I'm just back from a trip to Scandinavia which I cut short for many reasons. But first Norway. After two nights in hostels (Meppen, Germany, and Blokhus, Denmark) I caught the ferry from Hirtshals to Kristiansand, Norway, and stayed in the Budget Motel, just yards from the ferry terminal, and chilled out for a couple of days there. Meppen to Blokhus was a bit of a nightmare slog of 524 miles in 12 1/2hrs of non-stop riding, and I arrived there at 9.30pm to find the place all locked up. Not getting my smartphone company to enable International Roaming BEFORE I left UK was a major factor in spoiling the entire trip as I could only use the phone when I was experiemcing free WiFi.

After twelve happy years ownership of a Gentleman's Express (Honda Pan European) I found the buffeting on my R100GS-PD very tiring and each day's ride wore me out. There was also a slight hesitation at low revs making town riding a bit rough, and in rain, this became worse. It rained at some point or other each and every day, sometimes a slight shower, sometimes a deluge.

I headed up to Stavanger riding to Lysevegen on route, a series or hairpin bends leading down a steep hill to a village of the same name at the eastern end of a fjord.

By the time I reached Bergen, and with the bike left in the street 200m away from my budget hotel, I had the map spread out on the floor and realised I still had days and days in the saddle before I reached the northern tip of the Baltic and to begin my southwards route down the Finnish coast. I was tired and dejected, and the very high cost of everything in Norway (Small = £10, pizza = £18. hotmeal = £23) really depressed me even though I had known this before I left home. Once I experienced it, it weighed on my mind. I'd sit in a bar at night and drag a small out for an hour or so. Credit cards are used all of the time - no need to get currency - and the excellent Cardinal Pub in Stavanger even had six credit card 'machines' screwed to the bar counter. Nobody used currency even to just buy a small .

I decided I'd had enough, or the constant ache in my back had, so changed my plans and headed east to Oslo, then Malmo, then Copenhagen, then Aachen, then Calais/Dover, then home.

Norway has a blanket speed limit of 55mph which everybody STRICTLY adheres to - the fines being swingeing, although I saw no signs at all of police outside the towns. Speed cameras are painted in grey. It's just that with everybody else complying with the law, I'd have felt a bit of a houlighan doing an overtake. Some days I saw maybe only two or three overtakes all day long.

I gave up the idea of hostelling as searching and booking rooms on my bloody smartphone was difficult. I wish I'd taken an iPad.

So what of Norway? Decent twisty roads where 55mph is about the 'right' speed anyway, and sometimes 40mph is enough. More tunnels than you can imagine, some as long as 15 miles long, but many 3 or 4 miles. Some poorly lit. Some with roundabouts halfway along their lengths, with a further tunnel shooting off to the right. Pine forests. I've seen enough pine forests to last me a lifetime.

Regrets? Well I either need a bigger screen or another bike (a TransAlp?) or perhaps at 67 I should take up something less gruelling like golf? Malmo and Copenhagen were great and the highlights of the trip. 2,700 miles in ten riding days was too much for me on an unfaired bike.