Well we’re back now after 10 awesome weeks on the road and we really have had such a brilliant time. The scenery in Scandinavia, especially Norway, is as amazing as they say. There really aren’t enough superlatives to do it justice. We made it up to just past the Lofoten Islands, but as planned opted not to go all the way to Nordcap after hearing from other travellers that its not really worth the driving, especially with young children. The boys had a whale of a time and loved playing outside all day long, and for me and Amy it was great to be back on the road again.
Scandinavia is probably the easiest places to travel in the world, they all speak english, there are supermarkets everywhere, the roads and general infrastructure are excellent and there really aren’t many challenges. In fact a lot of the dirt roads we drove on had less potholes than the main roads around Derbyshire…. Bearing in mind we were travelling with a 2 and 4 year old the ease of travelling was what we were looking for on this trip, although I think we both felt by the end that there wasn’t enough of a challenge in the travelling.
The truck performed brilliantly, as I expected she would. We got a crack in the windscreen in Latvia that I repaired with superglue which amazingly got us home without it spreading, despite the sh*t roads in Poland, and as usual the oil pressure gauge showed some weird reading but i’ll do a different post about that another time as i’m interested to get the thoughts of the experts out there.
The only problem, well sort of problem, was with the wild camping. Scandinavias' ‘Right to Roam’ laws mean you can camp anywhere, and we had planned to wild camp most nights, however the problem is that there are really very few wild camping spots that are suitable with a ground tent. We kind of knew we were at a disadvantage not being in a roof tent but 2 year olds and roof tents don't mix so we really had no choice. But, finding a flat, grassy, not waterlogged and not agricultural bit of land big enough for a truck and a 4 man tent away from the main road was pretty bloody difficult. Also the time of year didn’t help as the melt water meant all the rivers were in flood. Anyway the result was that while me managed to find a few wild camp spots, we didn’t do anything like as much as we would have liked. In a roof tent we would have had much more success, especially without the boys and roads to worry about, although in all honesty if you want to experience the best vehicle wild camping you need a camper van (and if you were able to hike with overnight supplies the wild camping would be out of this world).
Which brings us to the second niggling point, there are SO many camper vans and even more motor homes, especially in the busier areas, that you can’t pass a single lay-by without there being a line up motor homes. This was especially bad in the Lofoten Islands where at one particular lay-by we saw 22 motorhomes parked next to each other. Not exactly wild camping….
Anyway, despite the whinging above, it really was a brilliant experience and an amazing thing to do as a family. And the best thing of all is that we have proved to ourselves that we can do it. This trip was always going to be a test trip of sorts and now we know we can go overloading as a family our attention turns to the real goals which are the Pan America, the Africa West coast route, or the ‘stans (probably not all at the same time tho)
Anyway, a few photos as I know you all love photos.