossing the road. We climbed up hills and onto plateaus, passing waterfalls and areas of permafrost. The sun was shining with blue sky’s above, it was perfect weather.
As we approached Honningsvag we saw several big cruise ships docked, and a queue of coaches departing loaded with tourists. The North Cape is one of Norway’s most popular tourist destinations, and it showed! We joined a queue of coaches stuck at traffic lights, there was some major road works going on to improve the route, and the next few miles were slow as we crawled behind them. The odd opportunity arose to overtake, which was more difficult with the Porsche being right hand drive and us driving on the right, but Gemma provided the second pair of eyes and the car product the horsepower needed to get past on more than one occasion.
The other highlight of the road trip were the tunnels. The road to Nordkapp had at least 4 long tunnels, totalling maybe 15 km; one of which goes under the sea pretty deep, being the longest at 7km long. We had the windows open a touch and the car was filled with the smell of wet cement and diesel fumes as we passed through them. Each time the sun dazzled us as we exited into the beauty of the Arctic landscape.
With one last push up a twisty mountain road, and passing a few dozen cyclists who must have had legs of steel, we reached the booth signalling the end of the road and the entrance to the car park. The attendant greeted us and said the parking was free, just entrance to the building would cost 300 NOK each. We only needed the parking so entered and parked with the campervans. We’d made it, the car had made it, we were still a couple of days behind the other rally teams but we’d achieved what I’d set out to. The next hour was emotional as I relived the last two years, the planning, the fundraising, all the people back home (and around the world) that had donated and supported us. But, getting there is only half the journey, we still have many thousands of kilometres to go to get home again. We looked around the North cape globe, took a few photos and wandered over to the sculptures created by children from around the world in 1988.
We proceeded back to the carpark, had a chat with a few people who had noticed the car and then ate some lunch. It was relatively cool at about 18C and pretty windy, a refreshing change from the mid-twenties we’d been having so far. One thing we hadn’t expected was that it would be so warm at night. The sun does shine all the time so it makes sense!
We got our lunch stuff packed up and began on the twisty road again, this time heading south! The sun was pretty dazzling and reflected off the aged and shiny plastic dashboard onto the windscreen, making it near impossible to see the road and any hazard like reindeer or sharp drops. A quick solution was to unzip my trouser leg from my trousers, converting them to shorts and placing a leg on the dash. Much better!
We began the descent and made our way back through all the tunnels, the engine and exhaust notes from the Porsche filling the void, but as we were approaching the last tunnel there was a queue, the traffic was at a standstill and folks were out of their vehicles. We parked up and waited; there must have been a blockage or accident in the tunnel, this was the darkest and narrowest of them. We took a few photos of the nearby waterfall and sea view; not a bad place to have a traffic jam! After about 20 minutes a convoy of vans with flashing yellow lights came out of the tunnel followed by a row of cars. We followed the prompt of another van with yellow lights on to proceed and made our way through, emerging only to find ourselves now stuck in the one way roadworks with oncoming traffic. I was keeping an eye on the fuel gauge now. We were getting rather low as we reached the North Cape and I had emptied the 10L fuel can into the tank in the car park. The next town was about 50 km away and we’d definitely need to fill up there! The engine was off at every opportunity to save fuel and we just hoped the battery would hold enough charge to bring the engine to life again on each key turn.
At last we noticed the traffic moving ahead and cars and campervans started to make their way around using a bit of road under construction. The two Swedes in the car in front of us had got out and figured out how to navigate the traffic and were jogging back to their car while the rest of us wound down out windows and applauded them. Once over the rough road (again made of huge pebble beach-like gravel) we made short work of the remaining miles to the town, with no traffic in front of us. The hour or so delay meant that we wouldn’t get as far as we wanted to today, and we stopped at Lakselv in Norway, filling up with fuel and finding a campsite with a space on the estuary. We set up camp, made some instant pot meals that we’d bough at Lidl, as we hadn’t the energy to cook anything more. A cup of coffee and waffles finished the meal and we discussed our plan for the next few days. The rally organisers were planning a party in Estonia on Thursday night, would we be able to traverse Finland and get a ferry to Tallinn over the next three days? We headed to bed, pretty exhausted from the physical and emotional day, thinking that we’re only half way through this journey, and missing home and family more than ever.
WILD SPIRIT 