Thursday August 25, Fredvang to somewhere near Smorten!

Yep it's me!. The hair is looking rather wild and windswept...badly in need of a haircut.

Another really good day on the Lofoten Islands, travelling through a real variety of landscapes.

No chance of the Northern Lights overnight, checked them out but had quite a bit of cloud cover and even had a bit of rain overnight. A rather slow start, slept in then a few Facetime calls back to NZ to Heatherbelle, who is following our blog on her iPad, not bad for almost 90! Also checked with Dean about how the electrical system runs as with being off the grid at the moment we are relying on our solar panels to keep the house batteries topped up and are using an inverter to charge up my laptop and batteries. Needed some technical knowledge to explain the readings we are seeing on the gauges, no problems, but just wanted to be sure. But as always, Deano had the answers!

It was 10am when we hit the road, really enjoyed the overnight spot. A short drive along the road to Ramberg, where we heard they had an ATM, but no luck, evidently it had been removed earlier in the year! Pottered around in the hardware store where Ian found some more lures…having lost one last night!  Drove on past more white sandy beaches and even some farmland, where Ian has been most surprised at the size and condition of the lambs, undocked and not a dirty butt in sight. One ewe had three of the biggest lambs he had seen…wonders what we are doing wrong in NZ!

Turned off the main road and down to Nusfjord, another old fishing village. The drive in was pretty spectacular through rocky mountains seemingly to rise directly above us. Parked the van and had some lunch then off to have a good look around this old place. There were many old buildings but no one seemed to be around, and we felt that the last person had left and no one turned the lights out. There were a few tourists meandering around, but nothing seemed to be open, except the General Store. We realise that we are travelling at the end of the season and this is going to happen, but quite happy in some ways as understand during the peak of the summer the roads are just full of motorhomes, and with such narrow roads it would make for pretty stressful driving. Maybe because it was so grey and rather bleak, we were quite happy to move on.

Meandered along enjoying the scenery to the next town, Leknos, which evidently had an ATM machine. It was on the next island, and most surprised as expecting a bridge but the road went down in a tunnel under the harbour for almost 2 kms, and we popped up on the other side. So impressed with the roading system here….why doesn’t Auckland just get on and put a tunnel under their harbour and solve so many problems!

Leknos really surprised us after travelling through so many small towns, it was quite a sizeable place. Followed the signs to the Info centre and found a parking for Ruakiwi. Picked up some free maps and the young girl sent us along the road for about another 100metres to the shopping centre where she said we would find an ATM machine. From the outside the building didn’t look much, noticed a supermarket, but once inside it was really warm, and there were three floors of rather upmarket stores. Found the bank and finally managed to get some cash out. I picked up some cheap warm gloves as well, as think I will be needing them before long!

It was mid afternoon when we left town and time to start looking for a good overnight spot. We branched off the main road to the coastal route to the south which was such a good choice. We followed the coast along through small inlets, rocky islands and little farms. Almost before we re-joined the main road we spotted a little boat harbour with a gravel car park area and a sign advertising campervan parking for 100NOK. Just what we were looking for, and tonight we are parked only metres from the harbour looking across the water to the mountains, and no one else here. I went for a walk around the rocks, such a beautiful spot.

Tonight’s dinner was a great success, I had taken some chicken drumsticks out of the freezer and as we had a bit of time, I decided to make a casserole with onions, garlic, peppers, mushrooms and a tin of tomatoes and popped it in the gas oven. This is such a bonus as we didn’t have a gas oven in Ruakiwi 1, so if we were off wild camping, I needed to use the generator to cook in the electric over.

The owner, Yngve lives just along the road, and he popped over after dinner to collect our money. Such a nice guy. He is retired now, but had been a teacher in Svolvaer, teaching maths, along with navigation and fishing, obviously very important for the young people of these islands to learn.

As the light faded tonight, we stood outside enjoying the evening in probably one of the nicest spots we have camped in.

These are fish racks, seen all over the island. Evidently the cod that is caught in the winter is dried on these.
I understand the smell is something else!

White sandy beaches, grey skies...and a chill 10 degrees in Ransberg

The rock faces on the road to Nusfjord

The sheep have the run of the towns. This mum and her daughters were on the move.

Dried fish heads on the wharf..the smell was "interesting"

This structure was designed by architectural students from Oslo and is made of wood. The spa is in the left corner.

More students work forming seats

Rather nice store in Leknes

What you can do with your white plastic chairs - outside a wool store in Leknes

Cooking dinner...and the result. Not a bad view from the kitchen!

Yngve, in his office.