Scandinavian Roadtrip - Sweden

August 2006

Ed note: You can see all my photos of Sweden. Just click on a photo you want enlarge and to see caption (constant rainfall prevented a comprehensive collection).

Twenty minutes later, we reached Helsingborg and drove off the ferry and into Sweden. Once we started to drive north along the fast and relatively empty Highway E06/20, the sunny weather disappeared to be replaced by intermittent rainy showers. The scenery was a continuation of Denmark’s greenery but with large clumps of forests breaking it up. There were enormous lumberyards of cut tree trunks, longer than three football fields and higher than a three story building. I had never seen so much timber in one place before. It was like someone had chopped up a dozen IKEA hypermarkets.

The Rough Guide introduced Sweden as a “large, geographically varied and strangely little-known country (we would get to know it better after Norway) whose sense of space is one of its best features. Away from the relatively densely populated south (relatively speaking in that the major highway seemed to have as much traffic as a main road in my home county of Norfolk which is very rural itself), travelling without seeing a soul is not uncommon. The south and southwest of the country are gently undulating, picturesque holiday lands, long disputed Danish territory and fringed with some of Europe’s finest beaches.”

We had hoped to find a campsite with a beach by the sea, but the heavy rainstorms forced us to keep going since it was impossible to pitch a tent in a puddle. Late in the afternoon, we pulled into Varberg, south of Goteborg and found an ATM to get some Swedish Kroner and explored an ICA supermarket to see how expensive Sweden was. We were surprised to find that food was generally the same price as in the UK if you were buying brand names. There was a cheaper ‘Euroshopper’ brand catering for the essential foodstuffs and even beer wasn’t much more expensive. Incredibly, petrol was cheaper in Sweden than in the UK (around 88p a litre).

The weather couldn’t make up its mind, and when the rain relented around 7pm, we immediately pulled into a cheap, run down campsite by the side of the motorway just outside Varberg, and Lori mobilised the kids to help her erect the tent as quickly as possible while I cooked another sumptuous meal (beans and sausages again everyone?). The campsite was virtually deserted.

The next morning, I was looking forward to reaching Norway within three days of leaving the UK. En route, however, we made a couple of detours. Firstly, we popped into Sweden’s second largest city, Goteburg (or Gottenburg as non-Swedish people usually call it). The outskirts were a series of large new industrial estates. Sweden’s most famous car company Volvo, is based here and up to 25% of the city’s population depend on it for either employment or it’s presence. Goteburg also has Sweden’s largest port

The central downtown area was an attractive, tidy series of broad avenues lined with tall, light coloured stone buildings, and broken up by parkland. There were trams dominating the roads which had a strange one way system. As a new tourist arriving by car, I ended up playing chicken with one. There I was thinking that I was in the correct lane when suddenly a tram headed towards us. “Why is that tram heading towards us?’ asked Lori as she glanced up from her street map. ’WHY IS THAT….YOU’RE IN THE TRAM LANE YOU IDIOT!” I managed to take an immediate right onto the proper car lane, narrowly avoiding a painful collision.

At another point, I ended up on a tram lane with a tram following me. This greatly amused the small ones in the back who thought a cat and mouse game had deliberately been invented for their amusement. Later still, unable to read the Swedish road signs, I went down a one way street the wrong way, as a local raised his eyebrows, shrugged and thought ‘Bloody English. Haven’t got a clue”.

When we had entered the downtown area, we had seen thousands of people walking towards a large sports stadium. Whenever you see lots of people all doing the same thing, you get interested. What’s going on? Must be something big. It turned out that the European Athletic Championships were taking place here – which explains why the city had large video screens of an athletic event going on. Doh! I fought the urge to say “OK. Itinerary change. We’re going to give our credit cards anorexia by buying a day pass so I can drink beer all day while watching the athletics” and we continued our exploration of the city.

Goteburg does not have any world famous sights, but is a very attractive city to visit. Dutch merchants helped to establish it in the Seventeenth Century and it does have a Dutch feel about it – it is surrounded by canal system which passes through the centre. The central windswept square of Gustav Adolfs Torg is flanked by the Dutch looking 19th Century Borshuset (Exchange Building), the 1672 Rathaus (Town Hall) and around the corner, the 1643 Kronhuset building.

We came across these sights by accident. Without a major sight to head for, I had asked Lori, while dodging the trams, what was in the city. She had just read about the bronze statue of Poseidon, which when erected in 1930 had an enormous, (how should I phrase this?) willy/dick/one eyed trouser snake. The citizens of Gottburg were outraged (well it was probably the men who felt inferior) and Poseidon’s member was eventually reduced in size (How? Did they file it down?). Trying to find Poseidon, which we did, was a great way of just driving around to see what you came across.

I liked cosmopolitan Gottburg. You can get really cheap flights from the UK and I think that it would be a lovely place to spend a romantic weekend. It had the bland comfort of Sweden yet still seemed to have retained its original character. Just watch out for those bloody trams.

Our other detour was north of Goteburg onto the island of Tjorn via a tall long suspension bridge with spectacular views over the local fjords. Then onto the tiny island of Kladesholmen which has a small pretty fishing village of lovely wooden cottages on steep inclines. The landscape around here is all pink granite islets which have been smoothed down. There are no trees either. We pottered around the narrow lanes past the cottages and down to the small pretty harbour. I think it is now protected by UNESCO as a traditional Swedish fishing village.

“Beyond the households names of ABBA, IKEA and Volvo, Sweden is relatively unknown. The largest of the Scandinavian countries, nearly as large as California and twice as large as Britain, it only has a population of nine million and is still one of Europe’s best kept secrets” (Rough Guide). So secret, in fact, that I didn’t know what was in the country and we made it up as we went along. Originally, the idea was to find a decent beach and hole up for a couple of days, but from the moment we arrived in Sweden, it started to rain and rained for most of the next few days.

We holed up at the plush Artus Campsite just out Lulea, only to find that the summer season had just officially ended (on August 16th? A bit earlier than the UK) and the swimming pool was shut. But it did have a beach. The problem was it also had rain the next morning, and there was little incentive to stay.

Near Lulea was the UNSCO protected town of Gammelstad. It looked easy to find on a map but once you got close there were no traffic signs for Gammelstad which turned out to be in a completely different place. Needlesstosay, we spent thirty minutes in the pouring rain trying to find a village ten minutes away.

Gammelstad was the original settlement of Lulea. The 1492 church is one of largest in this area of Norland and one of the most impressive in Sweden. On the outside were decorative brick and plaster gables and inside, the high altar was adorned with finely carved biblical scenes. The 1712 pulpit is the best thing – a splendid example of Baroque extravagance, its details trimmed with gilt cherubs and red and gold bunches of grapes.

Gammelsted died a death when its harbour silted up and the town was relocated to Lulea. However, some people stayed and what remains are four hundred small white wooden cottages gathered around the church along narrow lanes. It looked like a lovely place to live, though you can only live in a cottage if you were born in Gammelsted. Even people in Lulea must marry a local girl to gain the right to live there. Even the massive cemetery has flowers and plants blooming in front of every single gravestone.

We drove down Highway 4 …in the rain! I think it was on this day that I visited my first ‘IKEA’ warehouse – probably Sweden’s biggest export outside Volvo and ABBA. In the words of Forrest Gump “That’s all I got to say about that”.

It was a dreary journey south. Luckily, the sun came out for lunchtime when just outside Umea, we stopped at the Gammlia open air museum, where there was a 19th Century farm made up of buildings from around Sweden and the staff wore ye olde style clothes. There were sheep, horses, cows, pigs, chickens (and chicks) as well as some fantastic old wooden buildings to explore, including a 17th Century gatehouse. Some of the houses had demonstrations. A lady was baking unleavened bread in one of them. And the best bit was that it was all free to visit! This saved the day before the rain started again interspersed with sunny intervals.

Further south, we looked at Hoga Kusten (the ‘High Coast’), a hilly area of coastline with lakes, fjords and offshore islands. “The highlight of any trip up the Bothnian coast. This stretch of coastline between Harnosand and Ornskoldsvik is of striking elemental beauty: rolling mountains and verdant valleys plunge porecipitously into the Gulf of Bothnia, and the rugged shoreline is composed of sheer cliffs and craggy outcrops” (Rough Guide). Maybe, but in the rain, it looked nothing special, even though the cliffs have UNESCO status.

Sweden seems to have some of deal going with UNESCO. It has about twenty protected sites, yet when you see some of them, you think, it’s not exactly world heritage stuff. As a comparison, England has three UNESCO sites; Stonehenge, the Roman Baths in Bath and Blenheim Palace near Oxford. None of the Swedish sites were as good as those (apart from Drotthingham Palace) yet UNESCO gave them all international protection.

Near the end of the area region, we crossed the Angerman River via the High Coast bridge opened in 1997. The seventh longest suspension bridge in the world, with a span of 1210m and a height of 180m above the water. It is only 70m shorter than the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. It was a really impressive construction, but don’t tell UNESCO or they will put it on their list.

Sundsvall was famous for its original wooden town completely burning to the ground in 1888, which didn’t exactly expand its sawmill industry when the town was rebuilt of stone over the next ten years. We parked up at a campsite by a lake south of Sundsvall. The kitchen/toilets had been built on a slope so we got lots of climbing practice while holding pans, plates, food etc. The evenings were also getting darker earlier. It was black by 10pm.

On Friday August 18th, we had Stockholm in our sights, but it was a long tedious drive. Just north of Stockholm, we visited the hamlet of Gamla Uppsala where there are three hugh royal burial mounds dating back to the 6th Century and said to be of pre-Viking Kings; Aun, Egils and Adils. There were also three hundred small mounds and boat graves dating from 500-1100AD. Gamla Uppsala was the site of a heathen temple where human and animal sacrifices took place: Every ninth year, nine victims were killed and their bodies left hanging from trees until they rotted. Which was nice. This was replaced by Christianity in 1090. I hope they had got rid of the bodies by then. It’s a nice stroll past some large grassy lumps.

We also popped into Uppsala to check out the twin towered red brick Domkyrkan which is Scandavia’s largest Cathedral (if it isn’t Trondheim – Guide books differ). At least this was free. Started in the 13th Century, it was actually “built as a gothic boast to Trondheim in Norway that even their mighty church could be overshadowed, but loses out to its rival by its building material – local brick rather than imported stone” (Rough Guide). The spires were actually added in the 19th Century. Nevertheless it looked very impressive, especially inside, with a vaulted roof atop formidable white stone pillars and bathed in a golden decorative glow. .

Our tent had not dried out in three days for all the rain, so upon reaching Stockholm we first headed to a packed campsite in the suburbs at Angby, 10km west of the centre and pitched the tent and hung out damp, smelly washing. It was a lovely sunny day. We could have caught the metro into town but when I calculated it would cost us about £12, I decided to drive in and take my chances with the parking. (When we returned, we discovered a free sauna and after dinner, we sweated out the touring grime. The routine was repeated after breakfast as well).

“Stockholm is a bright and elegant place, and with its great expanses of open water right in the centre, it offers a city panorama unparalleled anywhere in Europe” (Rough Guide)

Stockholm comes lauded as Sweden’s most beautiful city and since it doesn’t have that many, I would agree. After days of just seeing endless lakes, forests and non descripit towns, it was nice to actually come across somewhere with some life. Built on fourteen small islands, Stockholm was a natural site for fortifications erected in 1255, that became the current city. It became the capital as the centre of the Swedish trading empire in the 17th Century.

The Stockholm festival was underway, and the city was packed with people. There was even street theatre which I thought had died a death in the 1980s. We drove around the old town, Gamla Stan looking for a parking space and eventually ended up two kilometres away on a back road near the History Museum. Since it was 4pm, we only had to pay a £1 for an hour and at 5pm got free parking all weekend. Bargain! For the next three hours we did a walking tour of Stockholm and the next morning drove around past other sights. In no particular order:

The first sight we saw (driving in) was Stadshuset, the Town Hall, which looks more like a large church, but its size is deceptive because it has two internal courtyards. The dominant brown-brick square tower is topped with a golden spire and the symbol of Swedish power, the three royal crowns. The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded inside every year. I passed on the £6 tour.

Three islands – Riddarholmen, Stadsholmen and Helgeandsholmen – make up Gamla Stan or Old Stockholm, a clutter of 17th Century and 18th Century Renaissance buildings, spiders’ web of streets and alleyways and old merchant houses , now really just a tourist city. The little island of Helgeandsholmen (Island of the Holy Spirit) contains the Riksdagshuset which is the Swedish parliament building.

Stadsholmen (City Island) contains some major sights including the 18th Century Royal Palace, Kungliga Slottet, which was constructed on the site of the ‘old’ royal castle which burnt down in 1697. By 1760, the remaining ruins had been hidden behind the new baroque exterior along with 608 rooms – still the largest royal castle in the world still used for its original purpose. You can still visit the state apartments for about £10. Fortunately, late in the afternoon, they were closed and my credit card breathed a sigh of relief. Royal soldiers marched around, sneaking cigarettes behind pillars.

Storkyrkan, the city’s cathedral and oldest building stands near the Royal Palace and was used for royal coronations. The brick built structure dates back to the 13th Century and also has a baroque exterior. Inside is a full size statue of St George and the Dragon. The Royal pews look like billowing thrones. There was a £2.50 admission charge for adults, so we sent in the kids for a look and hunted for the exit which was around the corner. When they came out, they held the door open and we sneaked in. A new low. I’m so ashamed. Tyska Kyrkan was a lavishly decorated German church paid for by wealthy medieval German merchants and had a copper topped red brick church with Baroque exterior.

Stortoget square – Gamla Stan’s main square, is crowded with 18th Century buildings painted in different colours. A group of people were offering Japanese back massages for £1 a minute (10/20 minute options). You had to sit up against a chair and have your neck/back pounded on, I’m not sure I would have felt relaxed having dozens of tourists watching me getting the treatment.

Riddarholmen (Island of the Nobles) was my personal favourite where Riddarholmskyrkan stood. Originally a Franciscan monastery, Swedish royalty has been buried here for the last six centuries. The small island of cobbled streets was deserted on a Saturday morning and very tranquil. The Riddarhomen contained the Riddarhurst where the Swedish parliament met in 17th Century until 1865. There are 2325 coats of arms belonging to Sweden’s nobility on display.

We drove around the Djurgarden (Royal Park – originally the 16th Century hunting ground) situated on another island which was lovely. Just after you crossed the bridge onto the island you pass the impressive looking Nordiska Museum (National Museum of Cuktural History) and the Vasamuseet – containing a completely restored 17th ship rescued from underwater.

Back in the ‘new’ centre, while driving around, we heard a military band playing. It was taking place in front of the Army Museum. There seemed to be some sort of inspection of the army going on. Then the mounted police led the band and the ‘army’ off through the streets of Stockholm towards Gamla Stan (to the Royal Palace?). It was also very tempting to take a boat trip around Stockholm to view it from the water, but it is just as nice to stroll around.

Overall, I’d say that Stockholm is a lovely city (more impressive than Copenhagen and Oslo) and I will have to return to do it properly. My account only covers some of the more famous stuff. I’d like to bring a wad of money and visit the museums and all the other sights we didn’t pay to go into. With two kids in tow, the expense would have killed us off and they would have been bored anyway. It was nice to get a general idea of what the city had to offer and know that it will still be there for us again.

We also visited ‘The Royal Domain of Drotthingholm’ – another UNESCO site and 10 minutes drive from the campsite. The impressive stately home bordered by a vast lake reflecting its vast image in the water, dates from 17th and 18th Century and was constructed on French models. The castle was lovely to look at but expensive to tour, so we walked around the grounds for free. Symmetrical miniature hedges dominated. No flowers seemed to be blooming but it was mid August. If you like duck shit, you will find plenty by the lake, along with massive numbers of shitting ducks.

Leaving Stockholm, we continued southwest down Highway 4 and turned south onto Highway 22. We came across the Gota Canal which transects much of Sweden with dozens of locks. In search of our elusive beach, our target was the island of Oland off south east Sweden – supposedly the sunniest part of Sweden. The Rough Guide was encouraging “unspoilt beaches, mysterious forests, pretty meadows and wooden cottages”.

It rained most of the way there and was still drizzling as we crossed the long 6km road bridge at Kalmer onto the long thin island. The rain god had taken the weekend off but now he was back and he was pissed. We saw lots of wet meadows, wet cows and wet old wooden windmills.

We pretty much kept driving north until the rain stopped temporarily and we pulled into Kopingbadens Camping somewhere around Borgholm. The owner was just about to shut up for the night. He was an ex-professional Swedish footballer. He had played many times in England during the 1970s UEFA cup. He remembered Wolves and Arsenal. He had also bagged a few Swedish caps. He was a kind, friendly man. He gave us coins for the shower (which should have been extra) and even gave Colin a job in the morning picking up litter. Thirty minutes work was rewarded with 20 Sek (£2.50) “to get an ice cream”. The campsite was right by a beach. It was completely dark by 9.30pm which was strange after the long nights last week. A wedding reception was going on in the nearby pub – it got very noisy with a drinking competition around 11pm and a rowdy send off for the bride and groom around 2am. How come I wasn’t invited?

Looking forward a day on a beach, we were welcomed by a grey and misty start to a Sunday morning. There was no point hanging around for non existent sunshine and by the time we got going, it was raining again. Bugger. Get me off this bloody island. So we got off the bloody island and travelled through the dense forests of the Glasriket area of Sweden inland from the coast. It is apparently the most visited tourist area for Sweden outside Stockholm and Goteburg, though admittedly, after Stockholm and Goteburg, you are hard pushed to find much worth visiting if it isn’t trees and lakes. And most of this area was trees anyway so don’t get too excited.

After Nybro, we drove to Orresfors and found their glassworks open, founded in 1898. Tourists come here to buy Swedish glass. Well, you would, wouldn’t you? So we became tourists and bought some of the (really) cheap stuff. Oh to be wealthy. I could have bought the shop. At Kosta, Lori demanded a visit to the Glasriket glassworks which started in 1742. When she saw the prices, she was glad that she had purchased the previous shop. We could have seen glass being blown but we had seen that before and I was more interested in not blowing my wallet.

It was one of those lazy unplanned (rainy) days. Where do we go and what do we do? We had decided to cross Sweden ready to start the inevitable route home. Alas, I would not sunbathe in Sweden this year and I would not visit the wonderful island of Gotland, further off the eastern coast and I would not visit the latest UNESCO World Heritage site of Karlskrona, an old naval fort on an island. So shoot me. It will still be there when I return.

However, we did come across a village called ‘Leesebo’ (Fnarr, fnarr), and further on or just before (I can’t remember), we spotted a lot of parked cars in what seemed like the middle of nowhere. We discovered that it was a ‘Moose Shop’ (Gronasens Algpark) selling Swedish ‘moose’ souvenirs – take a moose and turn every conceivable souvenir into a moose souvenir – cuddly moose toys (including my favourite snoring moose), moose fridge magnets, moose key-rings, moose skin rugs, moose ashtrays, moose thermometers etc. You could buy moose sausages and cook them on a BBQ.

There was even a ‘road kill’ area, depicting a real life size model moose and a car after a traffic accident. There were photos showing moose ‘road kill’ and the damage they can do. Take it from me, you don’t want to meet a moose in your car (does anyone remember the Woody Allen sketch on a moose on the bonnet of his car from his 1960 stand up act?). Somewhere in the grounds, there were live moose but you had to pay for that, so we spent the money on moose souvenirs instead. Unmissable and absolutely brilliant in a moose type of way. It wasn’t just us. Every passing car pulled in. It was one of those unique, intriguing places. A brilliant idea (for Swedish entertainment).I particularly liked the moose toilet sign (see photo). Much too good for kids. You heard it hear first!

Dragged away, I was forced to drive to the eastern coast to a peninsula north of Helsingborg. We were hoping to find a nice campsite but only found a village called ‘Krapperup’ (honestly – see photo) and eventually settled for an overpriced campsite at Orestrand on the coast between Hoganas and Mole. We were the only tent in the small campsite of caravans and cabins which was really a conference centre.

Today, there was a religious conference underway and the parents, while they sat in on seminars or whatever it is you do at religious conferences, had let their noisy kids run wild on the campsite. They were really noisy, and finding it hard to turn the other cheek, I was forced to yell obscenities at the loud uncomprehending 6-14 year old Swedish kids. Fortunately, when the parents finally emerged, they did not hear me muttering about taking their ‘Satan spawn’ away.

So on the good side, the Born Again crew departed with their spawn and all was well and quiet. Then the skied darkened big time and we were treated to a spectacular thunder and lightening storm over Denmark, whose coastline was visible to us. This was also good. We are talking ‘wrath of god’ thunderbolts and miles of black clouds. As we watched the sky break into flashes of light, we laughed, thinking ‘you poor schmucks.’ Then the storm seemed to turn and before we knew it, we were cowering in our sleeping bags while the tent took a real hammering. The lightening strike was so close, Lori described it as a ‘direct hit’.

In conclusion to my report on Sweden, I don’t feel as if I did it justice. At the same time, I’m not sure that there is that much to do justice to do. The lifestyle and quality of life of Swedes (ignoring the state taxes) is undeniably enviable. At the same time, they do not have the Fjordlands of Norway which are hard to beat. I’m sure I could get to like endless forests and lakes and there is lots of hiking available. Apart from Stockholm, nothing really stuck out as fabulous. Maybe the week of rain made everything look unexciting. Maybe it was an anticlimax after Norway. I will return to do Stockholm properly. I can’t say that I’m bothered about filling in the rest of the missing gaps.

Epilogue:

Ed note: You can see all my photos after Sweden. Just click on a photo you want enlarge and to see caption.

On Monday 21st August we drove to Helsingborg and eventually found the ferry (thanks for the signs…Not!) and crossed back to Helsingor in Denmark. Just as we had arrived, it was raining when we left. When we arrived in Denmark, the car mileage since leaving Norwich was 4970 miles.

We had given ourselves a two day return trip to make the ferry, allowing us to stop off and see a few things. With the continual rain, we drove from Helsingor, bypassing Copenhagen and then south down Highway 47/55 onto the island of Loland to the port of Rodbyhavn. I had crossed Loland on 1998 on the motorbike.

An hour long ferry took us across to sea to Puttgarden in Germany, which meant we could avoid having to re-cross Denmark. We had covered 5100 miles by now. The rain kept going all the way to Lubeck which I wanted to check out. Its old town (Altstadt) was an egg-shaped island surrounded by outer defences and a moat. We entered the Altstadt via the impressive 1477 built twin towered Holstentor, the city’s emblem and old gatehouse.

The trouble was that it was raining so hard that we were just forced to drive around and see what we came across without getting out of the car. Much of the town had been bombed during World War Two so reconstructions predominated. The Gothic Petrikirche was impressive with its tall spire (you can reach the top of the spire by a 50m lift inside). Nearby was the Rathaus (Town Hall) displaying Lubeck’s characteristic alternating rows of red unglazed and black glazed bricks. We also saw the Katharinekirche with its exterior of sculptures. Lubeck deserved more than a passing glance and I will have to add it to the eventual comprehensive revisiting of Germany – but not in the near future.

The intermittent rain drove us onto Hamburg, where the autobahn ring road was backed up for miles. We headed into the centre and then south, bypassing the jam. I have now driven through Hamburg twice and I still haven’t visited the Reeperbahn red light district to see where the Beatles used to play in the early 1960s. Add it to the list.

It seemed to take an age, but we pushed onto towards the Dutch border. When I ran out of petrol outside Osnabruck, I pulled in to refill and we hit a Lidls to splash out on German priced goodies as opposed to Scandinavian. We saw a camping sign but it led nowhere. Back in town, we followed another which led to Campingplatz Neidersachsenhof in the surrounding forests. It was nearly empty of people with no kitchen and no toilet rolls. The ground was squelching water and we were surrounded by rabbits. We managed to pitch the tent just before the rain started again, but I had to abandon dinner during the downpour.

It rained all night and was still drizzling the next morning. It was Wednesday 23rd August and time to go home. A drenched tent was packed away for a final time, and we motored on into Holland and headed for Arnhem. Arnhem is one of those places I had heard about from World War Two and the 1977 movie “A Bridge Too Far”. It was about time I went to see it.

We started at Oosterbreek (about 6km west of Arnhem). Here, we found the airborne cemetery where nearly two thousand paratroopers are buried, their bodies having been brought here from the surrounding fields after Operation Market Garden which commenced on Sunday 17th September 1944 (the D-Day of the Netherlands). The youngest grave we found was of a man who was just seventeen years, the oldest forty one years.

We spoke to a Dutchman who explained the ‘mistake’ of the strategy and who felt that the defeat was because of the commanding officers, rather than the troops, who had been led to believe that the Germans were not well armed (e.g. WW1 weapons) but they were He sang the mens’ praises for the fact that despite the odds they held the bridge at Arnhem for three days. He went to explain that he came every year for the anniversary but this year he would be staying away in protest – the Germans had been invited to lay a wreath and make a speech. Whilst he appreciated that relations between the allies and Germany are now OK, he could not accept them being there amongst ‘the boys’. He felt that it was wrong. Then we went to the John Frostburg bridge – the ‘Bridge too far’ – named after the commander of the battalion that defended it for four days…an ordinary bridge but symbolising so much for the British and Dutch. Lori felt that it was a very moving experience which brings home the horrors of war.

We carried on towards Belgium and Brussels. Considering how close it is to the UK, I had last visited Brussels back in 1987 when I used to take tours around Western Europe. We parked near the Cathedral and walked to the Grand Place – a beautiful square full of guild houses. Only one survived the 36 hour bombardment by the French in 1695 the rest were rebuilt in the early 18th Century and are still here. I could go into great detail about it, but would prefer to save it for a specific trip to Brussels. We left the square to see the Mannekin Pis, a small statue of a little boy having a wee – said to embody the ‘irreverent spirit’ of the city. The original was cast in the 1600’s but was stolen many times so the one we see today is a copy.

We retraced our steps back to the cathedral which was an impressive building begun in 1220. It has a massive oak pulpit inside. We also drove past the European Parliament. I stopped the car for a photo and had barely got out when security pounced – “Excuse me sir but you can’t stop here.” “Its OK, I’m not stopping and I hope you appreciate all the money we give you!” We drove on into Brussels rush hour. At least the rain held off. Brussels was left as another city worthy of another visit for a day/weekend at a later date.

Driving onto Dunkirk in France, we filled what little space we had with cheap French wine. Onto the port and check in. At British immigration I was asked to open the boot of the car. “Its open, you can open it”. “No sir I would like you to open it in case anything gets broken” so I got out to open it where all the wine bottles lay in the boot. “Thank you sir, just as I thought” and we were on our way. The boat left on time and we were back in Norwich by 4.30am. We had crossed or explored eight countries and four capitals in two and half weeks! By the time we returned to Norwich, we had covered 5,947 miles (not including distances covered on ferries).

I will leave overall thoughts to Lori just to make a change from my boring opinions:

Norway - a lovely country – especially in the sun. Worth recommending and worth another visit but very expensive. Campsites fine – toilets clean and free!

Finland - too brief would need to see more and would love to see it in the snow. Santa experience fun.

Sweden – lovely in the sun but awful in the rain! Campsites suffer from flies/midges take mosquito repellent. Different landscape to Norway lots of trees and lakes. Not really interested on returning except maybe to Stockholm for a weekend.

Denmark – very ‘fen like’ – flat and agricultural. Again was only a brief visit. Lego land was OK but nothing special – just another theme park. Might be worth a visit to see the towns but I’m not convinced.

Roadkill: Rabbits – 4, Birds – 6, Cats – 2, Badger – 1, Bird of Prey – 1, Fox – 1, U.F.A. (unidentified furry object) - 1

Travel - £785.27 (nearly 6000 miles driving)
Accommodation - £193.42 (all campsites)
Food - £86.77 (no meals out)
Other - £28.61
Total - £1094.09