Day 25-2. Græsli to Røros contd.
As we worked our way round Stuggusjøen we noticed a road across the lake and realised that we would start climbing again. As with earlier in the day there was a sign giving the gradient of the climb and once again it was between six and eight percent. Unlike earlier in the day it was now very sunny and hot going. As per usual Damae disappeared into the distance and I waited for her to catch up. As the the road wound its way uphill and the climb got longer and longer I decided to admire the view and wait for Damae again. Just before she arrived I noticed an animal crossing the road. It was a reindeer, the first one I'd ever seen in the wild. We both stopped and watched enthralled like a couple of tourists.
The reindeer having seen tourists before, wandered off into the scrub a couple of minutes later. We carried on and noticed the landscape had started changing. It looked like it was flattening out a bit. We started seeing more and more reindeer on the hillsides before we were stopped by traffic. Actually we were stopped by traffic that had been stopped by a reindeer on the road and an albino one at that. We noticed some more curious things about reindeer.
Firstly although there was nothing to stop the reindeer from walking off the road and onto the tundra it chose to stay on the road. It seemed a little stressed by being on the road too and it had a very ungainly gait on tarmac. As it moved along the road its legs looked like (Damae's term) egg beaters all flailing in different directions. It looked like an unfeasibly ungainly animal that was testing the limits of Darwin's theory. However, even more suprisingly, once it finally found its way to the rough undulating tundra it moved with astonishing ease and grace. The head and body just seemed to glide across the landscape on top of those big hooves.
We'd stopped by now to watch the albino reindeer head up the hill. Then as it got to the crest it stopped running, stood still and looked back down to where we were. I got this wonderful shot of the reindeer, the rock and the grey clouds behind it. Priceless.
It was now four o'clock and we seemed to have reached the top of the climb. The road disappeared down into the distance and we had a view across the expansive landscape into the hinterland of Norway. To the left we could look across to Sweden where the same landscape continued on, uninterrupted into the distance. It was time for a brew so we clambered down from the car park onto a bit of grass next to it and sat enjoying the view. (The panorama only gives a hint as to just how spectacular the view was).
Tea finished, we headed off downhill. This was a very fast descent and within an hour we'd arrived at the junction of the RV 30 and the RV 705. Here we took the right turn towards Glåmos stopping briefly to put our rain coats on as it looked like it was going to rain. Damae was also starting to struggle even on the flat and it seemed as if Røros was not going to be in reach. The skies were darkening and we started looking indecisively for a nice place to wild camp. At least the road was quite flat and the wind not too bad. There were a few small climbs as the road wound its way around the Aursunden towards Glåmos. There was a good reason to push on tonight. We were planning to spend the day sightseeing in Røros the following day and cycling out the campsite in Langen in the evening. This amounted to a sort of rest day.
An hour later we got something to raise our spirits a little. A herd of reindeer decided that now was the time to cross the road. The herd seemed to be lead by a big reindeer with very large antlers. The reindeer stopped after they'd run up the field next to the road and the large antlered male stopped to look back at us.