Two wheels and a fishing rod

All the planning (such as it is) is done.

That's the first step - packed the bike and left for the ferry. Felt very odd to be leaving home again - made me wonder why I want to do this trip at all. But I know I have to make the effort. It's something I've been rabbiting on about for ages, and if I don't do it now I will spend the rest of my life banging on about it and wondering what it would have been like.

Smooth sailing on the ferry, a good night's sleep, and a good day in the saddle. Weather was fair, pleasantly warm and dry. Fast roads make for easy progress, if not particularly exciting. I deliberately chose roads that stayed away from the bits we spent most time in, to make the trip more interesting and less déjà vu - and by and large it worked.

I was late booking the ferry from Travemunde to Helsinki - nothing I could do about it; I had to wait for the DVLA to issue the registration for my bike - and the only options (other than wait longer) were a berth in a 4-person cabin (with unknown people), a whole 4-berth cabin to myself (expensive) or a recliner seat (cheap!). How bad could it be? Answer: very bad. From the time we boarded to the time we disembarked, it was about 36 hours. On a boat with next to no entertainment options.

Time to get on the road again. Spent a wonderful couple of days with friends from Rome, foraging for mushrooms and wild blueberries and strawberries in the forest, fishing on the local river and generally having a great time catching up.

Started out following little back roads, including some that were unsurfaced, but decided to switch to the main road to put some miles under my belt.

The scenery is the same either way - endless tracts of forest. Made me think of the dog in the Eddie Murphy Dr Doolittle film - tree, tree, tree...

So much for the BBC weather app! It reckons there is just 'light cloud' here today, but the reality is that it is tipping it down. I'm beginning to feel like that truck driver in So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish who, unbeknownst to himself, is a rain god who is followed around by his own personal rain cloud.

Still, at least I can sit in this nice, warm, dry hut and wait to see if the cloud will lift.

After seeing warning signs for reindeer all through northern Finland, the first warning sign I saw in Norway was for . . . sheep.

I was surprised, and a little disappointed, by the scenery of northern Norway. It seemed a bit too verdant, too manicured. I was expecting something more 'arctic'; I didn't expect to find people growing potatoes in their back yard or farmers producing haylage.

I really don't understand Norway. After setting out from the campsite at Alta, I thought I ought to change some of my Euros for NOK. I stopped at a bank in a small town I was passing through, but they told me that they dealt only with things like mortgages -- no 'counter' services. They pointed me to a bank about 50 km further on. Which also did not handle foreign exchange. The bank in Tromso would, they happily informed me. The fact that I wasn't going to Tromso didn't seem to register.

I was never a great one for planning, but I have outdone myself on this trip. I booked nothing except the first two ferries and have been winging it since. Sometimes works, but other times it adds to the pressure.

Like this morning, when I woke up in Ottersoy; a lovely spot but well off the beaten track. I had no idea where it was in relation to Moskenes, which is where I had to get to to take the ferry to the mainland.

I woke to leaden skies over Bodø, but at least the rain of last night was in abeyance. I was still in two minds over which route to take - the 17 looked the more picturesque, but the satnav told me that it would take 16 hours to cover roughly 500 km, what with all the ferries. The E6 looked interesting in its own right, following rivers and lakes, and again the satnav suggested I could reach Trondheim by the end of the day, some 700 km.

I've been to Hell and high water.

Hell, as you probably know, is a small village on the road to Trondheim. I wonder how many times it's signpost features on blogs and Facebook?

Apparently, if you go to the post office there, they will stamp your passport with an entry stamp for Hell. If that's your kind of thing.

Woke to a dreich morning, but at least the rain had stopped (for now).

First stop, the Atlantic Road. And what a stop. It's only a short stretch, but makes up for it with wonderful vistas whichever way you look. And a fishy paradise. I just had to stop and get the rod out.

Casting a heavy jig bait out into the stream running under one of the famous bridges was simply magical. Had a start when a seal surfaced in front of me, almost as if asking what I thought I was playing at. Only caught the one fish, a tiny cod, but that's enough.

My plan was always to route through Lysebotn on my way to Kristiansand and the ferry to Denmark.

My original planned route involved a lot of very minor roads, many of which were unsurfaced, and a diversion to Bergen. But with the weather forecast looking increasing wet and cold, I decided to give Bergen a miss and head directly towards Lysebotn.

I set off as soon as the rain eased - about 10 a.m. - aiming to put in as many miles as possible to get out of the wet and cold zone.

This was another day of climatic contrasts. I set off from Sudalsosen with the temperature in the low 20s, so vents open on my jacket and no need for a buff. Which was fine on the initial stretch of the E13 - a fabulous stretch of road and one that I really enjoyed riding and being able to take in the scenery on a warm, sunny day.

My last day in Norway dawned bright and fair, which made a nice change. I packed up my tent and camping gear and set out for the fishing spot I had been told about the previous evening. And what a beautiful spot it was! A short walk through the woods brought me to a sandy cove surrounded by rocky headlands reaching out into the sound. I rigged up with a soft plastic bait rigged on a jig head and started casting around from the rocks, seeking out the deeper channels.

I've been back home for a couple of months now, and the memories are beginning to fade and the reality of life is pressing in.