Heading off to Scandinavia - Any tips

I hadn't seen that, but I'll definitely have a good look through :)
Thanks


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I`m very jealous

Norway is a brilliant place to ride, I`ve done most of the West coast 4 times now on my beloved R1150GS when you could get there on a ferry from Newcastle.
Don T mentioned most of the good rides but instead of the Lærdalstunnelen which is really interesting but in the end it`s a tunnel, do the Fv243 Bjorgavegan road From Aurland to Laerdalsoyri which is a fabulous road with some great hairpins and scenery. That road does the same route and not many people go on this road because there`s the tunnel now.

Geiranger You must do the road that goes down to Gerangerfjord and back up the other side which is route 63 and takes you to the trolls road via the Eidsal - Linge ferry.

You do these 2 roads before you get to the trolls road by which time it`s nothing special and you`re probably going to get stuck behind a coach going down it anyway. There`s a massive stopping place with cafes and shops at the top of it and everyone goes to see it because there are absolutely no other roads anywhere like it....yeah right.

I would advise keeping well away from Bergen as the traffic around there is stupid, I would imagine Oslo is probably worse. Those 2 places are where the vast majority of people in Norway live after all.

I'm already itching to get started

Thanks for some more suggestions of places to try. I had ( I can't find it now ) a great, large map of Norway and almost everywhere looks brilliant to ride. I read Don T's RR too, which just made the wait even worse

I'm going to 'do' Oslo for certain, as I like to stay in cities, as well as the countryside, but I'll only be there for a couple of days.

Judging by what I've already seen and read, this could become a regular trip :d

bergen is more confusing than london, i was there last week for a hospital appointment, your totally right, its norways second biggest city. i live on an island called stord, it between stavanger and bergen. its amazing here, mountains, waterfalls, lakes, fjords and a really awesome 7km tunnel with a forward facing speed camera. if you get the chance, visit sognfjord (you cant miss it) its actually my favourite place in the world, my inlaws are from there.

if the link works, thats sognfjord, the place i took the photo is called ramnaberg above a little town called feios

Oh I`ve gotta show some of my pictures.

The road down to Lysboten that Don T mentioned, there is a village down there but it`s a dead end. You can get a ferry from there to Stavanger which calls off at a couple of places. This was our first day ever in Norway so those hairpins were a bit scary, we got used to it by the end of the week. There`s a tunnel down this road which has a hairpin bend in it and Norwegians don`t like their tunnels too bright if you know what I mean :eek1




This is Latefossen, I wouldn`t like to work in them stalls, it`s quite noisy.



The weather can be a bit funny. We took a ride up to Dalsnibba viewpoint which looks across to Geiranger fjord, you have to pay to go up there and the road turns to just gravel half way up. This what we saw;



And this is what we should`ve seen



More pictures here http://www.tinwolf.co.uk/norway/

I've already changed my original route to include Lysebotn

I still have about eight weeks until I leave, so there's plenty of time to try and route all these suggestions....although I do only have four/five weeks for the whole trip

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVgiYlfuGNQ have a watch of this, thats the county i live in, as you see, its very beautiful here, the whole country is like that, i still find it breathtaking even now.
also try and see some viking stuff, its very interesting, near my inlaws house are several viking burial mounds
there is a viking camp thing near haugasund that ive heard is very good (not been there myself depite it being only an hour away
oh one more thing, its mandatory to have your licence and registration stuff on you here, its worth reading all the pages on http://www.vegvesen.no/en/Home also insurance is a little different here, check the small print of your insurance docs, here the bike is insured, not the owner if that makes sense?

AND.. dont let a norwegian licence holder ride your bike, the police can posess it (i know posess wasnt the right word, but my mind is fried today) its fine to ride a norwegian bike on a uk licence, just not the otherway round (i am a uk licence holder and ride a norwegian bike)
i hope my rambling is useful

Very good tip and you ( and others ) are being very helpful. thank you.

Can't wait to get on the road

i bet, im planning on going on a few trips this summer providing i get the VF sorted (ordered my sprockets today!) its such a beautiful place and i have hardly seen any of it

heres a little video of the roads round here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4AjowqUd114 that was 2 weeks ago, 20+ degrees, then last week it was minus 3 in the night, the weather is all over the place here

Good job I'm wearing Halvarssons and packing a Keis for the riding

After an year of enjoying this forum i had to register, so this will be my first post.
(forgive me for my bad grammar, writing in english isn't something i do too often.)

Getting an official measurement of your riding speed by a police is REALLY expensive in Finland too.
Oldbear allready warned you about the mosquitos in northern parts of your trip but i will do it again. They can drive a man insane in 15 minutes. Hat with a mosquito-net is something worth taking with you.

I'm planning to ride my first "adventure"-trip in mid-july as well.
Finland-Sweden-(west)Norway and maybe Denmark, i think that with too much planning it's going to be just a trip. (or that i'm just a bad planner)

Maybe I should buy shares in the company that makes Deet :huh

IMHO Ikaridin based repellents works like a charm.
There are 40 different mosquito species and over 40 different "sting-fly" species in Finland. Those "sting-flys" are 2-3mm little fuckers and their bite is a bit worse than a normal mosquito. Oh, and there are also ticks and horseflys....

Maybe some netting over me and the bike for the whole trip

my father in law got caught speeding through the tunnel here, the police car followed him for 10KM doing over 100KMH the whole way, not sure what the fine was, but he hasnt ridden since that. if you come to norway you are welcome to pop into motorsyklisten on stord, would love to hear stories about life on a bike in finland.

not so fun fact: mosquitos have anesthetic in their mouth things, which are also pointed, they numb the skin then bite, midges on the other hand throw up acid onto the skin of their pray, then they use a serrated mouth thing and chomp away at the now squishy infected skin until blood comes out.

My only major-plan is to suprise my cousin who lives in Sandnes. So just looking at the map tells me that Stord is going to be on the way.

And Op sorry for this little hijack. But if you need any help in Finland don't hesitate about asking for it. We Finns are strange not so much small-talking nation but our hearts are made from gold.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukS4opbHOFQ