The far north - part 2: summer in Finnmark.

Part 2: summer in Finnmark.

What happened in part 1: Micha, Yeti, and Jule drove via Stockholm, the Swedish coast, and Inari in Finland to the eastern most part of northern Norway.

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It's a strange place to be. Russia just on the other side, Murmansk 200 km further east. "Finnmark" is the largest but most sparsely settled county in Norway. And the county with the most mosquitos - perhaps more than in Finland, and there are plenty of reindeer as well.


The last settlement in Norway "Grense Jakobselv" is located at the shore of the Barents Sea and just opposite the Russian border. There is a prominent chapel which was built to reinforce Norway's territorial claim to the area and as a visible landmark for Russian ships to be aware of the border.
That is also the point in mainland Norway farthest by road from Oslo - that is where our trip really started!!


And that is also where the weather really started to suck... .


Literally washed out, we skipped the wild and empty regions of Vardø, Gamvik, and everything in-between and instead just followed the main road further west - or so we thought. Suddenly, we saw a sign pointing to "Inari, Finland". Hmm? Didn't we just come from there?! The rain was so bad that we must have missed the turn that should have kept us going along the coast, so we ended up further south, very close to Inari again... . When we realized our mistake it was too late to turn around, so we just took the next option up north again... . At least for once we saw some other animals than reindeer: a colony of common eider, and a happy pod of white-beaked dolphins.
As the weather continued to stay wet and disgusting we were overly happy to be back on the beaten track and made use of the dry kitchen and hot showers at the world's northernmost campsite.


The main tourist magnet in the far north is the Nordkap - the northernmost point of Europe that can be reached by road. This is the place that promises the most spectacular views of the midnight sun, and to spot whales and dolphins from the almost 300 m high cliff. Well - if the weather permits and if you have the sufficient cash. It costs 20 Euro per person to reach this point - included are parking and toilets. Ridiculous. BUT! If you come by foot or bicycle, it's free! So, we left poor Yeti at the last parking before the Nordkap and biked the last six or so kilometers for the well-known picture with the huge globe. If the weather is nice, I would recommend to hike to Knivskjellodden, the true northernmost point. It's about an 18 km hike there and back but you're rewarded with a not-so-touristic view of the spectacular cliffs and the midnight sun. As we had no view anyways, at least we could look at the pictures in the entry area of the museum and see how the Nordkap midnight sun was supposed to look like... .


So, this is where we wanted to spend our summer holidays, this is where we planned midnight-sun hiking treks in the polar ecosystems and bike tours over glacier-rounded rocks. Hm... but not when it's raining!! The weather forecast showed not a hint of good weather for the coming week, so very frustrated we decided to drive on - drive somewhere where it doesn't rain, or at least where there is some indoor-entertainment.. . The few pictures taken along the road may let you envision how beautiful this landscape could be... .


The rain finally took a break a few hundred kilometers further south, close to the town of Alta. South of Alta lies the Sautso canyon, which is about 12 km long and up to 420 m deep, making it the largest canyon of Northern Europe. A nice viewing point can be reached via a 14 km hike - or for us, a splendid bike ride with river and marsh crossings, single trails through blueberry bushes, and a nice flow trail at the end. Unfortunately, no wind and rain also meant that the mosquitos were back - preventing us from enjoying the view of the canyon for all too long.

A few hours later - mosquitos gone, rain back. We spent the night close to Alta as we still had some hopes to see the midnight sun. This was our last chance, as further south the sun set already again... . And the next morning - tataaaa - SUN!!! We took the sunny opportunity to visit the ancient rock carvings around Alta. Using shoreline dating, the earliest of these carvings were dated to around 4200 BC, and the most recent carvings to around 500 BC. They are showing hunter-gatherers, reindeer, fences, boats and fishing, bears, and other animals. For better visibility some of the rock carvings were painted over with red color. It was really fascinating to imagine the people that made these carvings and how they might have lived in these harsh environment when there was no warm and dry houses... . Why did they decide to live here? And how did they survive?


The sun was shining the whole day, promising that we would finally be able to see the midnight sun! We searched for the nicest spot in the area, bought BBQ, antipasti, some beer, and got ready for the night when the sun would not set!



It was truly amazing to see the sun up in the middle of the night and it was very difficult to get tired and go to bed. Especially when knowing that the sun would hide behind clouds again the next day... . Luckily it didn't rain immediately, so we could do another short hike up Laslettind overlooking Lille Altafjorden and Burfjorden.


But the rain rolled in and so we rolled on as well. We left Finnmark and slowly also the bad weather. Continue with part 3: back to the west coast!