We allowed ourselves two days to ride from Copenhagen to Oslo - only about 300km per day. We left Copenhagen in our wet weather gear as the sky looked threatening but we took it all off at morning tea as no rain had eventuated.

We rode through the tunnel and bridge connecting Denmark to Sweden, paid our toll of 30 Euro and then had our passport checked at the Customs point. The countryside was flat and green. The farms had barns much bigger than the houses the farmers lived in - I guess cows and sheep need more space in the cold weather. We stopped for lunch at a shopping centre before riding on to Gothenborg our destination for the night. We stayed at Hotel Orgryte - you can imagine what Greg called it I'm sure (Hotel Orgy of course). The hotel is in the suburbs and was great value - lovely room with breakfast included and 24 hour tea/coffee/fruit and cookies. We wandered down the street for dinner in a Turkish restaurant where we all ordered Italian food! We passed one of the best maintained cemeteries we have ever seen - not a bad place to end up if you were a local. When we returned to our hotel we watched a bit more of the World Cup on the big screen in the lounge area - this time it was Brazil and Switzerland - 1 all.

Before we got to Oslo we had a little detour. A few days ago Kerrie remembered that a student she had taught in 1991 had returned to live in Norway - and she remembered his name! She looked him up on Facebook and made contact. He is now a teacher and as the school he works at was on our way to Oslo he invited us to drop in and say hello - why not! Jostein Ryan and his younger brother Harvard (who Kerrie also taught) were born in Norway but moved to Australia when they were young. The family moved back to Norway when Jostein was 16. He now teaches Year 7 at Ambjornrod skole in Fredrikstad. We had a coffee and chatted about Oxenford State School, old friends and the state of life in Norway. We also chatted to a couple of other staff members who were curious about why 3 motorbike riding Australians were in their staffroom.

With our detour over we rode on - in the rain to our next 2 night's accommodation - a Hostel in Oslo. The weather was miserable and by the time we arrived at the hostel our good cheer had disappeared. The GPS is usually pretty spot on when navigating to our overnight accommodation - not this time! We got to where we had to turn left, hostel only 80m away but the road was closed with large piles of dirt in the middle of it. We retraced our route looking for another way in but it took us 30 minutes to find it - also up a closed road that had been dug up and was very muddy. Now anyone who knows Greg also knows that he does NOT ride on dirt roads - this time he had no choice. Kerrie was unloaded and had to walk the last 100m to the hostel! Finally inside we were delighted with the room - large sunny and very modern. With breakfast included this would turned out to be a good place to stay.

Playing tourist again tomorrow - this time in Oslo.