In the previous installment of our honeymoon travelogue: Cori and Ryan consider building an ark.
So you might be scared that my whole honeymoon travelogue is going to be blah blah blah we were wet blah blah wet wet. I promise, it’s not! While we got a little damp here and there on the rest of our trip, we were relatively dry compared to the first part of our journey.
After we bought new gloves, we headed north of Bergen toward Geiranger (which is impossible to pronounce for an American — think gee-ir-ran-yeh). Around every corner we were looking at the most beautiful thing we’d ever seen. It was absolutely incredible. The fjords were stunning, the mountains were majestic, and everything was breathtaking.
We were particularly interested in reaching an overlook near Strim, Norway, which didn’t disappoint! We pulled off to the side of the road and took in the amazing view. This was the first of many places covered in cairns in Norway. It was such a lovely moment until several tour busses worth of people stopped and overwhelmed the outlook like ants on a Snickers. Sigh.
The road over the pass into Geiranger was like no other road we’d driven. We were above the tree line and it felt sort of like the moon. It was really cold, but by that point I’d learned how to, well, wear pretty much everything I owned, so I wasn’t too cold. Just pretty darn cold.
We arrived in Geiranger that evening to the Grande Fjord Hotel. We weren’t the only motorcyclists that had made the long journey!
We had been on the road for eight hours, and by the time we pulled in, we felt like we’d finished a marathon. We hadn’t given up when the rain threatened to end our trip. We had made it to Geiranger, one of the highlights of our trip. The view from our hotel room was incredible. We were very happy.
And there was dinner at the hotel!
And did I mention it was in one of the prettiest places I have ever been?
AND THERE WAS LAUNDRY.
The laundry was shared by the adjoining campground, so we had to wait quite a while for it to be free. While we were waiting for our load to finish, we got to chatting with the family waiting for the machine after us. They were from Israel — and this being Saturday, they couldn’t technically do laundry because of the Sabbath. So we started their laundry for them and ended up chatting for a long while. It was really interesting to learn about their travels and what they do and how difficult it is to travel with Orthodox restrictions.
The next day, we did a somewhat shorter drive to Kristiansund, Norway, along the Atlantic Road (yes, our southernmost point was Kristiansand and our northernmost point was Kristiansund!). On the drive, it was as if Norway kept saying, “you thought that was beautiful? Look at this!!” And then we would both be overwhelmed with the beauty of the landscape. Neither of us was expecting some of the fjords to be so teal! It was absolutely incredible.
There was one point when we were waiting for a ferry and I saw a family out canoeing. Norwegians are hardcore. I bet they went and had an ice cream after their row.
The landscape changed dramatically when we got closer to the Atlantic Road, since it was on the coast. The road itself was a lot of fun to drive — tons of little bridges over rocky islands. The highlight is a bridge that looks way cooler than it is when you’re actually driving over it (it feels like any other overpass when you’re on it!). We stopped for a bit to get a few cool shots of the scenery.
Of course, we had to get one of the bike looking extra rugged:
It was only 30 or so minutes from the Atlantic Road to our hotel in Kristiansund, but we hit the last of our big rain. Thankfully, we knew we were almost there so it was more hilarious than anything. It was raining sideways! By the time we pulled into our hostel in Kristiansund, we were pretty wet. Ryan offered to go and pick up some dinner so I could dry off (I do love that man!) and he came back with ice cream (I DO love that man!!). We ended up doing some more laundry and just hanging out at our hostel that evening — it had been quite a day!
In the next installment of our honeymoon travelogue: Cori and Ryan visit the Troll Road and are eaten by a cloud.