It’s been a slow couple of days, brought on by occasional showers, frequent downpours and torrential, heavens-opening, deafening, so this is what real rain looks like kind of sessions. Good days to catch up with some reading, some accreditation stuff, and start a series of taped shows. Today has been better, allowing us to walk around Kristiansand, only occasionally taking shelter under trees and, once, more expensively, in a coffee shop.

To end the day we are parked next to a greened area, lovely large park with lakes for swimming and a real network of walking trails. The area used to be a real dump (literally) before being cleaned up in the mid-1800’s by troops – cheap labour – and is now a great resource. Lots of people of all ages running, some obviously keen on beating a previous time, others more inclined to use a calendar for timing purposes, but all having fun.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Kristiansand has been an interesting stop, particularly along the waterfront. We visited one of Norway’s largest cathedrals – for free (SO unusual). The building itself is quite simple by Gothic church standards, but has that usual Norwegian sauna feel. The air is warm, the church smells of wood, it’s dry (not so saunish I know), and generally relaxing. I was particularly interested to see a model ship hanging from the ceiling – a gift from Denmark’s hereditary prince in 1964 on the 100th anniversary of the battle. The ship, Jylland (Jutland) is currently berthed in Denmark and is the last remaining wooden screw driven warship.

Also … Sorry we missed the organ recital this morning – we would have loved to hear this monster at work. How any one person can control all of this is simply amazing!

We are going to try find a less direct road to Oslo, but so far this is proving a little difficult. It’s also interesting to see that ferries from here to Denmark will probably be cheaper than driving south from Oslo – thinking for another day.

We’ve been taking our time to travel down along the coastal route 44 after Pulpit Rock, rather than the shorter and quicker E39. We are very happy to have done so as it is a completely different landscape, and well worth the time. The road has been unexpectedly good – wide, little traffic, excellent viewing points, which has made traveling in torrential rain a little easier. We are currently enjoying a free carpark right next to the sea, and in the coastal centre of the Norwegian Magma Geopark. Along the way we’ve passed through Norway’s agricultural heartland, before the Anorthosite intrusions noted below.

The area is characterized by Anorthosite outcrops, which give the area its very distinctive topography. Forming the base of a Himalaya like range and formed as a huge magma chamber some 930 million years ago and 20km below the earth’s surface (tough luck to any ‘young earth’ nuts). This has now been exposed, and recently glaciated, so the landscape has all the characteristics one would expect. The rock itself is exceptionally poor in minerals, and therefore is only minimally vegetated – and that leaves fantastic views of a myriad of lakes (hello Minnesota) and countless high outcrops. We’ve had a great day cycling through the area around Egersund, making great use of a break in the rain – and well-timed too as it pelted down again after our return.

Our parking spot is also unique. This precise area is the contact zone between the tidal waves from the English Channel and from north of Scotland, resulting in no tidal range – an ‘amphidromic point’. Live and learn. And apart from all the science, it’s just a really pretty place to be.

With a bit of luck with the weather we’ll follow up with a different cycle route heading out from Hauge and Sokndal – looking forward to this!!

We have overnighted at the quay in Sand, a lovely little village on the Sandsfjorden, as we return to our intended destination of Stavanger. The town lost its car ferry service in 2016 and is definitely showing the effects, with empty shop windows through the main street. Chief claim to fame is the ‘Sandsfossen’ an enormously powerful waterfall/rapid which empties the Sand river into the fjord. We spent a couple of hours watching salmon head upstream while hopeful fishermen cast their lines in the calm area below the falls. The strength of anything to move upstream through this weight of water, the turbulence, is simply awesome. When a huge salmon leaps clear of the water and you see its body torpedo up through the white cascades – wow!

We have done a 200km meander, a consequence of a bit of indecision on our part. We have a bit of time on our hands, so after leaving Bergen we decided to stick to the coastal road as we head south. I know it’s all coastal, but I mean the road running most coastal, over the islands rather than around the fjords. That took us over a completely different landscape, where glaciers have ground the hills flat, and the bedrock shows the earth’s skeleton. Stunning. So we overnighted at a lovely spot, level and protected from the wind, just off the beach at Rommetveit, then headed inland to Odda.

Along the way we stopped at Langfossen – I’m sorry that any photo we took simply couldn’t do justice. The falls are huge, 612m, and we could only manage to capture sections of it, given the road crosses the lower section. We continued up to Odda, one-time carbide capital of the world, and overnighted at the Trolltunga Hotel. Following the pattern we set in the UK, we had a beer, made use of the internet, and had a great night looking over the lake to our left, waterfalls right next to us, and the Hardangerfiord to our right. Norway just pops up these amazing overnight opportunities almost on a daily basis.

The drive down from Odda to Sand has been breath-taking. The road itself is generally good, albeit single lane width in many areas, but very light in traffic. Tunnel after tunnel, snow poles lining some sections – the poles are 3m high, and indicate just how much snow Norway’s premier ski region gets, steep climbs & descents – particularly in the tunnels (including a complete 360° drop) … We exited onto the road branching off towards Sand and things got even better! Lakes, cliffs, waterfalls … it just didn’t stop! Add to this that we were only doing 50km/h at best, and you end up with 2 hours of the most stunning scenery.

Our overnight, on the quay at Sand, has bettered expectation. There is a small beach not 50 meters away, our spot looks out over the harbour, we have an authentic old time sailboat as a neighbour, the sun is shining and there’s not a breathe of wind. We did wake up to a new neighbour this morning, though, and she certainly was noisy. Niki not happy at being up before sunrise.

Oh yes, we are back to sunsets and sunrises! I’m writing this as the morning sun streams into our lounge – and it actually rose far from where it set! We again have an East and West. We have seen the moon twice in Norway in over 2 months – who would have thought that my star app would be so absolutely useless?