Day 44 & 45: Nordkapp

Day 44

I headed out for one more day of misery. And weather wise that’s what I got. When leaving Lakselv it was already raining and the wind was extremely strong. The following climbs were extremely exhausting and only knowing how close to my goal I was what kept my mental at a quite good place. Funnily enough the weather along the fjords was quite interesting as every now and then I would exit the torrential downpour into an area completely free of rain for a few kilometers before going back into heavy rain. I am not complaining though as that gave me a chance to at least take a few pictures of the stunningly epic landscape. Not too many though since the wind was so strong that when I got off my bike it just blew it aside onto the road. But yeah, the landscape was unlike any I’ve seen before. The huge epic fjords lunging into the sea like monuments of older times, witnesses of times long gone clashing with the violent winds and waves.

As I entered Olderfjord, the last ten kilometers had wind so strong that I had to be in my second lowest gear to even move forward, even though it was completely flat. If my goal wasn’t in sight already this would have probably worn me down quite a lot but now it just felt like the last final sprint, the last burst of energy before making it across the finish line.

Not shortly after, I did just that – cross the finish line, having arrived at the Olderfjord bus terminal. From here it would be a bus for last final bit. Now some of you might be disappointed or think that taking the bus for the last 100km is cheating or taking away from my achievement but if you do think like that, then I’d ask you to either give it more thought or just not follow my journey anymore. Because it was the only safe and reasonable decision. What lay ahead of me were multiple, very narrow, badly lit tunnels, some of them quite long and extremely steep. Pair that with the weather and my hyper alertness, a symptom of my CPTSD, it would have been lucky for me to arrive intact on the other end. Mentally and or physically. So instead I waited for the next bus to get me to Honningsvåg. I was actually very surprised and happy I would get a bus today, as I misread the timetables initially and thought I had to spend the night in Olderfjord.

Whilst waiting for the bus I met another cyclist who just came down from Honningsvåg with the bus. Funnily enough it turns out that he was Swiss, but we still had to convers in English as he was from the French speaking part and I am from the German speaking part and we were both apparently not too fond of our time in school studying each others language. It felt very excited and good to exchange experiences and give each other tips. He warned me about the winds up there, told me about how horrid the weather was in Norway lately and that he can’t wait to get to Finland and hopefully better weather. I gave him a few tips for the country of the thousand lakes and with that he headed off to where I came from. May the weather be with you friend.

I got on the bus a bit later and had the most epic ride I’ve ever had. I mean really… I don’t even know how I should describe the scenery it was so otherworldly and epic. Slowly the road wiggled it’s way around the fjords with the sea pounding on the rocks, making them look like jagged stacks of paper. The sky hang low, loomingly dark, letting go of whatever water it could find. An hour and a half later I arrived in Honningsvåg, the last big settlement on this continent. Due to the horrendous wind camping was not an option and all the cottages were already filled with people equally stranded. So I headed for a hotel, battling the wind and rain for a kilometer. That stretch was enough to make me look like I’m half dead apparently as the woman from the reception first asked if I was okay before anything. But my, was she nice. We had a chat about Finland since she herself comes from Jyväskylä and she even gave me a free room upgrade out of respect for my cycling efforts. And so the day comes to an end, so close to the big goal – weary but oh so excited.

• Route: Lakselv – Olderfjord
• Distance covered: 65.56
• Total distance covered: 2451.39

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Day 45

I made it! Today was the big day. Maybe my proudest moment, maybe my biggest moment. I’m so overwhelmed with emotions and joy I’m getting ahead of myself. So let’s start at the beginning.

I got up quite early. Before going to bed I had a huge mental back and forth if I should take the bus for the last 30km to the Nordkapp or the bicycle. The road is extremely steep with a total of 680m elevation gain and the wind would be absolutely out of this world. Everybody warned me of it and often you would hear stories about cyclists having to get rescued by busses after being ruined by the wind. I woke up though determined to defeat this last hurdle, battle my way through. That ended pretty quickly though, as when I went to get my bicycle out the storage I was informed by staff that cycling up the road wasn’t allowed today to begin with. That meant waiting for the bus. And when it came it was time for the final stretch. My excitement was getting hard to tame and when the bus took us up the fjord towards the cliff it really started to feel otherworldly. I’m not going to try to put words to the scenery as I wouldn’t know where to begin but it truly does look like what I imagined the end of the world would look like. And when the bus pulled up onto the final plateau, barren of anything but rocks and short grass it truly felt like walking towards the precipice of the world. And as I walked through the Nordkapp centre out onto the other side towards the globe monument I was flooded with this immense feeling of pride and accomplishment. Joy, happiness, disbelief, awe – so much just bundled up inside of me I am still not fully grasping it. This was it! Years and years of dreaming about it, planning, fighting through horribly difficult times, anchoring myself on that vague dream, months of meticulous planning, months of anticipation and then 2500km and 45 days later, this was it. I was standing at the end of the continent, the planet smashing me with it’s raw unrelenting power, winds so strong it was hard to walk forward, the waves crashing into the cliffs around me. I was so in awe of the sheer infinity of the universe and the small fleck that was me. I spent quite a bit of time at the globe, trying to grasp, enjoying the moment, admiring the view, talking to some other people taking pictures there. Quite a bit of time meaning probably around twenty minutes before I had to seek shelter from the sheer unrelenting freezing wind and rain that picked up. So I spend a long, long time inside writing post cards and just bathing in this amazing bubbly pool of emotions before eventually going out one more time, saying goodbye to the place that was my lighthouse for so many years now. A bus ride later, a couple of phone calls with the people most dear to me later, I sit here writing this entry, still just overwhelmed with joy and pride. I really did. I really did.

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