Swedish days full of rain

If you’ve been following this blog and have been getting kind of jealous, this post won’t do that to you. We left Jonkoping on Sunday (6/24/12) and hit the E4 (big highway) and after 5 minutes Chris decided he wasn’t going to ride on it. To be honest it was kind of sketchy, the shoulder is open to scooters, but its bigger than most of the shoulders we ride on. We got into a slightly emotional discussion that might have frustrated one or two of the people in our group and Chris pulled out his Gps and it told us that we need to backtrack about 10 miles. Now I really didn’t mind getting off the most direct route so Chris would feel safer and getting on a road that won’t lead us straight to Helsingborg, but I refused to add 10 miles to our day. I pulled out my compass to find south and said that we need to go on this road. Chris didn’t seem excited to blindly go down some road, but oh well. The road we found out actually snakes around the E4 most of the way to our destination. We rode in an awkward silence for most of the day until we set up camp on a lake that I’m pretty sure said no camping, but it was in Swedish and ignored it.

The next day we woke up and got right into the ride. Then the rain started. I don’t mind the rain at all. Josh seems to be pretty good it in, but Chris says it’s miserable, but we still kept on pedaling. Halfway through our day we decided to stop for pizza. We eat pizza a lot. I think we eat pizza once every 2 days. Afterwards we rode until we were soaked. I was wet from my hat down to my socks. Chris started pointing out places to camp, but it was early and none of them looked good. We started to get cold so we parked our bikes in a bike path tunnel to get out of the rain. We came up with the idea to go buy a 6pack of beer from the store right outside with some food and try and dry up a bit. It worked a little, but what it really did was give us our first chance since our talk about the E4 to stand around and joke with each other. Once leaving there and meeting a very interesting Swedish boy we found some abandoned cabins off the main road in the woods. It was creepy. No other way to describe it.  No signs about not camping and at this point even if there was it wouldn’t matter we decided to set up camp on one of the porches all huddled together telling each other that we were going to get murdered and raped. 

                                                        can anyone see the figure of a man?

We woke up with our lives and no stabbed wounds so we were happy, but it was raining still. A very hard rain that showed no signs of letting up. My clothes were still wet from the day before and made the whole day very cold. We knew we were going to hit Helsingborg in 66 miles so that made it better. We rode and rode and rode. The rain at times just started pouring on us then would turn to a drizzle and go back to heavy windy rain. Right before we hit the city Chris’ chain broke. He did a quick fix and got on our way and into town around 6. We looked for a hotel and the only thing we could find was a four star hotel. I was stuck outside shivering and I didn’t care what the price was. So that’s where I am now. Sitting in a bet chillin online in a warm bed. Hope the rest of the trip is better, but if not it would still be better than working all day in a coffee shop for my summer. Hope you enjoyed the read and next stop is Copenhagen! 

some pics thanks to josh and dont forget to play the game!

Midsummer in Jonkoping

Thursday morning (6/21/12) was beautiful. We decided to camp on the edge of one of the lake we rode by and waking up to the sun over the lake is a nice way to start any day. We packed up our stuff and started on doing what we do best, getting breakfast at awesome little cafes. Most of the food i get is in pastry cases ordered by a lot of finger pointing. We sat and slowly ate our food and used the restroom to brush our teeth and all the fun morning things. Afterwards we started our ride. More lakes and forest of course.

see what i mean by beautiful?

 We put in about 60 miles with our normal amount of breaks for food and taking pictures for you guys back home, along with a huge hill that had me going around 35 mph. Around mile 55 my right knee started giving me some problems. I had this problem back home and knew i wasn't going to be able to ride much further, but i kept on pushing. The plan was to hit Jonkkoping and take a train to spend the Midsummer (a nation wide Swedish holiday that we knew very little about) in Gothenburg. Just a lot of drinking and eating pickled fish. We got to the top of this hill and in front of us was this amazing sight. A city built around this huge lake and most of it was on a hill. A massive massive childish grin making slightly arousing hill. We flew down this hill and it was the best part of the trip up to date. It was a little over a mile long and on either side of you is this beautiful city and in front of you is a huge lake. Jonkoping is better then Stockholm in my mind. We took a little break after hitting the bottom of the hill and asked someone how to get to the train station. When we got there we are informed that a straight train from here to Gothenborg was coming in about an hour. Only thing was that they did allow bikes.

We went to the tourist information center and asked about hostels. She said there is one that's about Fifty dollars and one she didnt know about. We didn't feel like shelling out $50 a person so we went to the one she didnt know about. This whole doing things by ear wasn't going that great. When we got to the hotel they told us they had rooms for 1 night and it would only cost us $30 a person. 30 for a hotel with a water hole and Frisbee golf course. If you know me at all you know I love some frolf.

                                     

We opened up the hotel room door and it put us all in a great mood. We decided Jonkoping will be our home for Midsummer. Unfortunately everyone leaves the big cities to go out to the county for Midsummer, but we didnt care. We had Tv, Internet, showers (you remember how much we like those) and BEDS. Soft cheap beds.

outiside the hotel

We took it pretty easy the first night, but the next day we went out on the pier for a nice pizza breakfast and then spent the rest of the day lounging on the beaches and playing frolf and relaxing. Everyone we asked about things to do durring Midsummer told us about one bar. Oleery's pub. We went there and when we ordered our first beer an Aussie walked up and started talking to us. Being an american here kind of makes us special. He was with a study group for the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" books and they were with some french guys also doing a study group. We drank with the 15 of them till god knows when. I remember the bar being kind of empty then all of a sudden its full and im doing the C-walk and shuffle to techno and talking to someone about how amazing the Notebook is, riding our bikes back to the closed hotel and camping. A very good night. Hope you all enjoyed the read and if you get a chance get your ass to Jonkoping! No crashes or accidents yet so keep on playing the game! Next stop is Copenhagen in about 4 days.

I threw my frisbee in the water and had to get it.

Swedish showers for hours

       We spent Tuesday (6/19/12) like our other days. Wake up, pack up our gear, and ride. We were still in farm and forest areas of Sweden, so of course it’s beautiful. Unfortunately we had to deal with heavy wind blowing in our faces and the gps sent us down a route that added 10 more miles to our day. We weren’t happy about that, but hey it’s nothing to cry about. 

      The good thing about it though is we stumbled onto this town called Atvidaburg. It’s crazy nice there. Everyone is friendly, it has a farmers market, and kids are running around the lake. Did I mention it had a lake? It does. It had a touristy kind of feel to it while it also seemed like a nice community. And all the women there are also hot in case you were wondering. We hope you guys know we are dead serious about the looks of women over here. It doesn’t make sense. More on point, we got to a campground in the middle of the town and found out they had showers and we haven’t had one since we left Rob’s house. We looked for a way to pay so we can get a key to the shower house and sent josh on his way to the tourist info center to pay them. Chris and I sat for 10 minutes talking about how we were going to take an hour long shower and just chill in a nice cozy bed that the Swedish houses (little tiny cabins with bunk beds) have. Josh came back and informed us that we were shit out of luck. So we said screw it and set up our tents anyways after our defeat. The grass field beats a forest floor any day of the week, but the showers were the only thing on our minds. Josh got on his bike to go to the shopping mart and saw that someone propped open the showering rooms. When he told us, Chris got his towel and I’ve never seen a ginger move so quickly. We were kings for a night. We all spent a fair share of time in the showers and I did some hobo laundry in the sink. Life was good.

                                                       Everybody rides bikes here. 

        On Wednesday when walking to brush my teeth a woman came up and started speaking Swedish to me. I told her “English” and she asked very nicely if we stayed, then told me I could pay here whenever we are ready. Everyone here is pretty nice. On the way out of town we lost Chris (again). Then when we turned to find him Josh’s back rack screw broke again.  So I rode off to the hardware store and got him some screws. When I came back Chris was with him and we started our day off at the farmers market and the super mart for some supplies. On Wednesday our ride was a little bit different, in a good way. It was full of lakes. We probably rode by 8 all in all. There is something truly amazing about this place. Hope all of you can see the Sweden like we have and thanks for the read. Next stop Jonkoping. 

Sweden sweet Sweden

So we’ve been on our bikes for the last two days heading from Gnasta to Jonkoping and it’s been the most fun I’ve ever had. I don’t think we ever want to leave. On Sunday (6/17/12) we left Rob and his wife after they cooked us some amazing Swedish pancakes and then we hopped on a train for an hour and a half. Chris missed the connection even though he was right next to us, which gave  Josh and I an hour to explore Gnasta. It’s a small town with an amazing church on a lake. We eventually met back up with Chris and started on the real first part of the trip.

                                                     Maybe kungsangen means hoes.

                                                                     

After Chris caught up and we got on our bikes things got a little sour for a bit. Chris got a new Gps and it lead us on a cool little route ended on a horse trail. It was also raining so the trail was muddy and full of rocks. Not good for riding heavy bikes on. After a hour we finally got onto a good paved road. The rest of day was up and down hills while being surrounded by farms and forest. Skies full of clouds and rain, but we didn’t care. We stopped every hour or so to snack on crackers or bread along with whatever we got from the store that morning, enjoying the view. Nothing could have taken down our spirits. I’m sure there are areas of Washington that look just like the land we went through, but it just felt better doing it here. We eventually rolled into this small town and looked for a place to camp. This won’t sound to appealing to most of you, but we found a patch of woods about 100 feet from some apartments and set up camp there, in clear view of anyone walking on the trail 30 feet south of us. While setting up we also noticed the train tracks on the other side of the trail with trains constantly going over them. We didn’t care though.  It was our patch of land for the night and with the long day of riding we just had, sleep was the only thing we cared about.

On day two we stopped at the local grocery store for some more bread and snacks then headed off. It was mostly forest and some more hills. We would stop throughout the day for pictures and snacks then get back on the road. We went down this huge hill and Chris told us that we would be getting to a bridge soon. When we got to the bottom of the hill we all suddenly stop. No bridge. We might have yelled at Chris a little. We look around and across the water is a small odd ferry. Next to us is a cool little café that I went into for some information. Luckily everyone in Sweden speaks English.  The lady told me that the ferry came in 20 minutes and free! So I ordered 3 deserts from her and sat down with Chris and Josh for a treat with a view of the lake and some islands with little houses on them.

 When we got on the ferry the sun came out and the whole lake came into view. Beautiful is all I can really say.  When we got to the other side we were scared we would have to climb some more hills, but it became flat and full of farm fields. Sometimes you could find little sheds built into the hills like hobbit houses. We kept on riding till we hit a decent sized town and stopped for burgers and pizza.  We are now camped about 2 miles out of that town in the rain. Stinky and sweaty in some woods we stumbled on. Thanks for reading and don’t forget to play the game!

Ps. All women in Sweden are hot.

Stockholm is Seattle's sister.

Thursday was far from the easy day trip we all imagined it would be. the day before, Beau took Chloe, Jon, and I out for one last night to drink together. Thursday was filled with all of us calling each other trying to figure out when we were leaving, who has the boxes for our bikes, finding out that the place we originally thought we were going to get the boxes had them but at a premium price none of us wanted to pay and a lot of panic. Throw on top of that some tears from loved ones and a hangover and you got yourself a pretty rough morning, but we made it on time and with everything we needed. Our flight was Seattle > Iceland > Sweden. We left Seattle around 4:30pm and got to Stockholm around 1:00 pm the next day. When flying over Sweden it looks just like western Washington with evergreen trees all over the place, but its flat.

We were met by Chris' uncle Rob at the airport. Him and his wife are letting us stay at their place for a few days while we get over jet lag and wait out a few days of rain. They cook us food and deal with three grown men napping all over their house pretty well. I've never seen people be so nice to a nephew and strangers. I pretty beat from the plane ride and thought I'd chill around town while Chris and Josh went to Stockholm. After a nap I walked around Kallhall to the local lake and thought about how this is my life for the next three months, Nothing but adventuring and living life at my own pace. As i was walking around the lake though, I noticed that the sun was still pretty high for how late in the day it was.

  So get this, the sun sets here at 10:30pm and raises at 3:30am and never really gets pitch black at this time of year. Yeah, 5 hours of this kinda sort of almost dark is all they get. The next day we all took the train to Stockholm for the evening. The buildings here are tall old and amazing. We have nothing like it in the states. If you head over to the older parts of the town you hit narrow old stone roads with gutters carved into the stone. It was raining pretty hard too, but that wasn't stopping us and or the rest tourist from roaming the streets. We went into an old church that they turned into a museum and stumbled onto a major boat race happening on one of the many waterways that Stockholm is built around. We walked around some more and looking at the menus on the shop windows and found out that it's all pretty expensive here. We decided to pass on eating out in Stockholm and make our way back to Rob's for dinner made by him and his wife. Tomorrow we head out on our bikes for the first time and we are all pretty excited for the journey to really begin and even with Stockholm having some amazing buildings and cool shops, I think the best part of the trip so far has been just walking around Kallhall, spending time with friends and locals not worried about just pleasing another tourist.

    Some weird thing they do with pizza here. Calzone like.

                                                           

ps It's so much like Seattle it rained while we were walking around so my camera stayed in while i took pictures with my phone. Sorry for the bad quality.