A good night's sleep followed by a bright clear dawn saw me riding the short hop to the ferry port at Hirtshals. Stopped to fill the tank and have some breakfast at a filling station/cafe on the edge of town. It was apparently run by a couple of Vietnamese. The choice of food was the usual in this part of the world, namely everything comes with chips (think of the Monty Python "Spam" sketch, but with chips instead of spam). For something different, I opted for the "Vietnamese sandwich" which was astonishingly good! I guess it was authentic as the woman who made it was from there.
Refreshed, I headed for the ferry. I joined the queue of vehicles and asked the guy in front if this was the right place for the ferry to Kristiansand. Yes. I also asked the guy behind me just to be sure. Yes. All good until I got to the check-in window; it was "A" ferry to Kristiansand, but not "MY" ferry! Who knew two companies plied this route?!? They had to unlock a special gate for me to go back and make a mad dash around the docks to the ferry I was supposed to be on.
Made it in time and met some Fench bikers en route to Nordkapp, one of them was on an XT660Z too.
The crossing was OK, the sea a little "rolling" but OK. Disembarked and headed north under somewhat "Scottish" weather: some sun, some rain, but not too much of either. Only went about 50 miles on nice sinuous valley roads and decided to call it a day, in the hope the sun will win out more tomorrow. Got a hotel (much cheaper than I expected) overlooking a lake. The scenery is also very "Scottish" so far.
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| The wrong queue! |
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| All secure on the right boat. |
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| Norway, or is it Scotland? |
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| Peaceful and quiet. |
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Happy bunny!
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Soundtrack: "Bless the Weather ", John Martyn
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