My intention was to stay up pretty late Thursday night and sleep in on Friday because i knew i was in for a long day. Annoying thing about getting up at 6am every day for work, it makes it near impossible to wake up later. So not only did i not wake up around 9:30 or 10 like i had hoped, but i also got less sleep than i wanted because of staying up late. Lesson 1, don't expect to sleep in.
So i woke up around 6. i didn't plan on leaving until 10:30 or 11 to drive the three and a half hours to Seattle, with a stop at Chipotle (because that's pretty much the closest one to where i live), then catch my plane at 4:30. I had 4 hours to waste so i turned on a movie. The movie i wanted to watch was Idiocracy, but my computer went through a thing a while back and some file names got switched around somehow. What started playing was NOT Idiocracy. Instead, it was some weird French film. And it didn't have subtitles. I watched it anyway; it turned out to be pretty okay. There were a few parts where i really wish i knew what they had said, but over-all you could get the idea from the tone and the reactions. I think that actually makes it a pretty great movie, if they can get their point across without even understanding what they're talking about. Oh, and i'm not sure it's really French, it could be Canadian. Later in the movie you see that their cars have Quebec license plates. I didn't catch it if they showed the title of the movie in the beginning, so i'm not positive but i think the movie is called C.R.A.Z.Y. or some variation of that. Actually, the internet exists so let's see ... yeah.
 | ||
| C.R.A.Z.Y. |
We landed in Iceland, got off the airplane (directly outside. that's always fun. As i was waiting for the people in front of me to disboard? unboard? get off the airplane i saw they were taking the luggage out and my bike was the first thing off! At least i knew it got half way there. It was a pretty short layover, just an hour (until they ran a little late). Eventually we got back on the plane. The same plane i was just on. I had a middle seat this time so i was pretty bummed that i wasn't going to be able to get any pictures. It was going to make my 'getting there' video pretty crappy. Then, right before we were about to push away the flight attendant told my row that there was an EMPTY row just in front of us. I'm not sure if i did the I Dream of Jeannie head bob thing, or if it was Samantha's Bewitched nose twitch but i got to that window seat magically fast.
The flight to Oslo went pretty well. I got a bit concerned when, right before we were about to land they announced that everyone needed to collect their bags and go through customs, even if they checked their bags through to somewhere else. I was concerned because i didn't know if that applied to the Keflavik airport too. I certainly didn't get my bike and check it back in. Nothing to be done about it at this point. I was sitting just a couple rows in front of my last seat so i could see them getting ready to unload the luggage. I kept changing my glance from the crowed leaving the plane to the luggage guys. Luckily people take forever to deboard? and i got to watch fr a while, but all of a sudden everyone was gone! Apparently on Icelandair they have front doors AND rear doors. I never got to see if they had my bike or not. I went down to the over-sized luggage area and waited. After a few minutes i decided i should probably change my clothes before i had a huge box to look after.
Not long after i got back to the over-sized luggage area the siren beeped, the conveyor started rolling, and my bike came down the chute. I grabbed it up and headed to customs ... then walked right by everyone and never got checked? i don't know if i didn't need to do anything, or if i just broke some international law. But no one stopped me. I took the box outside and set up my camera to film the assembly process. Lesson 2, put your bike together in a shady area. It was HOT. I'm not sure what the temperature really was, but that sun was staring right at me.
After the bike was assembled (which went just fine, except for me wasting a ton of time digging things out of a bag, then putting everything back in the bag, then taking it all out again because i needed something else) i had nothing else to do but get on it and ride. I wasn't exactly sure where i was going, and the first couple hundred meters seemed like it was going to turn into another 'bicycling on the autobahn' situation. Fortunately the first exit to a non-highway came pretty quickly. I rode a short while before i noticed i wasn't seen any signs for the road in intended on taking. i stopped and got out my phone to check the offline Google map i had saved. i was pretty close, but it sort of looked like i needed to cross the highway or something to get to it. Not a good option. Not too long later i saw a brown sign with a bicycle on it. It said "Oslo" with an arrow pointing left and 52.9km or something. Perfect! a bike rout to Oslo. I followed the "Oslo" signs for a few miles, until they ran out. or i missed a turn. or who knows. maybe some crazy person just put up some random signs to confuse me. that's probably it. they knew i was coming. Never give information away on the internet!
Anyway, i must have made about 15 u-turns on the ride to the hostel. I'd be following some good signs to Oslo, then they'd make no sense or disappear so i tried following signs to Sentrum (which i assumed was like the downtown of Oslo). The same thing happened. I generally kept trying to go south and west. Luckily i had that offline map saved and that the GPS on my phone worked. Lesson 3, get offline maps! I'd have to stop and check where i was every few miles once i got closer to the city because while bike paths are everywhere, they don't go everywhere and they are not well marked.
My first thoughts about Norway, on the ride from the airport to Oslo, was that the landscape looks a heck of a lot like Maryland. Aside from some architectural differences and road signs being different, i could have just as easily been riding some back road in good ol' MD and not have known it. My second impression was that (and i don't know if it's just because it's the Fourth of July and Norway has some connection to it for some reason) almost EVERYONE had some sort of American muscle car or motorcycle. I even saw old Cadillacs with American flags stuck to the hood like the President does. it was crazy.
There's a lot more to the story of the first bike ride (Lesson 4, have LOTS of water at the start and during the ride) but my laptop battery is dying and apparently my charger doesn't work here. It's supposed to take 120-240 volts but something is wrong. That's why there aren't any pictures in this post, and no video either. I.. just. don't.. have the power, captain. So i got to the hostel and tell them i have a reservation. They say, "are you sure?". I checked my gmail and apparently i never actually made the reservation? I swear i did. but i have no record of it. I'm not sure what happened.They seem to have plenty of beds, but still. I'm not sure what went wrong a few months ago.
After today's ride i am not feeling psyched about tomorrow. Hopefully i can get out of Oslo a lot better than i got into it. Once i get to Sweden the roads are a lot more just .. roads. And hopefully that actually have signs. It's annoying trying to follow the bike path along a road, then the road turns one way but the path turns another. Or the path disappears on one side and reappears on the other. Guh. Oh, and one last thing. i am SO glad i didn't bring the yellow bike.
Hopefully i can post something tomorrow. I'm not sure what to do about the laptop battery. If you don't see anything don't get worried. Don't expect i'm dead. But if two days go by ...
Glad you made it there safely! Have a great time. The first day getting off the plane with jet lag is always brutal, even under best circumstances.
ReplyDelete