NOTE: The Norwegian language contains a lot of letters that are not on my keyboard. In most cases, I have typed in English without them.

Thursday, June 19th, 2025
Kinsarvik, Norway to Hovden, Norway
Distance travelled 252 Kilometres

I am not sure why, but I slept like a totally dead person. I always sleep well, but when I was roused from my slumbers by the unmistakable piping cry of Haemotopus Ostralegus (which some people call the Oystercatcher) I was quite startled to note that it was seven forty-five ! I cannot say that I never sleep that long, because I just had, but it is a true rarity.

I got up smartly, at least I was still good at that – and made our teas and coffee. From the terrace outside of our window, the bay looked calm and serene and the silence was broken only by the occasional cry from some Oystercatchers (see above) that, far from catching oysters, appeared to be ransacking the lawn across the road for worms. It was not raining, which boded well for the day.

We went for breakfast which was typically Norwegian extensive, but without herrings. I was eclectic as usual and, once again, managed to round things off with a bacon sandwich with HP sauce. As a bonus, our Harley was parked directly under the window where our table was.

While we were eating, two dual sport bikers, that were parked next to us, began loading up to leave. With all due respect to my fellow bikers, what a palaver !
Both machines had huge panniers (far bigger than ours) and a top box (far bigger than our bag on the rack). But they were both still lashing extra bags to the back seats, they had tank bags and one of them fixed a little bag to his engine protection bars. When they pushed their bikes back, it took them some major effort and it was obvious that both bikes were SERIOUSLY heavy.
Until that moment, I had thought the Harley was pretty well loaded but, when we left, it took Lucie only a couple of minutes to load the panniers and fix the bag. I will never again chide my lovely wife about what we are carrying.

We set off at almost exactly 10 a.m. By the way, it had started to rain. Luminously garbed, we set off south down route 13. We only had two more waterfalls from our “to see” list left and both would, hopefully, have been viewed by the mid-afternoon.

As we left, a big, sporty, Mercedes in front of us turned south too. The speed limits meant nothing to him, in the first thirty kilometres, he avoided them like the plague, but from below ! His speed was so slow it was almost farcical and overtaking was impossible because of the rain and oncoming traffic.

Several times I was in second gear. Finally, it was almost as if he found a higher gear himself and at least I could start using the 4th one in my collection. We trekked in tandem all the way down the fjord to the town of Odda where. mercifully, he turned off.

We crossed the vik at Odda on a neat little bridge before starting up the other side of the fjord and then we made a left turn onto route 49/500. We soon entered another long, long tunnel that took us under the headland and, better still, out of the rain.

Lucie, God bless her, had worked out quite a clever route to take us to the two waterfalls and, after an alternating deluge/tunnel ride down the next fjord, we came to the first one, the Furebergsfossen.

This was right beside the road and emptied directly into the fjord beneath a bridge. It was another combination of tumbling masses of water and a big, wide, drop that was truly spectacular. The spray from the falls was actually greater than the rain at that point. There was a handy lay-by/viewing point and we pulled in there. There was just one other car there when we arrived, but we immediately popularised the site and it was soon a throng of bikers and motorists waving cameras.

We continued our merry way down the route 500/548 passing through Rosendal and Dimmelsvik. Not that we had a lot of options. Then, when there were options, we headed towards Valen, where we topped up both the tank and ourselves, before heading to Utaker where we caught a ferry to Skanevik. The Norwegian ferry system is great. We did not have to wait very long, the crossing was swift and smooth – and it really did not cost much money.

From Skanevik we had a bit of a climb up out of the town on what was still billed as route 548, but more closely resembled a country lane. In the wet, it was less than fun. A trucker politely let us pass on an incline, but the going was so uncertain that his gesture meant he was soon breathing down my neck for quite a long distance. Luckily, before he crushed us under all sixteen of his wheels, we took a narrower still side road that, quite quickly brought us to the far wider and better surfaced E134.

On this better road and in intermittent drizzle, we finally made a bit of progress. For the first time that day, I got to use top gear and we sped along at, errrrr, 80kph, which was still the speed limit. We passed a junction with route 13, the road we had started out on when we had first left our hotel. My co-pilot noticed me noticing that – and informed me that we had come a more “interesting” way that avoided doubling back. OK then !

Our second waterfall of the day and, apparently, our last specific one of the trip, was the Langefoss.
This, again, was right beside the road (E134) and had its own designated parking area. I am running out of unique terms with which to describe the fosses. Suffice it so say that more water than you can easily imagine was pouring majestically over a cliff and tumbling, in a very eye-catching way, into the fjord below.

It had briefly stopped raining, but we got wetter from the spray than if it had not. When the real deluge resumed, two minutes later, we scarcely registered it.

It felt odd, riding away, no more fosses to specifically seek out (although there were less spectacular waterfalls, everywhere we looked, all of the time).

We set off for our hotel. Lucie had told me that this would entail some high altitude stuff and, as usual, she was not wrong. We climbed into snowy, ski-resort territory via a long tunnel up and then into an even longer one heading downwards. There were a couple of hairpins on the downhill part that, on an “E” designated route, were actually nothing to speak of.

At the bottom, we stopped and took the edge off of our hunger with a coffee, a chocolate and, far more importantly, a couple of sticky buns. When we headed outside for the final sixty kilometre leg of the day’s riding,we discovered that it had finally stopped drizzling.

The E134 climbed again, quite a long way, but not to the altitude where there were no trees. Then, the sun actually came out. This did not really make it warm, but did take the edge off the cold, because it really was quite chilly.

It is amazing the immediate difference a little bit of sunshine makes. The corners feel safer, the countryside looks greener and more welcoming, the distant mountains, many still snow-capped, look softer and the lakes, of which there were many, look bluer. On a wide, well surfaced and, above all, dry road, the riding became real fun for the first time all day. This was the Norway we had come there to see.

At Haukeli, we needed to switch to route 9. The road was, initially, not so good, but once we had climbed to the top of the incline, still well within the tree-line, it was good enough to enjoy. The panoramas of lakes and forest with the mountains still visible in the distance were perfect. Rugged and wild, but with a gentle air to it. The road was more or less deserted, 6th gear was in full use and I might even have exceeded 80 kph a couple of times (accidentally, officer, I promise you !).

We descended into Hovden, which was a seemingly quite upmarket recreation/ski resort and easily found our accommodation, Hovdestoylen (Hovdestøylen, 4755 Hovde), as it was set just back from the main road (still route 9) and very near to the centre of the town.

Booking-com had come up trumps again. It was a built in the traditional chalet-style and was beautifully furnished throughout. Our very well appointed room had a view onto woodland and the distant mountains.

We decided to eat in and it was a truly fine meal. We both had an excellent fish soup,

Lucie followed with trout ……

…. and I had ribs, from which the bone part of the ribs had been skilfully excised.

For dessert, we both had the rhubarb and white chocolate parfait.

All this was served at a window table that overlooked a broad, but swift-flowing river, backed by deciduous woodland that morphed into forest with a background of the inevitable snow tipped peaks of the mountains.

It was not a cheap meal, but it was not horribly expensive either, particularly if you consider the ambience and the surroundings.

The waitress gave me some milk for my morning tea and we retired to our lovely room. I was full-up and content – and you know what that meant ……

 

Here is the day’s ride ….