Spain to Norway on a Bike Called Reggie

by Andrew P. Sykes

  THE THIRTY-FIFTH DEGREE

  70°–71°10'21'' NORTH

  25–28 July

  I crossed over the seventieth degree of latitude for the first time about 25 km into the morning's ride from Sekkemo after a climb to over 250 m and a freewheel ride back down to sea level. It was to be the only serious hill of the day. My main physical battle was against the wind, which, after I turned east to cycle along the Langfjord, was doing its best to push me back to where I had started. I persevered and won. It wasn't easy, dressed as I was in my full waterproof body armour. The drivers of passing vehicles must have questioned the wisdom of cycling anywhere in such wet and windy conditions. It was certainly what I was thinking myself.

  Before setting off I had spent a while admiring the time and effort that Hans and Veronika had put into preparing what I considered a lavish breakfast. My own strategy of buying a banana and pastries, and washing them down with coffee from a local shop or café had worked well on almost every day since leaving Tarifa. Until now. No longer was it easy to find those shops and cafés, and although on this occasion Hans had offered to share what they had, it didn't seem fair for me to guzzle down their food so I politely turned down his offer. Perhaps I shouldn't have been so courteous, as I was still searching for a place to buy my own breakfast after having cycled over 80 km.

  Salvation came in the form of a Coop supermarket at about 1 p.m. Unfortunately, I managed to time my arrival at the only checkout just moments after a coachload of Spaniards. So desperate were my taste buds to consume something other than water that, while waiting to be served, I opened and drank the entire contents of the bottle of Coke that I was holding.

  'Sorry, do you speak English?' I asked the girl when it was finally my turn. She smiled and shook her head but I continued anyway. 'You haven't charged me for the Coke,' I explained.

  'Å pante…' she replied, pointing to a hole in the wall near the entrance. It was a 'reverse vending' machine where empty bottles could be inserted and the deposit returned in the form of a voucher.

  'No…'

  Lacking the mental energy to try to explain through words, I mimed taking the bottle from the shelf and drinking it, much to the bemusement of a few Spanish stragglers who were now behind me in the queue.

  After all those days on the road, I remained, at heart, a somewhat inept traveller. At least it felt that way.

  With the confusion sorted out, I went outside to eat what I had bought, only to be joined on my bench by two of the Spaniards, who lit up cigarettes. I gave them a hard stare but it had no effect. I couldn't believe that at this late stage of the journey I was having another Mercedes day. I should have been jubilant, joyful, eager, enthused to be within touching distance of Nordkapp. Yet I wasn't. I put my grumpiness down to lack of sleep, lack of food, the weather and the uninspiring landscape through which I was passing. It was in complete contrast to what I had experienced elsewhere since leaving Tromsø.

  A tunnel from which cyclists were banned was the icing on the cake. The alternative route added an extra 10 km to the cycle but the incident had me reflecting upon distances travelled more generally and, when I sat down at the campsite later in the day near Alta, I noticed that I had now cycled 7,500 km. Having seen a nearby sign informing me that the distance from Alta to Nordkapp was only 240 km, I realised that my initial back-of-an-envelope guestimate had actually been quite accurate. That brought a smile to my face. As did clean clothes and warm food.

  Hans and Veronika's efforts with breakfast had inspired me to make more of an effort with my evening meal and I went inside the campsite kitchen to conjure up a feast fit for someone who was about to finish cycling the length of a continent. My attempt was familiar – 'fresh' pasta (from a packet) and pesto, bread and cheese – but not bad. However, it paled into insignificance compared with what my fellow campers in the kitchen had knocked up. They were all from a large Italian family that spanned across at least three generations and their evening meal could have been served up in a restaurant. It was, it seemed, a day when I was never going to win.

  It was now Sunday morning and I was keen not to be left bereft of breakfast for a second consecutive day. However, a cycle around the deserted centre of Alta revealed nowhere to buy so much as a cup of coffee. On my map I noticed a large airport to the north of the town; it was the one from where Hans and Veronika were planning on flying south. Surely there must be something open there.

  I was saved by an Esso garage near the entrance of the airport. Outside I bumped into a young Norwegian cyclist who had just arrived from Nordkapp.

  'How was the tunnel?' I enquired. It was now my stock question for anyone I met who was travelling south.

  'Hard: three km down at nine per cent, then a little bit flat, then four km up at ten per cent,' he explained, adding a little detail to what I knew already. 'But for you it should be easier going from south to north.' He made a good, if minor, point.

  I stopped for a second time only a few hundred metres down the road at a Shell station, this time to stock up on chocolate. The 100 km road from Alta to Olderfjord, along which I was about to start cycling, appeared on my map to be as remote a road as I had yet to encounter. Two large bars of chocolate should see me through any dietary emergencies. Once supplemented with more food from a small supermarket slightly further north that had, by some miracle, chosen to open on a Sunday morning, my survival seemed guaranteed.

  As I moved away from the western side of the peninsula, I also began to climb. The gradient was never severe but it had been quite some time since I had been required to maintain such a constant and prolonged effort on the bike. Momentary relief came when I arrived at a large lake where the road flattened out and I could begin to catch my breath. For a few minutes I relaxed.

  I had been noticing birds of prey high in the sky all morning; their presence indicated just how remote the area was becoming. Beside the lake it was no different and, as I cycled, I watched one bird as it descended to its nest high on the cliff ahead of me on the left. Or rather that's what I thought it was doing. As I approached the section of the road nearest to the cliff, the bird continued to descend. It then pulled away sharply and climbed, but not for many metres, before once again swooping down. It repeated this action three or four times, on each descent getting closer to… my head.

  I suddenly realised that the large brown bird in the sky was aiming its displeasure at me. Either that or it saw in me a hefty lunchtime snack. Somewhat alarmed at a distant, graceful and majestic animal becoming a rather frightening sharp-taloned beast only a few metres from my scalp, I started to cycle as I have rarely cycled before. Such was the proximity of the bird that I could hear its wings flapping above my head. Would this be it? After over 7,500 km, thwarted in my efforts to reach Nordkapp by a… bird?

  I dared not look behind me but in front I could see a small wood beside the lake. Two people were sitting on its shore. The cover of the trees should, I reasoned, dissuade the bird from pursuing me and if it didn't, the two people could help me to fight it off before it started plunging its beak into my flesh.

  'Did you see that?' I panted, my voice shaking. I had dispensed with any pleasantries and assumed they could speak English.

  'Yes, it was very interesting,' replied the man, calmly. 'I don't understand why the bird has chosen to nest by the road,' he mused.

  'It was attacking me,' I gasped.

  'You were never in any danger. It just wanted to scare you off.'

  'Do you know what breed of bird it was?' I asked, my heart still racing.

  'I think in English it's called a rough-legged buzzard.'

  I didn't know whether to be more impressed at the man's relaxed manner – he had, after all, just witnessed a near-death experience, or so I thought at the time – or the fact that he, as a Norwegian, knew the English for 'rough-legged buzzard'. It had been a disturbing incident.

  I remained wary of birds, but animals rooted to the ground would be far more prevalent as I edged north.
Within a few minutes of leaving the wood, I noticed an elk beside the road. My pulse quickened slightly. Remembering the conversation I had had with the woman after my previous elk encounter north of Oslo, I was relieved that the adult was by itself. Then, on the other side of the road, I spotted a small elk, presumably the adult's calf. I hesitantly moved into the centre of the road and slowed to a crawl. Thankfully, they both ignored me.

  After having reached the high point of the day, the road descended slowly back in the direction of the eastern side of the peninsula. The landscape had now changed radically. Gone were the trees; low-level vegetation covered the ground and in the distance, dark mountains gently rose to meet the sky. This, I assumed, was perfect for the reindeer that wandered, seemingly aimlessly, in herds across the land, their bells jingling as they strolled. They ignored me too. I much preferred it that way.

  At Skadi the road split into two, with the E6 continuing east. This was the first settlement I had encountered since moving away from the west coast and I paused at a large café for a mid-afternoon break. The bikes outside were familiar; I found Hans and Veronika chatting to a Polish cyclist inside.

  'I've cycled from Irun in Spain,' he explained, 'and I haven't washed for two weeks.'

  I noticed Hans raise an eyebrow, while Veronika struggled to keep a straight face.

  We all agreed to cycle together to the campsite at Olderfjord, which was by then only 20 km away, but when we arrived, the Polish chap had disappeared. I guessed that staying somewhere with hot running water just wasn't his style.

  All that remained was to cycle the 100 km to Honningsvåg on the Monday, stay overnight in the town and complete the short 30 km ride to Nordkapp itself on the Tuesday morning.

  The weather had got into a rhythm of one day OK, one day bloody awful – and so it was to continue. Had I ever cycled in such appalling conditions? I doubted it. I fortified myself before heading out into the wall of water by indulging in a three-course breakfast in the restaurant at the campsite-hotel. The map gave every indication that there would be no opportunities to buy food before arriving in Honningsvåg; the road would be as coastal as it could be without falling into the sea until it shimmied around the headland and plunged into the horrors of the Nordkapp Tunnel. Close inspection of the map also revealed a second long tunnel immediately before Honningsvåg but it was, at least, not an undersea one.

  Was I procrastinating? It seemed highly likely. Eventually, with a heavy stomach, but a growing sense of excitement, I set off, leaving Hans and Veronika still cooking their breakfast in the campsite kitchen.

  The headwind made cycling in the heavy rain painful. I can only imagine I would have stayed drier and warmer if I had volunteered to have buckets of cold water continuously thrown in my face for five hours. The road had been cut into the cliff, revealing fascinating layers of geological history. In order to drag my mind away from obsessing about the tough cycling conditions, I tried to imagine how and why each layer had been deposited. It's usually the case that such slices of world history are evidence of the area being part of a tropical forest or sea. Really? Here? Could things have changed so drastically over the course of hundreds of millions of years? Yes, they probably could, but it did seem to be a line of thought so utterly removed from reality.

  In the back of my mind was the tunnel – THE tunnel – the Nordkapp Tunnel. As envisaged, it was tucked away from the coastal road but visible after a short cycle over the headland. As with all the tunnels through which I had cycled, from a distance its simple exterior appearance was understated.

  Then came the warning signs.

  Tåke i tunnel

  Fog in tunnel

  Low Gear

  9%

  Before a final confirmation of its vital statistics:

  6870 m

  212 m.u.h.

  After pausing to switch on and check my lights, I entered the black hole.

  Initially, it was a relief to be inside, out of the rain and wind. But not the cold. The chill was immediate, as was the incentive to keep moving to try to maintain at least some warmth. Yet with a nine per cent hill in front of me, gloom all around and a wet, potentially slippery surface beneath the bike, I couldn't help but grip the brakes tightly.

  Traffic was mercifully light – this just wasn't the day for a casual drive to the northernmost point of the Continent – but when a car or coach did appear, such were the crazy echoes that it was impossible to tell from which direction they would emerge. Eventually, I could feel the road surface flatten out and there was a modest sense of elation at having completed one of the three stages of this tunnel of terror.

  Then came the stark realisation of where I was and what was above me, 200 m below the level of the sea. The lowest point of the trip from Tarifa. How can this be a good thing? What is keeping the rock above me in place? What would happen if…? No. Those were not good thoughts.

  Part 3 was the long climb, all 3 km of it. I had already been in the tunnel for over 15 minutes and was keen to gasp fresh air. How could anyone cycle through here and not experience a few moments of claustrophobia? Experiencing more than my fair share, I felt the bike zigzagging slightly from side to side as I attempted to make the incline more hospitable. One slipped zigzag… Stop thinking the unthinkable!

  Then, in the distance, was the light and after a few minutes I emerged into the open. The wind and the rain returned but the chill abated; I had been underground for over 30 minutes. It had been an experience I wouldn't, indeed couldn't, have avoided but also one that I had found simply bone-chillingly scary.

  The light at the end of the tunnel was, of course, of double significance. It had signalled the end of a thoroughly unpleasant section of the ride but also my arrival on the island of Nordkapp. Now I just needed to find Nordkapp itself.

  Via the second, much less threatening, tunnel, I cycled into the centre of Honningsvåg and found a café where I was able to eat, warm up and, to a certain extent, dry out. The plan had been to stay on the campsite but, bearing in mind the poor weather conditions, I decided to reserve a room at the local hostel. I had been in the tent for 16 consecutive nights and had earned the right to reacquaint myself with a mattress for one final time before the end of the trip.

  My guidebook spoke glowingly of Honningsvåg but I was struggling to see its charms. Dominating the seascape were two large cruise ships, one of which was a Hurtigruten; it would be from here that I would start my journey south early on Thursday morning. After all this time on two wheels, it was strange to be contemplating a long journey by any other means.

  When I arrived at the five-storey hostel on the edge of town, Hans and Veronika had caught up with me and, for similar reasons to mine, they too had opted out of camping. We compared notes on a journey that had been just as gruelling for them as it had been for me and looked forward to the final push the following morning. Although the forecast looked promising, I still worried that the clouds would prevent us from witnessing the fabled midnight sun. Experiencing that was, perhaps, hoping for too much.

  As with the other Norwegian islands along which I had cycled, Magerøya, the island of Nordkapp, had its own unique identity. I set off at 9 a.m. and within a few kilometres was climbing through a treeless landscape. The mountains were all now behind me and here hills rolled modestly over the contours of the rock from which they had been formed. Herds of reindeer and elk roamed in the distance, wisely keeping themselves away from the road and its traffic of cars, motorhomes and, of course, bicycles like Reggie.

  The drama of Magerøya came in its location, isolated from the rest of the continent – a point where the land stopped, and the sea started and continued for many thousands of kilometres on a journey to the North Pole and onwards to the northern shores of Alaska. My own journey had started within sight of Africa but when I glanced to the west, to the east and, as I neared the cluster of buildings at Nordkapp itself, to the north, I could see nothing but a vast expanse of water.

  It was approaching midd
ay on Tuesday 28 July and the journey was entering its final few minutes. These were the precious moments that I had found almost impossible to imagine as I cycled along the causeway in Tarifa. The blank canvas of events was now nearing completion. As Reggie's tyres rolled over the loose gravel surrounding the Nordkapphallen tourist centre, my mind was split between looking back over the 7,776 km cycled and forward at the remaining 100 m. It was a confusing mix of memories and emotions but as I slowed to a halt next to the iconic metal globe on its plinth, the overriding feeling was that of calm satisfaction. I had been travelling for nearly four months. I had achieved my objective. I had arrived.

  I dismounted from Reggie and went to sit on Europe's most northerly bench. For a few moments, I was the continent's most northerly man. I smiled. Job done.

  —

  The journey may have ended, but the day had not. The night of 28 July would be the final opportunity of the year to see the midnight sun at Nordkapp. The weather had been kind, much kinder than in recent days, but as the afternoon progressed, the clouds remained. Nevertheless, the crowds – from their cars, motorhomes, cruise ships and bicycles – gathered.