Going on holiday in Norway - Any tips?

[Niels Svane]

Hi everybody

Me, my girlfriend and a friend are going on holiday to Norway this October, as we all have been buried in wrok at the university all summer (ie no real sparetime!).

The transportation will be the trusty R4, and the ferry from Frederikshavn to Oslo.

So do you lot have any suggestions for what to see up there, or places that we just have to visit?

As we are all biologist the nature will be 80% of the goal of the trip, but else good food, museums etc are the thing.
We will constrain ourselves to around 4-500km from Oslo, so no North Cape trip this time (ive been there though, with the family in an Old VW T3 camper).


Are there any advice on technical preparations, other than the normal oil, water and tire checks, those too are welcome. I'll get four tires and a spare wheel before we go off, and the oil+filter were changed this month.

Thanks in advance, and please share your road reports, og holiday plans too, as I hope the little R4's are properly used still

Yours
Niels

 

[reidalpine]

Hi Niels, you'd be ok with the normal procedures for any trip.That said you would be wise to at least bring a set of studded tires
These being alloved altho' you're Supposed to pay a fee for going through Oslo on them.. A plate to shut most of the grille-area
could be nice for heat,but mostly for closing up for snow and sleath.

My Main concerne is the fact they salt the roads as roads were going out of fashion up here,so you 4 Will be taking a beating!!
earlier on they didn't salt in the Northern parts of N. but now they as they are lazy slobs and this the easiest way...

What to see??? Hm-let's see, Oslo isn't much to see,congested roads,hookers & hashish all over,Damn expensive parking,you'd
have to Look for good dining..so best drive around

max 4-500kms from Oslo you say.Well most of that would be mountainous valleys where all small sh**-hole communities all
closes down (All) at around 16:00 so better get filled,fed and thrashed b'4 that time..

Forget what you've heard about Bergen. It's not a town as much as a symptom.Mayor is under investigation for serios corruption
hubbie for dipping fingers into clients account.harbour-master suspected of corruption...people talks funny-citizens of Norway do
Not understand a word either. Oh and did I tell you it frigging RAINS ALL OF THE TIME over there?
Mountains around Bg Are high though-if this be your idea of SM you'd fit in with the rest of them-otherwise don't do it-Ever.

Wherever you go you'd be met by moping people (wondering what the hey you'r doing there in the first place)nobody talks to
you by choice.You'd have to sit on them to get them to,around 16:30 they'd all be home in their tin shelters gazing at some
stupid usually US tv-serie about fatty people moaning & groaning Or some 'Mercan guy going for Prez
walking about sharing his thoughts with "other thinkers of the world" (not exactly a lenghty walk you see) Takes all of 90sec.
but leaves ample room for ads re "LatestDesign by iconic plastics" i.e. form over function.

Museums you say...You mean New museums showing dead stuff off the past or Old museums showing new stuff pretending to
be a-r-t or nuveau-someth-someth... Ther's always the viking-ship museum in Oslo if you haven't seen a pile of wood decaying
that is..
Art-museums..You mean For real your' into watching paint dry?? -You sure it'll be wise to leave home unatended like this?
Have that in writing do you??

SO-did we leave out anything..at all?? No didn't think so.

MY tip if you at to see Norway... Drive parallell along the border,best done from within SWEDEN.. and Rememeber to bring own
torch as Norway closes at 16:00 so it'll be all DARK. -R.

 

[Niels Svane]

Haha, I didn't think Norway was so similar to Denmark - We just cant put salt on the roads anymore, 'cause there are no money for it.... So now its sand sand sand.
But we might then stay in Sweden an go over the border in short bursts, so we dont get caught by the dark, salt etc. Food we can bring from DK, and maybe sell some cucumbers, bacon and butter up there to pay for the whole trip (and of course beer)...

Thank you for the thorough reply and I hope you can manage to live there even though it sounds a bit problematic

 

[reidalpine]

Hi again Niels. Yepp it's Hard work living here but someone has to do it - right ?
PS:any chance you go past Stony on your way up here? -R.

 

[Iain]

Hej Niels, good luck, I agree with reidalpine, studded tyres can be real useful. I lived in northern Sweden for many years and often drove to Trondheim. In winter, studdeds were great, means you can both get about and stop when really needed. A thick glycol solution might also be an idea for the journey. We used anti-freeze good for minus 50 grader. Should be changed/retained etc., for Spring/Summer, we found, as it's just too heavy going in rest of year conditions. Har en bra resa!

 

[reidalpine]

Iain.. see, the world is just a tiny puddle. You say you lived in North of Sweden..Was it you I sent some 4L-stuff to in
Sweden some yr's ago?? In case,how is everything?-If not, How is everything? So you took over to Trondheim and Nor
way via Storlien.. then the chance is big we crossed
each others path there as I grew up in Trondheim and we used to go over to Østersund and Sundsvall quite often..

On your good tip re glycol..just remember not to mix over 50/50 as this gives even worse internal rust-proofing. Plus
not very good antifreeze function as a little less...

Niels,remember to fill her up with 98oct.petrol as this is the Only E0-choise. It doesn't say E5 or E10 on the pumps here
so filling lower grade than 98oct. you end up with watery/etanol-based Crapola..
Much like Stoly mixed with some Real bad grappa -Less the fist-fights! -R.

 

[Niels Svane]

Hi again Niels. Yepp it's Hard work living here but someone has to do it - right ?
PS:any chance you go past Stony on your way up here? -R.

Sadly my masters project and my girlfriends assignments (also in biology) seems to build up. We'll have to see if we are going at all. If Im going i'll visit stony first, to get some spares (and 4 new tires). But as it seems right now, the timeplan is going to be too tight when the university is taking its toll :|

 

[Niels Svane]

The alternative (which my girlfriend seems to like the most) is to grab my bmw k75 bike, and take a quick race to someplace warm in southern Europe

Just got the bike running again today (its sensitive teutonic fine-engineering you know = too much electric nonsense), so France might be a possibility instead.

You can say a lot of nice things about the R4, but an autobahn racer it will never be. To visit Italy for example would take some time . And in 6 months time when i'm out of university, I'll only have the 6 weeks a year for vacations...

 

[reidalpine]

I'd second your girl-friend here Niels. I'd taken the Triumph Thruxton and gone south in a sec too...
-It's getting chillier by the day up here -even down south/east where we live ,we've already had
down to +3C. early in the morning,so better save Norway for another not so chilly time.
Roffen the F4 isn't exactly holding up traffic,wasn't b4 and isn't going to be after new motor/gear
in either......

Anyhow; Ride fast but safely/-R.

 

[Niels Svane]

Haha, yeah we've had our +2 to +5C mornings this week too. Actually pretty nice as ive done some fieldwork (dronemapping) between 7 and 10 At midday the temperature was at 18 though
My R4 actually performs well at 80-90 km/h so its no farm-vehicle in regards of halting traffic.

So, lets see what it ends up with. Im down on motorcycle riding this year with just 700km on the bmw, and some 3000 on my now sold CB400f. A quick 1200x2 km would rectify that

And I always ride safely... Looking like a policeman in a neon west, with a large schubert helmet!