Day 9. Svinesland to Lunde (Farsund).
Distance 63.5km. Average 14.3 km/h.
We'd hoped to get to somewhere near Farsund that night, and were feeling a little tired from the exertions of the day before. We left the site a Svinesland and headed towards Kvinsdal along the Fedafjorden. After twisting and turning though villages (passing more examples of the extensive improvements to the Norwegian road network), the landscape flattened out as we went gently downhill to the head of the fjord.
On the way we stopped at a petrol station and Damae picked up some more Rød Sprit and was taken by a couple of stickers for the bikes. Hers became known as the Troll and mine as the Moose.
Fedafjorden should have been a good cycle down one side of the fjord and back up the other. Going down was fine as going up should have been, seeing as the inclines were not too steep. However I found it too unsettling to be able to cycle.
The disadvantage of doing the route the way we did it is that you end up on the OUTSIDE edge going up and down fjords. In the case of Fedafjorden this means cycling next to a wooded but nearly sheer drop, with only a 20cm concrete wall beside for 'protection'. So I walked whilst Damae cycled. In truth this did not slow us down much as I could walk at 5+km/hr whilst Damae was cycling at 6km/hr. I'd really like to do this section again some time but the right way round so I can enjoy it.
We carried on with a couple more climbs as described on the map but then made a map reading error and missed cycling at the end of the peninsular past the airport. At first we thought we had taken a good decision as we ended up cycling along the 465 next to Åptafjorden past a lovely shoreside campsite.
But there was a stinger in the tail, we'd started climbing again. Adding to our growing irritation the road narrowed and as it started drizzling a large Dutch camper driven by someone with unnecesary haste overtook on one of the narrower sections (a wider bit was only a 100m away). The scariest incident with a motor vehicle on the route. We finally stopped to put on rain gear after the warm heavy summer rain set in.