May 2023 Meili Trials: Norway Fjords & Mountains

Day 1: A long drive

We drove from Ypres through the Low Countries, Belgium and Holland and then Germany, the support truck nearly got taken out by a Dutch pensioner in a Volvo, then an HGV that had a massive blow out right in front of us and closed all three lanes. Luckily I was driving and my story about Stonehenge wasn’t interrupted which would have upset Purves if I hadn’t finished it.

We drove the length of Jutland, big skies, and arrived at the northernmost point of Denmark, a fishing port called Hirstals.

It’s an odd place. Fewer than five thousand inhabitants, the largest aquarium in Northern Europe with a fish tank that hold 4,500,000 litres of water and 70 different species (from the North Sea 🤷‍♂️), there’s a really big sculpture that I thought was a Norse fertility goddess but turned out to be someone’s dark vision of a snowman standing guard over the port, and there’s a local radio station Color Radio, that plays 1980’s hits from loudspeakers all around the town all day, interspersed by earnest Danish DJs informing everyone when the next ferry for Norway or the Faroe Islands leaves. Who needs the internet.

Day 2: Trolltunga: Instagram vs Reality

We left Hirstals on a speedboat passing as a ferry that crossed the North Sea from Denmark to Kristiansands in Norway at warp speed, drove for 5 hours (7 with stops to look at waterfalls and insane scenery, my bad) and arrived in Odda, ready to launch the 20 hour trek to Trolltunga, a slab of rock shaped like a troll’s tongue, 1100 metres above sea level and over a sheer drop to the Ringedalsvatnet lake.

It’s one of the most enigmatic and stunning views in Norway.

That’s what Instagram tells you. Splendid isolation, peace and tranquility and the glory of nature uninterrupted.

Apart from the hoard of people who hike all day to come here to get their perfect 'gram.

Sat alone, pensive and serene, over looking the lake a mile below.

If that is you ignore the 3 hour queue snaking down the hill behind you, all waiting to have their photo taken, with marshals ensuring each person gets their perfect pose for 1 minute.

1,870 people visited it in one day having hiked the 20 hours from dawn to dusk (they skip that part in the guidebooks).

If each one of them took 1 minute to have their shot it would take over 30 hours for the marshals to process them all.

But that’s Instagram right?

Here’s the real TrollTunga with queues of people with selfie sticks and tripods and cameras with timers.

It’s surreal.

We’re heading further north tomorrow to the Arctic circle, to the Lofoten Islamds, about 639 miles, give or take a few. Empty roads, skipping through the seasons, and the Meilis are smashing it.

Day 3-5: Fjords, Mountains and Wildlings

We drove north from Odda in the Meili trucks, each turn of the road opening up new immense vistas, stunning Fjords and snow topped mountains, for hour upon hour, heading into first the Western Fjords then hugging the coast towards the mighty Jostalbreen Glacier, Europe's largest glacier.

Jostalbreen covers over 400 square kilometres, sitting atop a plateau that gives rise to epic waterfalls as the meltwater thunders down the U-shaped walls of the valleys hundreds of metres below. Just one of these would be a huge tourist attraction. Here, they're two-a-penny.

Ok so there were no Wildings. Or Trolls.

Basecamp for the next few days would be a small valley with a ridiculously beautiful lake from where we could move into the realm of the glacier on foot. With a drone. If we thought what our eyes beheld was special, the drone eye view of the glacier took us to a place just beyond our imagination.

Centuries of ice have scoured the rocks that line the valley walls until they are glassy smooth, and made slick by the rain, we were reminded why we were doing this field test.

An accident here, miles from anywhere, and it was good to know that back at base camp and in the UK, the team had our location and were tracking us with feelings that ranged between mild envy and white hot rage at being left behind...if anything happened they knew where we were. Ok, it might have taken them a while to arrange help, once they got over the rage, but it would have come eventually.

And the Meilis? Yep. Smashed it: reporting our location for the entire trip on a single charge. It's beginning to look very exciting!