For a long time, I was thinking about undertaking a longer journey and utilize the Parental leave. We had the experience of travelling with a Motorhome (Wohnmobile) for three weeks during the first parental leave in 2016. This time around we wanted to be on the road longer and the decision was made to purchase a caravan (Wohnwagen) to reduce costs.
On July 3rd, we left Mannheim, where we live, on the journey that will take us to the lush greens of western Norway. Our little girl just turned one right before the start of the journey and her bigger brother turned 4 in May. We could only go very slowly due to the small kid not being very happy with the proposition of sitting for a long time in the child seat. We did not have a specific destination for the first nights stop and wanted to stop whenever we felt that going forward does not make sense. So we landed for the evening at Camping Ulmbachtalsperre and ended up staying there for two nights. Now I was not really comfortable with the trailer yet and parking up and adjusting the position of the caravan was also not really good the first time. The two nights were rather not easy because I had to sleep on a slanted surface and the mosquitos did not make life any easier. Next stop was Münster where we spent another two days and Hamburg with the Miniature Wonderland and visiting friends took up another 4 days. As you see by now, the going north is really slow upto this point.
It was only in Flensburg that we really had the opportunity to first time weigh the Caravan – surprise, surprise – we were 200 Kg over the limit ☹. Taking into consideration the high prices in the Scandinavian countries we tried to stock up on lot of food, and we were carrying along a number of stuff that turned out to be ‘dead weight’ at the end of the journey. Beginners mistakes!!! We managed to transfer the weight over to the car and crossed the border to Denmark on the same day driving into the night to stop before a camping outside of Copenhagen at Ishøj. This was the first time we had the feeling that we were getting up north, and also really the first day where many kilometres could be travelled at a stretch – thanks to sleeping kids. This we will remember for the rest of the journey and strategically plan the longer routes in the night.
After Hamburg somehow I was not anymore in the mood for another big city and we skipped Kopenhagen and took the Oresund bridge to cross to Sweden. Sweden and Norway being the actual destination of the holiday, now the holiday feeling started to seep in. Also I was very excited about driving on the Oresund bridge – which turned out to be boring. But hey, I did it . Now in Sweden we travelled the west-coast northwards in the direction of Oslo, a stop at Kullaberg for lunch and a hike to the picturesque Lighthouse was squeezed in, partly to cook lunch and partly because some guidebook suggested it. Late in the night we reached a ‘Stellplatz’ – Smarholms Badplats, the night was short, the morning was amazing. Waking up to the sound of waves, surrounded by big stones and here and there places to jump into the cold North sea. We came to admire the local swedes – mainly old ladies – who came for a swim in that cold and after the swim sat around and chit-chatted with friends… and here we were trying to find the warmest jacket to even go out of the caravan. I wanted to try if would jump into the water – by the time I donned my shorts and reached the water my family and the aforementioned old ladies started to cheer. Now I had to jump into the water, lest I be branded a ‘weichei’ for the rest of the holiday… it was surprisingly refreshing to jump in.
Next stop would be Firstcamp Kungshamn, again we landed here without any idea and the camping turned out to be one of the best (and expensive). The minigolf at this camping was the most creative I had seen. The next day the journey continued in the direction of Oslo, seeing all the Norwegian registerd cars shopping on the Swedish side we took extra care to stock up on bread and other stuff. We figured it must be cheaper on this side of the border. In the dead of the night we reached Holmenkollen Skijump accompanied by thunderstorms and heavy rain and stopped for the night at the top (Tryvannstarnet Oslo).
The next two days we used to visit the museums in Oslo and the famous sculpture park. It was time to move into the heart of Norway, away from the highways and concrete jungle. We did not really have a concrete plan of where to go – apart from a few points of interest that we picked up along the way from friends, books and websites and wrote it somewhere in the recesses of the memory to definitely have seen it. We started off from Oslo northwards in the direction of Lillehammer, leaving in the evening to make good progress. We would drive along the majestic Mjøsa – the E6 is full of constructions and we definitely struggled a few times with the trailer. We stopped for the night at the Sveastranda Camping on the shores of Mjøsa, again reaching well past midnight and ready for a quite night.
The next day we spent at the camping relaxing and enjoying the play areas for the kids. We also decided to go over to Hamar on the following day to the Norwegian train museum, my 4 year old being a big fan of steam engines. We had indeed passed Hamar on the previous night – it could have been better planned, but it was as it was. At least we did not have to travel back with the caravan in tow. The first advantage of being able to detach the caravan and proceed with only the car.
Next leg of the journey would take us over Grotly to Oppstryn. Quite an eventful day, at Grotli Høyfjellshotell – my navigation in the car directed me to the Gamle Strynefjellet, without knowing at that time that we are going to drive over a mountain pass. I was still not very comfortable with the caravan and as each narrow stretch of the road came up, of which there were many, I was hoping that no other vehicle came in the opposite direction. Luckily it was 10 PM and there was no traffic. The route itself is majestic and we would have loved to stay at the top of the mountain for the night. However the prospect of having to drive the next day when possibly more cars are going to be travelling was not very appealing in that moment. We managed to cross the pass unscathed and in good spirits and stopped at a parking lot on the shores of Oppstrynsvatn. Here we also met up with my wife’s work colleagues who were also on a similar journey with a wohnmobile – they had planned to go all the way up north and over to Finland.
This was the Norway that I wanted to see, majestic mountains and green. Waterbodies and waterfalls wherever you look. Nature in its pristine beauty.
Stryn, well Sande Camping to be precise was on my list of places to go to in Norway, so we headed out after breakfast to the camp. Oh my, was the drive challenging the road to the camp was narrow – thankfully the other drivers were understanding, stopping and waiting for us to pass wherever there was a pass-by place. At the camp we were lucky to be directed to camp right next to the water and we set up camp there. This was the second and last time we would use our heavy ‘Vorzelt’ during our journey. First time was in Hamburg to even try out for the first time if everything worked and if we had all parts… I know, planning should have been different but with the little kids and work and everything, we just did not have the opportunity to do it beforehand.
