Hammerfest to Lofoten Islands 31 July, 1 & 2 August

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Hammerfest to Lofoten Islands 31 July, 1 & 2 August

I cannot believe it is our 80th day away since we left for Darwin for the Kimberley Cruise in NW Australia.

After leaving Hammerfest we drove 150 kms to Alta.

We were looking forward to driving through the Lofoten & Vesteralen Islands but before we did, we drove through some more of Norway's magnificent scenery. We have noticed extensive new or resealed roads everywhere. The oil & gas money they are receiving is certainly going into infrastructure of the country. And Norwegians HAVE to be the best tunnel builders in the world, even better than the Swiz and Austrians, just by pure numbers that they have built. We drove through many tunnels which shortened our journey considerably, even though there is still, big kilometers to do, to drive from north to south.

Norway is 1,752 kms long, from north to south and over 75,000 islands lie offshore. Between the fjords, islands mountains and rivers, as we saw today, makes very pleasant driving, and with the improved roads, it is even better.

We stopped at Alta for the 1st night in a campsite that was next to the Alta River. Alta is a growing industrial and education centre for the region with about 18,000 people. Alta also has a new, silver church and new buildings springing up everywhere. We camped next to the Alta River which had a rocky base and hence many rapids.

The town was completely flattened during WW2 apart from the church. It is surrounded by spruce forests and agricultural land.

The original town at the mouth of the Alta River has grown and merged with its neighbour to form the most popular town in the region of Finnmark.

It showered with rain over night but wasn't cold and cleared to a beautiful, sunny day. We have noticed the temperature getting warmer as we travel south. The sun shone as we drove along the edge of the fjords and drove to Bjerkvik for the next night.



We found a lovely quiet site to camp over night, just outside of Bjerkvik. After eggs on toast for breakfast, we set our GPS for Harstad near the Lofotan & Vesteralen Islands.

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