Day 21-2. Mjølfjell Vanderhjem to Voss.
The last time we were here we'd been too tired to look around the area, having eaten, showered and gone straight to bed. This time we decided to have a look at the suspension bridge just across from the youth hostel. There we spent a few minutes wandering across the bridge and taking some pictures of the river. I had been interested in taking a picture where the flowing water smudged but today was not to be that day. The sun was too bright and all I suceeded in doing was taking a photo of the flowing water stopped.
The run down was fairly uneventful but reminded us just how much this road goes up and down. It was definitely not a continuous run downhill but that kept it interesting. We stopped a couple of times, once by a general store just after Mjølfjell which shut early the day we were there, and then at Norheim and that wonderful bend that had been our lunch stop the year before.
In between we had to pause as an articulated lorry carrying building materials made its way slowly uphill. A year has made a lot of difference to the area, the higher reaches where there is no farming, holiday homes are now springing up like mushrooms and I guess that big lorries are not an uncommon sight on this road. Although the road is generally very quiet, it pays to be careful as 'normal' traffic (including lorries taking supplies up and down) uses this road too.
Norheim was a tea-stop where we sat and enjoyed the view again. The trip had been far easier than the last time we had made it, the early start and the lack of baggage made a significant difference. Perhaps also that this was our third long cycle trip which made things seem less strange and new. It was nice to be back and surprising to see how development is rapidly changing the countryside in and around Voss.
That evening we were lazy having achieved a respectable distance in a day and wandered into town. It was rather lively in the centre with groups of teenagers standing around. They were mostly occupied with each other and not with other people. We sat outside a cafe and drank some fizzy pop and hot chocolate and watched two teenagers in a very large tractor racing around the centre of town. For the participants it was all very good fun if a little disconcerting. After all, a teenager on a moped gets it wrong and generally no-one except perhaps the direct participant gets killed. A teenager getting it wrong whilst driving a several tons of tractor round a crowded town centre would be a very different story.
We ambled back to base, with the aim of heading to bed. Not far away a Spanish couple looking rather tired were organising themselves. They sat near us making their dinner as we lay on the grass. In March of 2008 an email dropped in my inbox from these two, saying hi and that they recognise us from our website. Fame at last.
We chatted about the following day, and what we were going to do to occupy ourselves before the night train left. There were a few options, including taking the cable car up the hill and some more sight-seeing and we decided to make decisions tomorrow.