Day 6: There is always one more hill

The only good thing about today was meeting my friend May.

The plan was simple: from Lillehammer follow the national cycling route 7 which goes all the way to Oslo. Like I have written before these routes have really been put together my some office boy. Sometimes it is well marked but other times they have just forgotten about it or given up. Then they go all over the place at the sametime - left, right and centre.

The path is supposed to be good to cycle on but this one was gravel loose. You can't cycle up it and when you are coming down you can't brake on it. So I had to walk about 4 km with the bike. I went back to the main road and cycled on it to the campsite.

These cycle paths should encourage more cycling but instead, based on today, I would have given up cycling forever. The only thing that kept me going was Oslo and a cold beer in Oslo (watch a film called – Ice Cold in Alex, you would understand) and a rest day. Hopefully the route does not kill that for me - I have to follow the route 7 tomorrow aswell.

That's cycling for you.

Anyway I met May for the first time after her wedding and now she is pregnant. It seemed like we were not going to meet - she had to go the hospital at 3pm. I would have arrived in Hamar at 3, but by sheer luck I was there 30 minutes early and decided to go to the hospital and wait there. As faith would have it I was at the wrong hospital. so I gave up and cycled on through the city centre it was already 3pm. Suddenly the phone rang - she was running late for the hospital and was in the city centre and she had 5 minutes. For old friends 5 minutes face to face is enough to download and upload information and of course a hug.  That was the highlight of this gloomy, very sunny day.

Wish me luck for Oslo, I will need it.