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Norway 2007: The North |
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Sunday 3rd June: Alta - Alteidet (100 km) |
Alta has one of the best salmon rivers in the world.
It also has a UNESCO world heritage site with Stone-Age and Iron-Age rock carvings.
The first people to live in Norway were the Komsa hunters, who arrived after the last ice age, 11 or 12 thousand years ago.
Later came the Sami, who still live around here and throughout Northern Scandinavia.
Modern nomads continue to roam through this area: people such as us on our bicycles but mostly they are in camper vans and caravans.
South of Alta we passed large groups of camper vans stopped next to the rivers and fjords.
One of Alta's attractions for the modern nomad is the shopping.
There are a number of supermarkets, some staying open until 11:00 PM.
Toften, west of Alta
Langfjordbotn, at the end of Langfjorden
The camp ground south of Alteidet (Simonsen Gårdsferie)
Karen's diary:
I woke at 5.00am feeling warm. It had been a mild night and morning; we started out of Alta in thermal tops and bike shorts (no tights!). Alta is a long, patchy sort of town, with no obvious centre. At the southwest end of town is a world heritage listed archaeological site - the Norse petroglyph museum. Sadly, it would not be open for hours and we were keen to get moving.
Alta is in a rainshadow; despite the ominous buildup of watery, black clouds in the west, we felt only a few drops of rain before the clouds passed overhead and disappeared. The road follows around Altafjorden - it is convoluted and undulating and has good views. There are plenty of reindeer. They don't seem frightened of cars at all, but they are a bit nervous of bicycles. At the end of Altafjorden we rounded a headland and crossed into Langfjorden - a dramatic fjord with pointed, snowy mountains on both sides. It was a pity about the robust headwind which we endured for 31kms. The sky was clearing but there were plenty of cirrus and lenticular clouds, sometimes a sign of bad weather to come. At the end of the fjord was an enormous campground - completely deserted and obviously closed.
A short climb over a pass brought us to the fjord of Kvænangen and the village of Alteidet, where we found the quiet, overgrown campground... also closed. What to do? We had done enough for the day and the next official campground was far away. We decided to continue and look for a rest area or a clearing in which to camp 'wild', not as easy as you would expect in this rugged country. Before long we came across a small sign pointing to a tourist park. We decided to take a look - and 800m down a narrow dirt road we found paradise. Simonsen Gård, formerly a farm, was a camping and cabin resort with beautiful cabins for hire - but the lush, green lawn was so inviting that we used the tent instead. There are astounding views across the water to the Kvænang mountains - tall, steep fingers of rock, too steep to hold the snow. The weather might be bad tomorrow but right now it's perfect.