A trip to Norway - Part 2

When we woke up the following morning it was under a slightly overcast sky.
We had talked about maybe staying a day but decided to move on to Stavanger, and plan our best route to the Preikestolen, our main goal for the trip. So we had breakfast, packed up our stuff and did a small hike back to the main road where we found a good spot for hitchhiking at a busstop.
As mentioned before in the previous post a main theme to the trip was having bad luck in good spots and good luck in bad ones, and this was to be the first example of having bad luck in a good spot. We stood there for quite a while, perhaps an hour or an hour and a half untill we got a ride. As also tends to be usual though, the rides we waited long for also took us quite far, and Orian (turns out I got the previous name right, but from now on there will be more mistakes, and this is probably one of them haha) took us all the way to Stavanger.

When we got there after a bit of a drive the weather was slowly getting worse. The clouds grew darker and upon arrival there was a slight drizzle falling down. We discussed the possibility of staying at a hostel and taking a ferry and a bus to the start of the Preikestolen trail, and to see how much this would cost us we looked for and found the tourist information centre. As we looked at our map and discussed the plan another two guys with backpacks walked in, who also turned out to be Dutch, were also hitchhiking and who's goal was the Preikestolen as well. What are the chances right? Their names were Rick and Bernhard, a bit younger than us, sitting around 19, and we would run into eachother several times from this point on.
After getting some food at McDonalds we (the four of us) looked around on the internet to look for hostel prices, and found them to be too steep. Along with the ferry and bus ride it would cost too much for our liking, and so a new plan was made: to backtrack a little bit to Sandnes, and follow the road further east into the country to another ferry at Lauvik.
The road from there would take us to the Preikestolen from the south, while the ferry and bus would have gotten us there from the north.

So after dinner we walked through the centre of Stavanger to the nearest road that would take us in that direction. This is where we split up again, because getting a ride for four people is ofcourse nigh impossible.
So we left them at their spot close to the centre and moved further down the road ourself, walking to the city edge (which thankfully wasn't very far at all) and setting up our position there.
Now at this time the sky was completely overcast and the drizzle was getting thicker and we were getting slightly wet, but we had decided to push on and make it as far as possible. It wasn't too bad yet.
After a little while of standing there we suddenly heard a honk and saw waving arms from a car as Rick and Bernhard passed us by with their ride. And not two minutes after we got a ride too. Her name was Anita and she would take us to Sandnes. She was a nice lady who worked as an engineer who designed plans for laying oil pipes under water. The vast majority of people in the area of Stavanger work in the oil industry as we were told several times. Orian worked in the oil industry as well.
After reaching Sandnes we were a little bit lost as Anita didn't know the town very well. She dropped us off at a place she went to shop at, and from there we gathered intel as fast as possible.
After asking around for a while we had a direction to head to, and so we started walking again. By now we were taking turns carrying the tent which was quite a nuissance throughout the trip, at least for me. I hate having to carry stuff around in my hands, that's not what I have a backpack for, but it didn't fit in there or in Willem's. So carrying it in my hand it was!

Eventually we made it to another bus stop, not an ideal position but it was shelter for the rain, which was coming down a bit harder now.
As I was standing out by the road trying to catch a ride a guy walked past who started a conversation with Willem. He wanted us to come with him to his place, where he could give us some food and where we could wait for the next bus to come later on at night, but Willem declined. There was still daylight left, and we had more road to travel.
This turned out to be to our benefit as soon after another car passed us by, then turned around at a roundabout and came back for us. In the car were another two very good-looking young girls, who were bored and had decided to give us a ride just to give themselves something to interesting to do.
Especially the driver could have been a photo model, she was that good looking. Another major surprise haha! What's more, they were going to take us all the way to Lauvik.
Now this was one of the harder names I've had to write down, and I'm not at all sure if I got it right. The girl in the passenger seat was easy enough, Marianne, but the driver was called something like Reinhilde.
Her English was really good, which was understandable enough since she had spent quite a bit of time in England as an au pair. After maybe an hour's drive they dropped us off at Lauvik, which turned out wasn't a town but just the ferry port, and lo and behold: Rick and Bernhard were there already!

The ferry here was just a small one, not like the big ships at Stavanger or the one that took us from Denmark to Norway. Just enough room for a few cars that got put over onto the other side in about 15 minutes.
It is a paid ferry but as we walked on (we had arrived just in time to catch one) nobody bothered us to pay, even while we walked past one of the ferrymen. So we got over to the other side scot-free.
Unfortunately none of us had thought to ask around for the next ride during the way over and so everybody drove off, which left us standing there having to wait 30 minutes for the next batch of cars. So we decided to walk and see if we could get a good sleeping spot (by now it was around 22:00 I think).
Not too far away we saw a sign for a house or a cabin, so there was a chance of a roof over our heads. We walked until we saw a little harbor area where a man was still at work. So we approached him and asked if he knew of or had a place for us to stay. Turns out he rented cabins out to people, as well as boats for the lake etc., and if we wanted we could stay in his barn. He didn't have any empty cabins left and at any rate he didn't figure we had money or wanted to pay for a place to stay.
So we walked up to his place while he finished up, and he showed us his barn, which was quite big and had more than enough room. Thanks to Lars we had a roof over our heads that night, and the ability to let all our wet stuff dry, and even the ability to fill up on water.
We put down a plastic sheet to lay our stuff down on and laid our stuff to dry. Willem and I played another game of chess before going to sleep.

The barn

The following morning

We could sleep in for as long as we wanted, but we woke up quite early nonetheless.

Lars wasn't around anymore but we had thanked him the previous night for his hospitality already, so he knew we were grateful. 

We knew the weather report too. It was going to clear up at 12:00. Before we moved out though Willem wanted to see if he could catch a sea star he had seen the previous evening, so we moved back down to the harbor area and as he and Rick and Bernhard looked in the water I got out my book to do some reading (Anne Frank's Diary, I had never read it before untill I decided to buy it shortly before we left).

Eventually they caught a few sea stars and we decided to move on. This time Willem and me got dibs on the first ride, so we moved back up to the road.

The small harbor area.

We didn't stand up there long. We had quite a bit of luck. We had missed the cars from the ferry but as we stood by the road Lars' neighbour from across the street walked up to check his mail, and started a conversation. Eventually he offered to take us to the Preikestolen, driving us all the way up to the start of the trail! His name was Ingval, and he was here on holiday from Stavanger. He had quite a lot of bad weather the previous week and told us our timing couldn't have been more perfect. And he was right: the clouds were almost completely gone, and there was only good weather coming up for the rest of the week.

When we got to the start of the trail we thanked Ingval, and decided to get some postcards from the giftshop for our family. We didn't have to carry them around either as the shop clerks could send them for us.

After hanging around for a little bit and eating some ice cream we started our hike to the top of the Preikestolen.

It took us about four hours. It can be done faster but we were ofcourse carrying our backpacks, each weighing in at about 20 kilo's, while everybody else was just carrying some food and water. 

Suffice to say the climb eventually got quite hellish as I was not in a good enough shape to do that climb with that backpack, and I paid the price haha. When we got to the top my legs were beat. But the sights along the way were beautiful and very well worth it. Besides, now we would get to sleep on top of the Preikestolen!

Around the start of the trail

And wouldn't you know it? Ahead of us we ran into Rick and Bernhard, who had actually gotten in front of us while we were lounging about at the start of the trail.

Nearing the top!

Willem.

Me.

The actual Preikestolen! From the edge it is 600 meters straight down :)

At the very edge of the Preikestolen

Enough to make you feel a bit queasy, isn't it?

I also took this video when we first got there.

As evening fell, it got quieter and quieter untill eventually there were only a handful of people left.

We climbed further on up the mountain to stay in the sun as long as possible, played some more chess, and eventually got driven back down again by the mosquitoes. 

Bernhard and Rick stayed up on the mountain with some German friends of their's that had run into trouble at the border carrying illegal substances with them, who as fate would have it managed to get to the Preikestolen on the same day as them. Now it would probably be a good time to say that Willem is in the police academy, so we decided to take our distance from these guys. 

After dinner above Preikestolen, seen on the right below us.

Sundown

When it got dark enough we laid down our sleeping bags. It was around 23:00 but it was still very light because we were so high. The sky was clear and the moon was out in force, so it never really got so dark that we couldn't see.

My sleeping bag at the edge of Preikestolen :)

And then, the following morning, we were greeted with this view...

What a great view to wake up to, isn't it?

This was approximately around 4:30. It gets dark late, and bright early.

We decided to skip breakfast and leave early before the crowds arrive. There already were some people that had arrived earlier during the night, and more would surely follow very soon.

One of the few small lakes you'll find on your way to the top

We were high enough up the mountain to stay above the morning fog, and it led to some awesome sights!

Nearing the parking lot again.

Back down at the start!

And this is where I'll finish the story for now... More to follow soon(er than this time)!

A trip to Norway - Part 1

Just recently I have made another journey, this time with my friend Willem. It was to be a much shorter one than the one I made in Canada and the U.S.
It was about time too, I needed to get out, and unfortunately I don't have the funds for a longer trip yet, so this was perfect. The goal: hitchhiking to Norway, see the Preikestolen. To do this we had about 2 weeks time.

To get us started we had already fixed up a ride through a website to take us from Holland as far as Kolding in Denmark. It cost us about 45 euro's per person, but at least we had certainty we would make it quite close to Norway on the first day, so this was acceptable to me.
The man who drove us there was Peter, a retiree from Holland who now went to a market in Kolding, where he would buy Danish furniture to take back and sell back home. While he earned quite a bit of money from this occasionally it was mostly a hobby, but some of the prices were staggering to us. Once he had bought a chair for 10 euro's and had managed to sell it at an auction for 700 euro's... That is quite the profit!
Anyway, at 8 in the morning he picked us up in Heerenveen, and at 14:30 we made it to Vejle, just north of Kolding where he dropped us off at a big tank station, and wished us good luck.

Looking around we saw it was a good spot, but we decided to get a sign. So we started looking around for cardboard boxes, but we didn't find any. Asking inside the station, Willem managed to get a piece of paper.
It wasn't sturdy but it would have to do!
We wrote down Aarhus, and took position at the exit onto the highway. And got lucky with the second car to pass us by!
Merzad offered to take us along for a while, and dropped us off at a McDonalds at a location that I don't know the name of. Along the way he told us about his home country of Iran, and of the problems it faces in the perception by the media, the politicians in power who mess up the country, and the hospitality of the local people. Hearing him talk about Iran made me want to visit the country. He was a well-spoken man and interesting to listen to.
At McDonalds we managed to get a proper piece of cardboard, and with it we assumed position at an on-ramp.

Hitchhiking in Denmark

This time it took maybe around 20 minutes, and then Jespe showed up. Jespe was a softly speaking man that we sometimes had to strain to hear, but a very nice guy overall. He reminded us of someone we knew back home. He dropped us off in Randers (or at least that's where we figured we were at, we weren't quite sure!).
At this location it took us longer to secure us another ride, which came in the form of Njal, who apparently was named after a popular saga. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nj%C3%A1ls_saga)
He dropped us off further along the highway toward Aalborg, where the highway split off in two possible directions for us to get to a ferry.  But the location we were now at saw very little traffic.
From where we were standing it was hopeless to get a ride within a reasonable amount of time, and so we decided to walk onto the highway itself, hoping to get a ride before a cop showed up.

And thankfully, we got lucky. A car pulled over, but it was so much farther from where we were that we doubted if he pulled over for us or if he was simply breaking down. So I ran over (quite a distance!) and went to look. Thankfully, yes, he did pull over for us. But he was nervous being on the side of the highway like this and wanted us to hurry up. I ran like the devil back to Willem, hoisted up my backpack, and sprinted back to the car. After quickly jamming our stuff into the back we got in, and we were on our way to Aalborg thanks to Willy, from the Congo.
Willy, as it turned out, had made quite the journey himself when in 2003 he was forced to flee the Congo due to hostilities in the area. He had been working in the south while his family had remained in the centre. When the fighting started he was unable to get back to them, and had to flee. And so he came to Denmark, not knowing what had happened to his family as the fighting moved up to the centre of the Congo.
Then, in 2008, as by a miracle, he had found his wive on, of all things, Facebook. She had managed to flee the country as well, and was living in Germany. What a miracle! And what's more, they now had a second child who was two months old! But they still had not gotten back to living together, because Willy wanted to finish school and because he didn't speak German, he couldn't move. And his wive didn't speak Danish, and had her own stuff going on in Germany too. So it might still be a while before they are back living together.
I wish them all the best!

Willy dropped us off in Aalborg, and we had a bit of a distance to walk to get out of town and onto the proper highway again. We tried hitchhiking through town, and we actually did get lucky.
This would turn into a common theme during our trip: in all the worst places we had the best of luck getting rides, and all the good places, where cars had lots of room to pull over, lot's of time to see us etc. we would be getting stuck for various amounts of time.
This time our luck was due to Onja, Peter's young daughter who thought it would be funny to help us. And so together they drove us out of Aalborg and to where we needed to be!
This was another place where there wasn't a lot of traffic, but this time we decided to wait a bit longer. We didn't have to wait long until another car pulled over.

Michael and Lylian were an older couple with a long car in which we could sit in the back. There were tools and other stuff scattered across the floor and we were sitting a bit uncomfortably, but we had a ride all the way to Hirtshals! And from Hirtshals there was a chance of us catching the last ferry for the day to Norway.
Along the way we encountered a horrible sight. An accident had happened just shortly before we came along. The highway was covered with pieces of debris, and various people had already pulled over to help.
What we think happened was a car carrying a woman and her children, who were now sitting by the side of the road crying and in panic, was smashed into from behind somehow. In return their car probably smashed into a car in front of them, which had flipped over and was lying upside down a bit further down the road.
Next to it on the side of the road was a man lying on the ground bleeding, being tended to by two people.
In the flipped over car we thought we saw a body sticking out the back, but we weren't sure. The couple giving us a ride moved through the accident and drove on. There were enough people to help, professional help was on the way and you don't need a traffic jam blocking their access.
This incident quietened us all down, and we didn't speak much untill we were in Hirtshals, where they dropped us off in front of the ferry terminal. Further misfortune: the ferry had already left, and we would have to wait till 12:00 the next day.

Looking around in the area we didn't find much in the way of sleeping spots, but there was a parking with some mobile homes that had people in them, next to the train station. And so we put down our sleeping bags next to the train station walkway when it got darker, and went to sleep.
Then we scared off a guy who rounded the corner of the building, thinking he could take a leak there. Nope!

Where we had slept. Here we are in the process of drying our stuff that got moist, and making some morning tea!

The next day as we were waiting for the ferry I taught Willem how to play chess, which I had learned to play in Canada. I had a mini-board with me, containing all the little magnetic pieces. It takes almost no room and weighs practically nothing, and you can hold it upside down without the pieces falling off.

And then we boarded the ferry.

After about three hours we had made it to Kristiansand, Norway. 

We moved out of the ferry as quickly as possible to take up position at the car exit, and put up our sign.

Our first destination would be Flekkefjord to the west, and again we didn't have to wait long untill a car pulled over. When I ran over to ask where they were going exactly I was surprised to see two really good-looking girls sitting there, willing to take us to Flekkefjord. We had not expected that!

Ida (I don't know if I spelled her name correctly, and this is the first instances of probably many misspelled names!) and Louise took us to a little while before Flekkefjord, on our request, after asking them for a good camping spot. They suggested a location with some nice waterfalls and a lake, which they showed us.

We decided to stay there, and thanked them for helping us out.

The top of the waterfalls

A little further down

Looking around we didn't see a very good spot to set up our tent, except for maybe on the other side of the waterfalls. And so we decided to cross over, which I filmed with my GoPro camera.

We tried setting up our tent there, but it turned out that spot was crawling with red ants. So we picked a spot right next to the water, and decided to spend another night under the stars. 

We also decided we wanted a campfire to keep us warm after sundown, and so the search for good rocks for a fireplace began, as well as the gathering of tinder and firewood.

Willem sitting at the campfire, still unlit

While waiting for the sun to go down we decided to play another round of chess. Good looking set, no? :)

Me breaking some wood for the fire

We spent the night sleeping on the rocks, but slept well considering!

The following morning we decided to move on and try to get to Stavanger, which I will describe in a following post. To be continued!