June 29, 2022

Around 8am this morning I heard somebody pull into the camping space across from us and start setting up. It seemed a bit odd: who arrives at a campsite at 8am? I looked out of the tent and saw a silver Fiat camper van. Later that morning, after eating our great pastries (order them the night before at the campground office; pick them up in the morning), as we were packing up, a woman approached us. “Where are you coming from?” she asked, with an accent that sounded a bit like Italian.

I pointed at the license plate on the bike, as usual. “Texas. And you?”

“Southern Switzerland, near Lugano”.

“Ah, that explains the Italian accent”, I replied. She laughed, and we started talking about bikes. It turns out Silvia is also a motorcyclist, and by preference, a solo female traveler. She has a Triumph Speed Triple at home, which has seen many trips, although she now has the camper van also, which she admits is luxury compared to our sleeping on the ground. It turns out she arrived at 8am from another campground because she needed good wi-fi, as she is working while traveling.

We talked for so long that we missed the noon check-out time, though nobody seemed to care. We definitely shared similar outlooks on travel and our reasons for it. In the end, we invited her to stay with us if and when she tours the US (her dream, like many Europeans we’ve met, is to ride Route 66 on a Harley); and she invited us to stay with her in Switzerland, which we may well do later in this trip.

This is Silvia. She’s quite a find. She rides a Triumph Speed Triple, loves motorcycles and traveling. Finds it hard to decide whether to travel by motorcycle or camper van. Lives in a beautiful part of Switzerland near Italy (as if there is a part of Switzerland that isn’t beautiful). Has a great outlook and attitude towards life. If I weren’t married, I might consider moving to Switzerland. 😉

We had such a good time talking with Silvia that we forgot how late it was getting, and ended up not leaving the campground until just after noon.

We left Rødvig and headed towards the Oresund Bridge, just outside of Copenhagen. This bridge connects Denmark and Sweden, and is nearly 8 kilometers long. The west end is a long tunnel under the Oresund Strait, which eventually emerges onto a man-made island in the middle of the strait, and then onto the bridge. A railroad line runs along the bridge as well, making it the longest combined auto and rail bridge in Europe. It’s also a toll bridge: it cost $35.00 one way for a motorcycle to cross; nearly double that in a car.

Before we got to Copenhagen, we passed a small hotel on a side road. There were several brightly painted trucks in the parking lot, and lots of people working around them. I immediately recognized it, and turned around to go back and take photos.

I wasn’t aware that the Tour de France was starting in Copenhagen this year, until Sylvia mentioned it this morning. Then we saw these trucks in a parking lot as we rode past. If we had known earlier, we would have stretched things out and stayed in the area a bit longer to watch the Prologue.

We came off the Oresund Bridge into Malmo, Sweden and headed north. We stopped for fuel, and rang up a total of 283.64. Of course that’s in Swedish Krona, so about $27.75. As we were about to leave, our second friendly encounter of the day happened. Another motorcyclist approached us and asked if we would help push-start his motorcycle. His MV Agusta starter had died a few days earlier, and it was going to take two weeks to get a replacement. Being on holiday from Rome, Italy, he didn’t have two weeks to wait, so decided to just keep going, bump-starting it along the way.

As he and I walked towards his bike, he asked the usual: “Where are you coming from?”
“Texas.”
“Wow. On a boat?”
“Yes, the bike came on a boat, and we flew to Germany to meet it. We’ve been across Europe for the past two months. And you? Where are you coming from?”
“I am from Rome, but I’ve been to Nordkapp. Now I’m heading home.”
“We’re headed to Nordkapp now! How is it?”, I asked, excited for some very recent updates.

Have you ever watched a television show, or a cartoon, where someone asks the main character a question, and the character has a flashback? One of those where the camera zooms in very close to the person’s eyes, and you get that blank stare, then the picture slowly fades to a memory of something horribly painful?

That’s what I saw. I asked about Nordkapp, and there was a second or two of a thousand-mile-stare from a set of dead eyes. Then words seemed to uncontrollably start falling out of his mouth.

“The wind was terrible. It was so strong. The temperature was very cold, about 2 degrees (36F). And it rained very hard the whole time.”

I tried to switch to something more positive. “But it’s paved the whole way?”

He pointed at the parking lot where we stood. “Don’t expect this. There are many potholes, and many areas under construction. And the road is very slick with the rain and wind.”

Clearly he didn’t have a good time. Then he said, “I hope to do it again some day. Perhaps on a bicycle.”

Now THAT is a glutton for punishment. Or a true enthusiast. He did admit that he seemed to arrive at a very bad time as far as the weather; he was there one week ago, and today it’s 76 degrees there, with a low tonight in the upper 50s.

I stood behind him and pushed his motorcycle until he dropped the clutch and his bike fired up. We wished each other a safe journey, and he rode south, while we headed north to Varberg, and our campsite for the evening.