Jeff: And back to Norway

After exploring Stockholm we headed out of the town and headed north driving for about an hour, with a short stop at Lidl to buy some food. We stopped at a lake where we planned to spend a quiet night. The next morning we had a quick run before getting ready and heading slightly further north to a town called Gamla Uppsala where there are 300 burial mounds from as early as the 3^rd century. There are three called the Royal mounds which according to ancient mythology contained three gods but later they were thought to hold the remains of three kings. There is also a very old church which was a player in the development of Christianity in the country. We had a walk around the Royal mounds and found a cat to fuss before heading into the church. There appeared to be a camera crew outside but we headed in anyway to find some one recording a programme on the church so we quietly backed out and left them to it. We headed back to Jeff an on to our next destination which was a couple of hours away. We stopped for lunch on route and eventually arrived at Lake Siljan late in the afternoon. We wandered around the park up and then chilled for the evening. Once we had dinner and the skies had grown dark we headed out with the hopes of seeing the northern lights as there was supposed to be a bit of activity but unfortunately despite the clear skies there was nothing and we headed to bed about midnight. We weren’t sure if it was dark enough to see the lights as there was a couple of towns on the other sides of the lake which were quite bright. We did see alerts on the phone the next day that there was a possibility that we may have seen them at 3am but this was only a possibility.

The next morning we headed into the town (Rattvik) where we walked around and explored. We also walked along Scandinavia’s longest pier which was 628 meters long. After exploring the small town we headed back on the road and drove for about an hour and a half to our next destination. While driving however we did have a near miss as a lorry driving on the other side of the road had a blow out which sent debris everywhere. We missed it all and managed to carry on driving with no incidents but think we will be cautious with lorries now.

We managed to get to the start of the famous Vasaloppet which is a cross country ski race which is 90km long. There is a hiking and a cycling path which follow the route so we decided we would do a cycle for part of the route – there is no way we feel like doing the full 90km there as we would also have to cycle it back or find a way to get back. We settled on a shorter route and set off on the path across the fields. The path then curved to the right and we crossed the road and headed up into the woods. It was all up hill to get to the higher ground and then it settled down and carried on through the woods. It was a lovely ride on very quiet countryside roads and we cycled for around 15km before we decided to turn around and head back – enjoying the down hills section at the end. Once back we decided to head back into the woods and up the hill in Jeff for the evening and found a nice park up next to one of the lakes we had cycled past.

We were also joined by another camper and we chilled there for the evening and managed to light a fire in the fire pit and cook some food on it like real campers. Again there was a chance of seeing the northern lights so we stayed out watching the skies till the early hours before heading into bed without seeing them.

The next day we carried on west as we are heading back into Norway for a few days. The weather wasn’t great so we decided to have a day driving and getting the van serviced so we would have water and a clean toilet for the next few days. As we were also seeing people we thought we would ensure both us and the van were clean so we had long showers and cleaned the van from top to bottom (something it really needed). We also got the last bits of shopping in before we crossed the border. We then carried on driving late into the evening before we got to our stop for the evening which is next to a lake and already had two campers parked up so it was obviously a popular place to park for the evening.

The next morning we got up and headed towards Lillehammer where we had arranged to stay for a couple of days to meet my new cousin (technically my first cousin once removed) who was born just after we left the UK. They were out visiting their Norwegian family and as it wasn’t that far we had decided to pop along as well. We spend a couple of days there which was a nice break and we managed to get in a gym session in their gym, do all our washing and have showers in a real bathroom. It was a lovely few days and really let us relax and recharge our batteries while also allowing us to spend time with family.

After the few days with family we headed for the evening at a lake which was about halfway between Lillehammer and Sweden where Rich had a quick swim and then we cooked some food and chilled for the evening.