Friday 27 May 2011

The campsite I am at now does not have internet so I don't know when this will be posted, I'm here for two nights as well.

I forgot to mention that as I entered the Roskilde camp site there was a red squirrel leisurely crossing the road, very pretty with a big bushy tail.

I really must check times, I got back to the library soon after 9.00 am to discover it didn't open until 10.00. The car park near by was virtually empty probably because most of the shops also did not open until 10.00 however I had a nice stroll along the main shopping street window shopping then going into a supermarket that was open to get some provisions. As this was the last day in Denmark on this part of the trip I thought I ought to buy some bacon. I returned to the library for opening time, finished the blog, transferred some photos to my home computer and up[loaded a few to Flickr. Finally left Roskilde at 11.00 heading for the ferry at Helsingør that would take me to Sweden. Hamlet's castle was based on the one at Helsingør.




The ferry was even called Hamlet, one of many ferries criss crossing the short distance between Denmark and Sweden.






From Helsingborg I headed north. I was due at Brit's house on Saturday morning, Brit is Sarah's uncle's, brother's daughter and she is kindly going to put up with me for a couple of days. Now I was in Sweden I could more easily assess the situation and after rereading the email from Gavin (Sarah's cousin) I decided to head another 200 miles further to Mellerud which is on the shores of a lake. I think the lake might be called Vänern however my map seems to give it three different names. Gavin said that there was a very good craft shop nearby and that the area is gorgeous. I can stay for two nights and then it should only be a 50 mile drive on Saturday morning to Halden.



Some things about the drive to Mellerud.  

I do not wish to go anywhere near Göteborg again, leastways not until they have sorted out their traffic management. It took about 45 minutes to go about 8 miles on a dual carriageway. The other carriageway was also stop-start and every road we crossed I could see was nose to tail traffic. I remember that when we were here over 20 years ago it was very bad.


The sign above the road said not to exceed 30 kph, oh to reach those heady heights!

As I came over a hill the view looked familiar, I stopped to take a couple of pictures of Fluffy posing. Remember this Sarah?




It was not long before I saw the first road sign warning me of low flying elk, well something like that, but I have yet to see one. I am hoping to some time during this trip and not just ones in captivity.

I noticed that the power lines hung very low between pylons, I guess that is because their winters are colder and they will contract that much more…well I thought it was interesting, feel happy I didn't take a picture of some random wires!

Once off the motorway I lost track of the number of speed cameras. many more than in most areas of the UK but these were much less obtrusive, no garish yellow boxes but just slim poles. The sat nav warned me of every one but the campervan rarely made the speeds they were checking any way.

In the countries so far visited the terrain has been fairly level but the camper had its first small tests today. On the motorway my usual speed of 50-55 mph dropped down to about 42 mph on one long haul but I managed to overtake a couple of lorries that had previously overtaken me. I think these were the first overtakings I had done since Holland! Later on a more minor road and a steeper hill the speed dropped to 26 mph however I didn't need to drop down a gear as it was still pulling fine and as the slope eased we accelerated away again. I have no doubt that there will be some much steeper hills to cope with later.

Made it to the campsite which looks very quiet, a farm house, a few buildings and some well spaced out camping plots most of which are empty. Almost time for bed and it has started to drizzle but I don't mind.


2 comments:

Sarah said...

Yes Paul, I remember. :o) I hope any encounters with elk are of the slow and ambling variety. Enjoy the craft shops! xxxxx

Mike said...

I love your optimism Paul, I would not call 26 mph in top "Pulling Fine"
:-)
Cheers

Mike