Having now taken the DMD tablet on two or three trips, I’ve made some progress with it but I find there are still some serious problems with using it that amount to deal breakers for me.
First the positives: I’ve worked out how to turn up the volume and assign a button to that so I have been able to hear the turn by turn instructions from Google Maps and DMD – when riding at slow speed at least.
I’ve worked out how to tether my iPhone to the DMD so now have a live connection that allows Google maps and Myrouteapp to work properly.
With stick on fingertips on my gloves the touchscreen works pretty well most of the time.
These are all major problems solved. But there are still some unsolved issues that make me consider deinstalling this outfit and putting it up for sale:
1 The screen is not very bright – nothing like the Garmin Zumo XT and I can’t understand why people say that it is. See the picture. DMD is set to 100% brightness. It is pretty much unusable when the light shines directly on it, in even dull sunlight.
2. The link to the iPhone keeps dropping out and is long-winded to reestablish involving two separate set up screens – certainly too involved to do safely while riding. And when there is a poor mobile signal, there is no GPS mapping – at least on the Google maps app.
3. The DMD app map seems to have centred itself in a large blue ocean somewhere and does not seem to auto centre on where I am. Again, this would take time to sort out – involving stopping.
4. When using it, the map does not seem to keep where you are updated.
The pros still are: I can just take one device on journeys that I can use as a Kindle, for internet browsing and blog updates
Thursday 29th June at just gone 9 pm – because I am on the Stenna ship to Harwich and we have just gone back into British time. I’ve just been up on the deck. When the ship left the dock at the Hook of Holland I watched all the way as it sailed out of the harbour. It was amazing because I think of Hook of Holland as a small place, little more than the ferry terminal and its infrastructure but as the ship sails up towards the spit, I suppose, there is a beach at the end which is rather beautiful and what look like apartments in a small semi-circle facing out to the sea, right on the sand. They must be amazing places to stay in. And there is a spit, a road that goes out further and, after that, a wall made of rocks. I have no idea how they would have built this. The wall goes out for half a kilometre, or a full kilometre maybe. And at the very end of that is a small light house and after that you are in the open sea. All of this with the sun setting though it was freezing cold in the wind. After seeing the ship away from land I went back into my cabin to, again, get my head down early to not be too tired for the morning.
(On my recording, I did neglect to mention my enjoyable ritual of having fish chips and mushy peas and a small bottle of chilled white wine in the restaurant. After a couple of weeks of cooking by my tent, I really appreciate this kind of meal.
Once at Harwich, I have to ride back home to deal with all the domestic things awaiting, needing sorting out. I think it is about two hours to ride home. Who knows? Certainly on the way out from central London to Harwich the traffic was terrible. It’s a bit of a heartsink journey going back into London. Its much nicer leaving London.
Now, earlier today: The crossing from Kristiansand to Emden was calm. I had one coffee and a croissant and then another coffee before packing everything up in my cabin and sitting on deck for the last half hour or so of the sailing. We got off the boat about half past ten in the morning. There was a huge number of motorcyclists that people seemed to stand in crowds to watch (even a German policeman waved at us all). There was a line of maybe 100 or more motorcyclists all taking this turn and then that turn. Eventually once we got on the the autobahn – A31 I think – this large group dispersed. I rode down that long road for a while and then turned right into Holland. I stopped for a snack, then carried on heading towards Utrecht and Rotterdam, stopped again for petrol and a drink and then headed off. I don’t know whether it is getting worse or I am more nervous but the big ring roads around Utrecht and Rotterdam have so many lanes and most drivers are really wanting to drive as fast as possible. It was really crazy. By the time I got to the A20 and then the A12 and then the smaller roads to the Hook of Holland there is not so much traffic but it is crazy before that. It’s a nasty bit of riding for any journey to Europe that involves landing at Hook of Holland you have to run that gauntlet before you can get very far.
That is the end of my recording of that day and of the whole trip. The ride down into London was not too bad though when I arrived home I found that my bedroom had been flooded because someone staying here (my sister in law) had left the Velux window over my bed open all night (she went off to stay elsewhere) in torrential rain. The water even ran through the floorboards and down into the next floor. My mattress was soaked. Then there was less than a week before I set off on a family holiday to the outer Hebrides so I had little time to reflect on the trip immediately afterwards. But now (in mid-September) is a chance.
First – its such a shame about the Holland Norway line going bust and leaving, I read, 75,000 people out of pocket and another group stranded. It is a useful route, not cheap but not terribly pricey either.
Norway as a m/c destination: its beautiful obviously with a varied terrain and also offers the challenge of a ride all the way to Nordkap. Camping sites are plentiful and many have cabins which are brilliant alternatives to camping or hotelling (expensive). Its not too expensive if you don’t eat out or buy wine or spirits. It’s a long way to go to get there – and now there’s one less ferry route.
GoPro 11 and helmet set up: I captured some good footage but forgot the short adapter cable that joins my helmet mic to the camera so no running commentaries. This has made putting together a series of videos about the trip a bit less interesting – though I have lots of footage.
Mosko Moto luggage. I’m reluctantly getting used to the Revolver luggage and took a much larger Shad roll top bag instead of the standard MM roll top – more than twice the volume I think. Stashing shopping was a pain and I lost my home made cake and bread from the back of the bike on the way to Harwich.
The Garmin Zumo XT GPS behaved strangely and often stopped charging for no reason. If it breaks down I’m tempted to try something completely different- an Android approach here.
The bike was good. At the ports I could see I was the smallest bike amid loads of big GSs.
Tuesday 27th June. I’m still staying in my cabin in Ogna Camping, on the coast, south of Stavanger, and the cabin is very nice to have. Last night it was blowing a gale. It seems very windy here by the coast and it was wet again. I sat here and I luxuriated because I wasn’t in my little tent. I have paid for a second night here. This morning I thought I would take a short ride around here. There’s a place called Tondstad. Its about 50 or 60 miles from here and the road there is meant to be good to ride. I headed off, got some petrol, on route 42 up to Tonstad – its quite high up. About 20 minutes into the ride I could see I was riding towards really quite dark clouds and the road started to look as though it had been wet and there was a fine drizzle in the air. I did not bring my waterproofs for some crazy reason. Maybe I forgot that I was in Norway. I thought, in a slightly defeatist way, ‘right, I’m outta here if it starts raining’ but it never did start raining. I got to Tonstad which is a pretty place and then I looked at the map and could see that route 42 carries on further. The question was, shall I go back the way I came or shall I take a slightly longer route? The GPS said that it would take 50 minutes to get to a place on the coast called Flekfjord and from there, it seemed there was a coast road back up to the campsite which is north of Egarsund. I did some spirited riding and there was not much other traffic. It was really enjoyable. I got to Flekfjord and then I was routed by the GPS onto the RV44 which is a road that hugs the coast. Its known as the North Sea Road. See this link on BestBiking Roads. And that’s when the excitement really started because it – well, I had no idea – it’s a really twisty road full of steep hairpins going up, going down with lots of traffic, like caravans going both ways, though mainly going in the same direction as me which was good. It was the kind of route where you are asking – is this corner second gear, no, its first gear? Lets not go too wide coming out of it and there was just hairpin after hairpin. I would look ahead and see this line of caravans going up at some impossible angle, high above me but actually really close. The ride was on the borderline between exciting and really scary! And tiring because there was so much of it. Eventually the traffic came to a halt – on the flat – at some roadworks for five minutes or more. I turned off the engine and then realised that I did not have my helmet camera turned on so did not record any of that amazing riding. So you will just have to take my word for it.
Once the light changed I headed off, still quite a long way back to the campsite but on a much easier road to ride. I got back here about 3.15 or so exhausted. And now I must confess my mind is on packing for the morning and getting down to the ferry terminal by about 1.30. This seems a good time even though they have delayed the ferry from 3pm till 5pm (I think) but check-in still starts at 1. I am sure we can get on the boat early. We could last time. In the afternoon the sun shines into this cabin. Its beautiful and I have the curtain open. And its lovely and warm and the little porch is great – but as soon as you step out further you are in the wind (recording now includes wind noise) and it takes the temperature down by lots of degrees. My bike is sitting there in the sunshine looking a bit sad. Its covered in mud and the tyres look a bit worn, and the dodgy GPS connection needs sorting. But it has done me well.
Sunday 25th June: In the evening. Its ten past nine though it doesn’t feel that late. I’m in my tent in a campsite just north of Stavanger. I don’t know where exactly I am. But I do know that this campsite is right next to the E39. Its next to an embankment that goes up to the main road. The road goes over a bridge over a fjord and I can see a little bit further is a ferry that crosses the fjord. Again, today was beautiful riding with a couple of ferries and on one of them two Norwegian guys riding motorcycles and chatting to them which was nice. After the ferry we went our separate ways with some really long tunnels going down towards Stavanger in fact I got a recommendation from Thomas Hansen for some places to buy food on a Sunday near Bergen. He had some good recommendations, but I had already found somewhere which was by a small harbour with lots of children jumping in to the water on a warm sunny Sunday morning. I had to wait there for quite a while for this small shop to open.
No beer to be bought on a Sunday
In the end what I bought there was not bad. Riding: It got to 3.30 or twenty to 4 and I thought I might as well stop somewhere rather than run out of road to enjoy for the rest of these few days. But I know that tomorrow there is rain forecast and in fact one of the bikers told me that torrential rain is forecast with thunder and lightning. And it makes my heart freeze the thought of it tomorrow. Its forecast to start raining at 9am and rain until 2 in the afternoon. So that has put me in an anxious mood. On the way here I rode into one campsite, very slopy and gravelly which just did not feel right. It was packed full of families in caravans (it felt more like a holiday camp than a campsite for travellers) so I rode on and have ended up in this place. Even before I got off the bike in the parking area here at Austre Bokn Camping, I was looking at my Norcamp app for places that had huts because I could see that this place does not and I could not see any sites nearby that had huts. So here I am. It is one of those in transition places that was quite traditional but the new owners who have owned it since 2021 (I know that because they have written their biography and their ‘vision’ for the site in many languages and posted it up around the site) and are making the place slightly swanky so you have to pay for everything: you have to pay for a shower; you pay to use the kitchen; to use the washing machine and the prices are up on the walls everywhere. It’s a nice place but it has got some disadvantages: its really windy which obviously you can’t blame on the campsite but its unsettling – and being right next to the traffic (the sound of a truck going by on my recording). Tonight will be another night of wearing earplugs. Not only all day but all night! Looking back I remember how odd it felt trying to sleep in broad daylight a few yards a way from a traffic embankment.
The view is beautiful – in that direction at least
But now I am really nervous about tomorrow. I really want to get packed up tomorrow before 9am when its forecast to start raining. I have an alarm set for 7am.
Camping in a windy corner
I have been looking on the map and found what looks like a good campsite. I did start looking for hotels. They were either really expensive or there was a cheap one but I realised it was cheap because you shared – it looked pretty crappy actually. So I am going to head off to this place called Steinsnes NAF camping in Egarsund. I can see from Google maps that they have cabins and I just pray that they have a cabin that I can stay in tonight and possibly tomorrow night and I was also looking on the map for places that I could shelter on the way – get off the bike, park at a shopping centre and hang out inside for an hour or so if its pouring in Stavanger, or a petrol station… somewhere just to shelter from the rain, just stand there under shelter for an hour or even two, I really don’t mind. So I have lots of nervousness about tomorrow because of the rain. The dread is nearly always much worse than doing it – but I do want to get off before it rains. Its windy tonight here. I’ve got a lovely view over the fjord. I’m on a high piece of land here on this very slopy campsite but it is pretty windy. I am sure it will be fine. Worse things have happened at sea. I got very drenched three or four days ago but its just a memory now. In fact there is something about that kind of adversity that makes you really focussed on the moment. When you are riding along and the weather is fine, my mind is going all over the place but when things are tough you are really there. So I am hoping that I sleep well. Apart from the noisy traffic the place is quiet, very quiet. There’s no noise from other people at all – just the birds, the wind and the traffic. The traffic is getting quieter too… So, this anxiety about stuff its so – its not the end of the world. Its easy to get clenched up and hunker down, look inward. Its crazy. It doesn’t help but I have made a few plans which is good. Lets see what the next instalment brings.
Thursday 22nd June: Its Thursday and I am staying at a campsite called Hogkjolen Fjel Fannrem. Its located on the E39 to the west of Trondheim on the way to Alesund which is where I want to end up tomorrow night. Last night up on the E6 in a town just south of a town called Mosfjelt(?) was my first night of hiring a hytte – a cabin – which cost Kr400 – about £40. It was a cute little place. It had a fridge which I didn’t expect. It had lights. It had a mattress on the bed and a small cooker and a kettle. All in all it was fantastic. As I wrote earlier, it was the perfect space between staying in a swanky hotel and camping in my small tent which is the other extreme. I’ve been buying smaller and smaller tents in order to be lighter – because ‘light is right’ – right? Have I already said this but, being in a (small) tent is alright when the weather is dry but as soon as you add in rain, the whole thing becomes almost untenable (maybe a slight overstatement but it becomes extremely awkward) as you squeeze round and try to take off motorcycling clothes and boots in this small space. When the weather is questionable, staying in these huts is the perfect answer. Its almost an answer made in heaven. For example – no, lets start from today. I knew when I stayed in that hut last night that it was going to be raining in the morning and that it was going to start raining at about 8am. So, the bike was outside, of course, I was safely dry inside. The bike was covered up with the Oxford cover I will now always take with me travelling. And it rained right on cue at 8 o’clock. I dithered, eventually packed up. The rain was not heavy but it was more than a drizzle and I left though I wondered about leaving a little later. I think I got on the road by about 9.50 in the end. It was raining but I was in wet weather gear and it was OK. I rode for an hour, maybe more like two hours. What made things start to go downhill was when big trucks came thundering in the other direction. They cause so much spray and splash. Usually I can move over when I see them coming to the side of the carriageway to get away from the worst of it but one particular truck – maybe I didn’t move fast enough or maybe there was a particularly deep puddle but I got drenched and from that point my legs felt wet. Somehow they had got wet. I thought that this good quality wet weather gear (made by Klim) is fine but it has its limits or perhaps is starting to weaken. An hour later I stopped at a roadside diner – not a fantastic place but fine for the purpose and had a coffee and a strange cake. I sat at a table by the window and looked out rather despondent at the rain falling heavily by now. And in the end I just had to go back out and get back on the bike in this heavy rain. I headed off, continuing south on the E6 and I was thinking things like (the Buddhist mantra) ‘everything is impermanent’ and ‘it can’t rain all the time’ (after the song by Jane Siberry) and for a flicker of thought I thought: this is a privileged moment to be in the middle of suffering and to have this opportunity to think through these things. And I rode and maybe an hour later the rain stopped. I was going south and then eventually as I got further south, the sun came out! So I stopped at a roadside picnic spot and had a roll and some orange juice sitting on their benches. I think I kept the wet weather gear on – I can’t remember but I certainly felt a huge relief. Then I continued south, riding around Trondheim where they are doing huge roadworks and it was the kind of time that people are leaving work: lots of traffic, queues of traffic, lots of tunnels. Eventually I got around Trondheim and took the turnoff from the E6 to the E39 which is the road that goes right around the coast on this west part of Norway. This is a beautiful part of Norway. I gave myself a cheer in the helmet for getting on to this new road: having gone up the E6 and then back down the E6 and now I was doing something different.
At this point I put a random campsite into the GPS because I wanted it to route me round Trondheim to the right place to get onto this particular road. Then, maybe it wasn’t the same campsite that I put in but I stopped by a wide gravel drive off the main road towards a big site – where I am now. You could not call this place pretty but it is sprawling with gravel tracks everywhere. There’s even a mechanic’s garage just at the end of the drive where my cabin is planted where people are working on interesting looking vintage cars. The man that runs the site in the office is an older man who was interested in my motorcycle travel and showed me maps and some nice routes that he recommended, all of which I have forgotten and he showed me down to this hut. (That’s what I like about these old school campsites – that the people who run them seem genuinely interested in your travels.)
Drying in the sunshine
This is hut number two in my travels. This hut has four beds in it – two bunk beds. It has a small kitchen with basic equipment and a veranda with a small table and chairs. The sun has been shining in making it beautiful and warm. I have all my wet clothes spread out, drying in the sun. The only thing that has not dried yet is the sheepskin (on the seat) which was soaking.
Why do I like this campsite? I think its partly because it has a variety of people staying. There are people who are travellers. There is a German couple in the cabin next door who are travelling on two GSs, then there’s another German couple on one GS over in a tent (interestingly they had packed up and left before I event ventured out the next morning). There’s also some interesting looking vehicles around. Its definitely not one of those sites where all you see are Dutch families sitting around all day outside their huge white motorhomes. It seems much more to cater for people who have a different idea of travel. Interesting. I like it. I’d come back. And (I keep saying this) I really like the hut formula. I’ve been to two sites now and they have had huts available. I haven’t been turned away.
Here’s a quick gear review: the bike is doing fine. A lot of riders are on big GSs here – which, of course, I don’t have any more. However, what my bike does not have is fantastic weather protection because I fitted a rally style front end and screen onto the bike. The original screen was actually better at keeping the wind and rain off so it is self-inflicted. I wonder whether a clip on screen extension would work, though perhaps it would look out of place. The helmet is fantastic. It is definitely water tight. I would know it by now if it wasn’t. Water runs off the visor quite nicely. Now that I no longer need to wear glasses, I’ve not been wearing sunglasses but have been using the drop down sun visor which I can, with a struggle, put up when I go into a dark tunnel and some of them are very dark and then down again when I emerge back into the sunshine. That works very nicely. The GoPro Hero 11 seems to work well though it runs out of battery at unexpected moments. It’s the same with my ‘B-roll’ camera, my Sony FDR – the batteries seem to suddenly go from ¾ full to being flat. Tomorrow my route is over to Alesund to pick up the rest of the route of the Motorrad tour and perhaps I will follow that round to Stavanger. Its Thursday and I don’t need to be in Kristiansand until next Wednesday. I did not realise I had so long so I can really take my time on this. It seems like there is a bit of rain coming but its not continuous – unlike when I looked on my iPhone app: the weather in the place that I left this morning is currently rain and its going to rain all night, all Friday, all Saturday and stop early Sunday morning. Whereas down here it’s a much more mixed picture. So, obviously, you have got to be prepared for rain in Norway and I think you have got to be flexible enough to do some dodging and diving in your route to avoid it.
21st June 2023. Today is the longest day. Its been a really good day. I didn’t sleep all that well in the hotel. I did have a lovely soft bed but it was very light in the room. The curtains were not good at keeping the sun out. I woke at 7, had breakfast and got away by 8.50. My objective was to get to the polar centre which was about 2 and ½ or 2 and ¾ hours away north on the E6. First I rode through Mo I Rana, the place I had expected to be staying and then continued north. It seemed to take an age to get up there. It seemed that everything was in slow motion, like a hangover. As I rode further north the scenery became more dramatic, more rocky, more snow-capped and more snow by the side of the road. Eventually the Polar Centre came into sight, and I turned off. It was quite busy but was a large area. Lots of motorbikes parked, lots of motorhomes and lots of nicely customised jeeps. Of course I took lots of photographs and had something to eat.
I made it
I didn’t buy any of their ridiculous things in the gift shop but it felt really good to have achieved getting there and I found myself thinking that having a concrete objective on a holiday, or when travelling, is much better than just having the vague objective of riding around and having fun. This is something that you know you have done and it seemed to work because I eventually I packed everything and turned round and came back heading back south. I felt – mostly – more relaxed. I could stop whenever I needed to, I didn’t have a punishing schedule. I stopped and had coffee and a roll at a petrol station which feels more natural every time I do it. Then I plugged in the campsites into the GPS. The nearest was campsite Haugen. It was only half an hour down the E6, though I was tempted to try and get further but it was beautiful weather today, glorious sun all day, sometimes a bit too warm – up to 28 degrees, cold in the tunnels. Some of them were really long where the temperature fell to 13 degrees. I arrived here and a woman came out and I said I had a tent and she offered me a cabin and because I had been looking at the weather forecast so often which showed there was an unavoidable band of rain coming across tomorrow; some places get it earlier than others but around here it should come about 8am – I said yes to the offer. And that rain seems to last all Thursday, all Friday and all Saturday. According to the forecast there seemed no way of avoiding it. So a hut/ cabin or hytte seemed a fantastic idea, so much nicer than being in my super-cramped tent. So I’m in the hut now. It’s got a mattress – really nice, It’s got a fridge, it’s got a little stove top, its got lights, its got sockets for me to charge everything up. Its like a mini hotel but it’s a log cabin. It smells like being in a sauna.
My home for the night
Like a mini hotel
Fast flowing river
It cost only Kr400 instead of Kr1100 that last night’s hotel cost. The washroom and the shower is a bit old school; you have to put Kr10 in the slot to get hot water but that is fine by me and I can really do without the swankiness of the hotel. This really suits me well. The tent is fine when its dry and warm but it’s really cramped so to be in a place like this is amazing for really not much more money. It makes such a huge difference. So, this site is beside the E6 but there is also a river behind it, quite a long way down. You would have to take a steep path to get down there. As I am writing this the sun is – well it won’t set tonight probably. It is a beautiful evening, still warm and the river is rushing down there happily. There are a few other bikers staying but they are a safe distance away. Staying in a cabin is such a good solution and if the next few days are going to be rainy this is a much better option than going for a hotel, I think, unless it is really horrible. I’ve covered up the bike but it seems unimaginable that such a sunny evening will turn into a rainy dawn and then rain all day.
Two other things: my GPS – Garmin Zumo XT – when it goes into tunnels it goes into night mode dimming and then lighting up again when you come out. But earlier today it got stuck in the dark mode and I could not see the screen. I tried restarting it in a lay-by but this didn’t help. Eventually, after restarting again and making an adjustment it got back to normal, but it gave me a real moment mainly because I rely on it to see whether I am exceeding the speed limit (everyone warns that speeding fines are very expensive here). Thing number 2: I’ve got my big map of this part of Norway spread out here on the table and I was going to put a town Rorvik into the GPS. I’ve looked at it before – its one of the places where the ferry goes on the Motorrad tour but there are two Rorviks and now I’ve found the real Rorvik which is a much smaller place near Trondheim and this is one of the first ferries that they catch on that particular day. Luckily I didn’t put the wrong Rorvik in which is further north but close enough to be a plausible place that you might think you were heading to. I am planning to head to Trondheim and then peel off the E6 to the West, the coast road, the E39. So that’s my plan for tomorrow. I’m expecting it to be wet but I have good wet weather gear and I can hunker down and get going, so lets see how the next days go. The 28th is the day I catch the ferry. In summary, it took 3 ½ days for me to get to the arctic circle from the bottom of Norway and I have 7 days to wind the way back down. I’m really happy with this place and let’s hope I can find other places like it on my journey down south. Using cabins transforms motorcycle travel in Norway.
