Well I have had a pretty busy week since our return from our Denmark, Sweden and Norway tour.

Firstly I would say I really enjoyed our first tour to Norway, there is no doubt that it is a long way, but we are left with little choice since the ferry to Esbjerg stopped last year. The tour started with a Hull - Rotterdam crossing, which once again was very smooth and returned us to the high temperatures that Europe has been enjoying for the last couple of months. Our journey across Holland to an overnight stop near Hamburg was uneventful and we met up with Ian the one person that had elected to use the Harwich - Rotterdam crossing.

The first petrol stop saw one of our group frantically searching for his passport, finally deciding that he had left it at the last hotel he returned, whilst we continued on to catch the Puttgarden-Rodby ferry to Denmark.

After another calm crossing, some of the group broke off to go into Copenhagen, whilst we continued to cross the Øresund Bridge which is actually a 2.5 mile tunnel to the artificial island of Peberholm followed by a 5 miles bridge to Sweden.

Approaching the tunnel I stopped to receive a call from our agent who told me that money and documents (but no passport) had been found in the last hotel room. (Do you see a theme here?) – Turned out they belonged to one of the Tiger twins who shall remain nameless (Harry) – leaving Mick to pick up the bill for the rest of the tour………

On arrival in Sweden we were greeted by a lecture from the toll booth operator – seemed we had stopped where we should not have done…. Mmmm , welcome to Sweden.  Like many things the bridge is not as dramatic as the aerial pictures show, but I am glad we did it and it’s something off the bucket list. One good thing was that Graham of lost passport fame re-joined us having found it amongst his dirty washing, and I suspect broken a few speed limits along the way.

We all enjoyed Malmo before making our way across Sweden and into Norway for our first stop in Trondheim. Despite daily forecasts, the weather continued to be kind and we paid a visit to the Stave church at Ringebu before entering the Rondane National Park. Views were stopped by low cloud, but we soon re-emerged to sunshine as we headed to our next overnight stop in Molde.

A two night stop here allowed us to ride the Atlantic road .  Built on a series of islands and skerries the road uses several bridges to link everything together, creating not only a feat of engineering, but what some claim, to be one of the best rides in the world. At 5 miles it is not very long, but very dramatic and well worth doing.  Our only real drama of the tour was Stuart filling his Ducati with diesel. Thankfully he realised in time, and did not start it, so was able to siphon out and refill with petrol. Speaking of which, I did not think the petrol was that expensive. The general price was 15.8 NKR to the litre which at today’s rate and if my math’s is right is about £1.22 – I have paid much more than that in Europe.

Beer was expensive, but once again it depended where you bought it, in bars it worked out at about £7 per pint. However, I did not see any reduction in intake.

Heading south we had fantastic weather for our ride up the Trollstigen Mountain Road with its gradient of 10%, 11 breathtaking hairpins and fantastic waterfall.  This was the one time  we got tangled with tourists – the majority of whom had been transported by bus from the cruise liner that was anchored at our next view point Geirangerfjord.

Bergen was a bit of a contrast to our previous night’s stop next to a fjord in the middle of nowhere, as it bustled with tourists from all over the world. I think the Japanese tourists especially thought they were in heaven with the incredible choice of seafood available in the harbour side restaurants.  

Bergen is known as the ‘City of rain’ – but once again it stayed dry for us, only raining through the night and kindly stopping at 8am before we left.  

Our journey continued southwards past Hardanger National Park, before leaving Norway by ferry to Denmark. It was then a straight foreward ride across  Germany to Rotterdam.

Wherever we went in Norway we were told that it was the worst summer they had had for years and that the snow should have disappeared, however, as I said we could not have asked for better weather and had the bonus of some great snow covered landscapes.

Take a look at the photos in the gallery, thanks to everyone that sent them in. If you are wondering about the suspended red bike on our final hotel, it was a promotional bike that belonged to Michael Schumacher.   

For me the things that stuck out about Sweden, Denmark and particularly Norway was that everyone was so friendly and all spoke ‘perfect’ English.

Norway is much like Scotland on steroids, never have I seen so much water and in particular some very dramatic waterfalls.

Yes the speed limits are 50mph, but to be honest, it’s a tour; you want to be able to take it steady and take in the views. An unexpected bonus was that the low speeds gave tremendous mpg (remember the 56 mph speed limit in the oil crisis) with most bikes getting an extra 25% more miles to the tank.

The roads are generally of good quality and you marvel at the engineering feats in building some of the bridges and tunnels – especially when they have roundabouts in them!

We are looking at doing a Norway tour next year, with a few tweaks to hopefully make things even better – now if we could just arrange  the weather……