Author Archives: Greg

North to Oslo

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We woke up in our tent with a bit of a cloudy day, but the cloud soon lifted and we had a another warm day. We drove back to the Freeway from our forest camp (we were only camped about 4km from it) and headed north. We needed to get more supplies in cheap Sweden before we got to expensive Norway. We stopped at a holiday town of Stromstad, just south of the border with Norway. In the nice town of Stromstad we found other people doing the same as us, stocking up before Norway. There was a large supermarket with camper vans and other travellers parked outside, buying cheap Swedish food inside.

After getting another few more days food (we have about 8 days), and petrol, we then drove north, and crossed the Norwegian border. At the border there was customs. We had 19 cans of cheap Swedish beer, and 2 cans of cheap Swedish meatballs, did that count as something we should declare? Luckily we didn’t have to answer the question as no-one on Sunday was manning the customs booth.

We paid our first of many Norwegian road tolls. 23Kr (about $4) at the border, and then about 3 more of another 23Kr-30Kr that will be charged automagically on our credit card at some future date. We got to Oslo and headed for our third airbnb accommodation.

This airbnb did not go as well as the previous two. The complication with Airbnb is you have to meet someone to get a key. In this case the owner was on holidays and we had to meet someone else to get the key. The someone else was in the middle of the city, and our experience of Oslo is it is very hard to go straight between two points. Oslo is a city of cul-de-sacs. Our mobile phone was sending SMSs but somehow not receiving them. The person we were picking the key up from was not totally sure where the apartment was. Anyway, all the running around took 4 hours. We eventually got into our very nice but sparsely furnished apartment at 6:30pm.

As for Norwegian prices? Well it cost $A2 to go to the toilet at Oslo Central Station. A good way of comparing countries costs is to compare the cost of fast food. The Big Mac index is used to compare living costs worldwide. A Big Mac meal in Australia costs about $A8, in Oslo it costs $A16. Fuel costs $A2.70 a litre.

Judy using the internet

Judy using the internet

Loading up supplies in cheap Sweden before reaching expensive Norway

Loading up supplies in cheap Sweden before reaching expensive Norway

 

 

Our Ocean Cruise

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Judy found out that to go back to Sweden we would  have to pay another $A60 toll on the Øresund Bridge, so we decided to go on an ocean cruise instead. We headed north out of Copenhagen (the GPS getting us lost several times), and headed for Helsingor in northern Zealand. It was saturday, and we got caught up in some road works on the way. We arrived at Helsingor put our credit card in a ticket machine and drove our car on the ship for an ocean cruise!

We wanted to swim in the pool, but there wasn’t one, and we were going to have a haircut, but there wasn’t time, we just had time to walk out on the back deck, and it was time to get down to the car and drive off. Total cruise time 20 minutes.

We had arrived in Helsingborg Sweden.

View of Helsingor from Cruise Ship (ferry)

View of Helsingor from Cruise Ship (ferry)

Greg enjoying the 1st class deck on the Cruise Ship.

Greg enjoying the 1st class deck on the Cruise Ship.

 

 

We then headed up north towards Gothenburg. We got supplies for crossing into Norway. All our reading says Sweden is much cheaper than Norway, so we stocked up to make sure. We continued north until we are about 200km south of Oslo, but still in Sweden. We found another nice campsite in the forest.

last-camp-sweden

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Bicycles in Copenhagen

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Cargo-bike-canal

We got to Copenhagen yesterday in the early afternoon. We had booked another apartment with airbnb and met the owners daughter at the apartment in Valby, about 3 km from the centre of Copenhagen. After checking out the shops in the local areas we headed into central Copenhagen. The next day Thursday we walked into the city and hired a cargo bike, and Judy volunteered to be the cargo. It was a nice day (about 19C) and we rode all round the centre of Copenhagen, visiting the closed because of renovations Noma restaurant (number one Michelin restaurant). The number of people riding in Copenhagen has to be seen to be believed. There are more people riding on just a few streets of Copenhagen then there is in all of Adelaide.

There is no Lycra, no cleats, no road racing bikes, no helmets, and no drop down handlebars. Ordinary people wearing ordinary clothes and ordinary shoes riding around. It is one of the safest places to ride a bicycle in the world. Adelaide South Australia is not as safe to ride in, and we have compulsory helmet laws. Bikes have baskets, carriers and more, so things can be carried on the bikes like shopping, and cargo bikes abound for carrying children around.  There are great bike paths along side the road, mostly with a raised curb separating the bike path from the road.

 

Bikes in double level bike racks at a railway station near our apartment

Bikes in double level bike racks at a railway station near our apartment

The cargo bike outside our apartment. Notice the rows and rows of bikes that are parked outside every apartment building

The cargo bike outside our apartment. Notice the rows and rows of bikes that are parked outside every apartment building

 

 

Judy outside the closed for renovation noma restaurant

Judy outside the closed for renovation noma restaurant

Steak for lunch in Copenhagen, all the way from the Coorong in South Australia

Steak for lunch in Copenhagen, all the way from the Coorong in South Australia

 

 

 

 

 

On the road

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camped-sweden-1st-night

We picked up our (tiny) rental car this morning and by lunchtime we were on the road. We have driven about 450km south along the E4 towards Copenhagen, We detoured next to one of Swedens lakes. There are two lakes in the west one little and one large, we drove down the coast of the little one, it was enormous. You could barely see the far shore,

As it got later we started looking for campsites. Sweden (and Norway and Finland) have a law called :”Allmansrätten” or public right of access. This means you can camp all sorts of places as long as you follow some basic rules. We eventually went down a little country road, followed a dirt track into a pine forest and found a nice quite place to camp next to a creek.

Tomorrow we get to Copenhagen.

 

Walking Stockholm

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The Stadsbiblioteket Stockholm the central city Library, circular and designed in the 1920s

Tim Winton books in the Stockholm Library

Tim Winton books in the Stockholm Library

 

Australia wine in cardboard containers

Australia wine in cardboard containers

 

Stockholm arrival

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We arrived in Stockholm at Arlanda airport on time, after leaving home 30 hours before. We waited at the luggage carousel and got our first bag (mostly camping equipment), but the second bag never appeared. We were waiting with a few other people whose bags also didn’t appear, and after a about twenty minutes we found out that they were never going to appear. We found out one of our two bags was sitting at Heathrow Terminal 5.

We put in a form for the missing bag, and then got a Taxi from the airport to Kista. We has a great Iraqi taxi driver who not only took us to the right place but rang George the person we were meeting to make sure that it was the right place. Every Swedish person we have met so far has been very friendly.

We are staying in an apartment in Kista that we arranged on AirBNB. It is basically student accommodation in a building over the top of the Galleria shopping centre. The apartment is an Ikea size 25 square metres, but it has a kitchen so we can save some money cooking food ourselves. There are 3 supermarkets in Galleria, and prices are similar in most cases to Australian supermarket prices.

The 25 square metre apartment

The 25 square metre apartment

Judy-shopping-swedish-supermarket

Judy choosing bread in a stockholm supermarket