Monday 20th July 2015
Just what the hell did I drink yesterday? Has someone snuck into my tent during the night and poured a few gallons down my neck? Fully drained, I lay back into the cosy embrace of my sleeping bag.
At 6:15 I feel the need for a pee again. As my "overnight" is already full of freshly squeezed, I have no option but to take a walk. I get up, have a shower, and once back at my tent I start to pack up my things. Greg is up and starting to pack too. We have breakfast and set off around 8:30.
Just as we are leaving the site I notice that Greg has left a couple of luggage straps lying on the top of one of his panniers. With visions of the straps wrapping themselves around the back wheel of his bike and firing him into the scenery, I flag him down with some frantic arm waving and pointing.
Crisis averted we head out of Mora on the E45, before taking the 296 and 30, and the 50 east to Soderhamn on the Baltic coast. Heading off the E45 onto the smaller country roads makes the riding more enjoyable. The roads are fast and winding, and we are able to keep up a decent pace. Dense pine forest lines either side of the road. Occasionally a clearing appears containing a small red wooden cottage. It is how I imagined Sweden would be.
Around 11, Greg makes the international hand signal for a coffee stop as we come to a small village. Not the Gareth Hunt, Nescafe advert kind of signal. This is more of the raising a cup to his mouth kind. If it was after noon, it would be known as the "fancy a pint?"
A café is spotted on the radar and we move in on the target. I can smell the fresh baking as we park up.
As I open the door and step inside, the lovely smell is more than matched by the stunning array of pastries on display. A young lady is wiping the glass front of the counter. I assume it is to remove the drool spillage left by the previous customer.
I choose a twisted ring donut with a hazelnut fondant centre, and a coffee. Greg has an equally sickly looking custard filled, chocolate dipped pastry and a coffee.
The café seating area is divided into a couple of rooms. It was obviously somebody's home at one stage. The first room was full of older people drinking coffee and playing board games. It was like a social club. Greg and I sat in the adjoining room where it was a bit quieter.
An hour from leaving the café, we arrive in Soderhamn. Here we head north again on the E04 which will take us all the way to Umea. The E04 is another straight slog. The road follows close to the coast along the Gulf of Bothnia. But, a wall of trees blocks any views. It is a fast road with sections of dual carriageway every 10kms to allow the faster traffic to pass.
We start to see a few road-train trucks as we travel further north. Some of these are rolling along at 100kph, so we don't take chances when overtaking. They are ideally suited to the long straight roads up here.
Greg pulls over a couple of hours into the journey. He is bursting for a pee. We had not passed an open service station for ages. We are both running low on fuel. Feeling more comfortable, it is back on the road.......for about 600 metres! As we crest the top of the next rise, a huge service station complex comes into view. We pull in, fuel up, and decide to stop for lunch. We are both chuckling as we take our helmets off at stopping just up the road.
With a ham and cheese calzone, and a bottle of blue drink consumed it is back on the road for the final few hundred kilometres to Umea. I spot the odd glimpse of a coastal inlet, and we cross a couple of nice suspension bridges, but the road is just long and straight. The last 160kms is a real ordeal for me. My music player and helmet camera batteries have died, and I am brain dead. I just seem to be riding for ridings sake. Heading for a destination that never seems to be getting any closer.
At 74kms to go, my fuel light comes on. The countdown readout on the dash says that I will make it with 6kms to spare. I know that there is some fuel left after the readout reaches zero. But, I have never run that low on fuel before. Game on!
Every roadside mileage sign is checked against the satnav which is checked against the fuel countdown. At least the tension of running out of fuel stops me concentrating on the monotony of the journey.
Eventually, we reach the outskirts of Umea. I insist the satnav takes me to the nearest fuel station. 17.3ltrs of fuel go into the 19ltr tank. My heart rate begins to return to normal. Now lets find the campsite where we are stopping tonight, and where we will meet out friend, Finn.
Finn is Danish. We all met through the Aprilia Caponord forum. He is a super fit, marathon running dynamo, who fixes fighter jets for the Danish Air Force. As we get to the campsite, Finn greets us with cold beers and his usual smile. We start catching up on our travels so far, and discuss the next parts of the trip.
Finn is looking at my bike. " I see your bike is a real Triumph!". I look at him with a confused expression. He then points at the oil residue on the right hand side engine case. Arse! I take a look and discover that the oil seems to be coming out of the gold coloured gallery plug. I check it is tight, wipe off the mess, and top up the oil. I will have to keep an eye on it, and sort it out when I get home. It never gets any worse throughout the trip, thankfully.
We turn in for the night at around 10:30 even though it is still bright daylight outside. We have another long day ahead of us tomorrow, which will take us into Finland.
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