#9 We drive from the North Cape to Lapland in the northernmost region of Finland

When dreams lead you on journeys, the moment of fulfillment will come at some point.

Our goal, the North Cape , has been reached and after the fulfillment of our dream comes disillusionment. We are on the Cape, at the very top, the night was cold, damp and stormy. We first make coffee in the lounge to get back up to temperature.

The weather is bad and we want to go to Lapland today. The route should go via Finland towards Turku.

The weather app predicts stormy times for us, a storm is heading towards Lapland that is slowly coming across the full width of Norway and according to the route we drive right into the storm. But the three of us are all born optimists and so we are in good spirits.

The hardest ride ever, ever, ever!!!

Departure from the North Cape, our next destination is Lapland

It's already midday again by the time we leave, but we weren't in bed until 3:00 a.m. We take a moment that seems good, take another quick snapshot and we're off. And as it starts, heavy fog makes visibility extremely poor, plus incredible winds pushing from the side, what's coming now is really going to be my toughest tour ever.

You know the distance you keep to the person in front when riding a Harley , enough reserve for braking, but not too big a distance either. Hermann is driving in front of me and suddenly he's gone, I can't see him anymore, no taillight, nothing!

Our tents on the North Cape withstood the storm.

I'm increasingly losing sight of Ernst in the rearview mirror, but I can still see him dimly in the mirror every now and then. In addition, the extreme wind forces you into an inclined position, which is quite unusual at a speed of 30 to 40 km/h. The wind keeps pushing you into the opposite lane and the tourist buses are coming from the front, you just can't see them, that's a short story.

I can only see the road in front of me on the map from my navigation. I have to catch the Road Glide Ultra again and again, when a gust dies down the feeling is quite tricky, it's an amazing ride.

Shortly before Honningsvåg things get better, now fill up at the Shell gas station in Honningsvåg and collect again. You can imagine how happy we are not to have been hit by one of the buses and to have made it through the first few kilometers unscathed.

Now we continue to Lapland

Now we continue towards Lapland , we drive again through the Nordkap Tunnel and towards Olderfjord . That's only 130 kilometers, once we get here we first want to eat something in Russenes kro . We have time on our hands and that's why we're going to continue now. Our goal is ambitious, we want to drive another 250 kilometers. The weather is terrible, it's raining really hard at times, Hermann and I's boots are wearing out, they're soaking in water even though they're supposed to be 100% waterproof.

The story of our waterproof boots

Before our tour started, we sent Ernst to Detlev Louis to bring us boots from a great Hyper offer. All three of us bought the same model, only Ernst has the brown ones, Hermann and I have the black ones. It's unbelievable, our Ernst has dry feet and I don't even have good socks in them anymore because I can't get my boots dry anymore and they make noises when I walk.

Hermann has exactly the same problem, unbelievable. To get straight to the point, Detlev Louis changed his boots after the tour. There were actually massive problems with the black boots, they weren't tight and the black ones were taken out of the program.

Only the brown ones are really waterproof, which I can now confirm. Now they have thrown them both out of the range, even though they are really very good boots, the brown ones are now great and really waterproof .

We spend the night in a hut in Kautokeino, drenched in the rain

After hours in the rain we arrive in Kautokeino, now we need to fill up our supplies and we're actually done for today and we just need something to dry, we're not in the mood to pitch the tent in this weather, we need something solid.

The original plan was to drive through to Finland, but suddenly we see huts on the left at the exit from Kautokeino. One of them is now ours, we were really lucky, the heating is immediately turned on and the “drying boots” can begin. Nothing worked for us that evening, the rain was straining our nerves, now all we had to do was put our feet up and goodnight.

A new morning and today we're crossing the border into Finland

A new morning begins, well rested we want to cross the border into Finland . We even got up early today and finally managed to sit on the trestle shortly after 9:00 a.m.

It's 50 kilometers to the border, after a good half an hour we see the signs in front of us and there's even a border guard there, stupid, Ernst pulls over to the left in front of him into the parking lot and we follow along with him. Even waving from the customs officer didn't help, we're probably a little too fast.

The customs officer is coming after us!

The border also looked somehow open, so we don't really worry about it. The only question is, why is he coming after us now? Now it starts, first we hear that we have to stop and can't just go through with it, after all he's not here for a joke.

Now it gets more funny, he was enthusiastic about our Harleys , especially Ernst and his special airbrush. This is a really cool customs officer, he takes photos of the Harley-Davidson machines and a selfie with us.

Then we get the information from him that this powerful depression is still heading towards Finland and we thought we were already in the middle of it. Without further ado, he uses his fingers to paint the weather map of where the storm is coming from E-Glide Totally thrilled by the friendly Finn, we've all laughed enough now, we'll have to see if we can move forward.

Construction site! 80 kilometers just a gravel road

We continue driving quickly, after about 50 kilometers there is a construction site, the asphalt road is over. The next endless kilometers drive on gravel , traffic lights keep coming and why not, the rain is slowly getting heavier again. We go down the E8 and at Kihlanki it starts to get too much, the rain forces us to stop.

It's really starting to get going now, we can't drive any further and we're looking for shelter from the mega shower under the roof of a gas station. This has now cost us another half hour, we continue on to Pello, it is early afternoon and it is time to eat something, we have found a restaurant with a large kitchen.

We are at the Kahvila-Ravintola Granni , there is a buffet and also cakes, I am thrilled. But it's no use, we can't stay here forever, we still have 200 kilometers to go.

The next day we want to catch the Silja Line ferry to Stockholm in Turku

We want to the Silja Line ferry to Stockholm Turku . If our timing is right, we could get there tomorrow, late afternoon. Unfortunately, it is not possible to book the ferry in advance due to our uncertain schedule. We have no idea whether we will be able to do it in time, let's hope it still works.

It continues, the weather is slowly getting better again, and now there are moments when you have more of an eye for nature in Finland. The country is just as breathtaking as Norway , just completely different. The vastness that opens up when you drive over a mountain is beautiful.

Simo in a slightly better mood , we saw a river on the map and now we are looking for a place to wild camp . We drive a few kilometers along the river and see a narrow entrance through a forest. It's muddy in places, it's not that easy to drive on a forest path with our loaded machines.

We can't turn around anymore, there's no opportunity for that here. We reach a clearing right by the river, which looks good. You can only get off if you place checkered plate

Trillions of mosquitoes attack us

But now we're making a completely different acquaintance, the mosquitoes in Finland ! You won't believe this, suddenly we are infested with billions of mosquitoes, even the whole Harley is suddenly full of them. Now everything is happening very quickly, we are on the retreat , it's time to get out of the forest, only my cross-country experience from my youth has saved my ass now. We drive back to the main road and are totally shocked. We definitely wanted to go wild camping, but we quickly forget that.

Now the question arises as to whether we should even camp! Suddenly we notice an inconspicuous campsite , so we drive there and check the situation.

The groundskeeper is a bit of a strange guy, he doesn't really seem that enthusiastic. We are offered a place right on the water, but we want to take a look at it first, after our previous experience, that's clear. The joke is that there are hardly any mosquitoes here, which is probably because there is no tall grass here, we were told by some Finns.

We have a great place, there is fire pit That's perfect and this is where we check in now.

Ernst lost a pallet of beer and had to go again!

We set up the tents and now we eat dinner, we've made ourselves really comfortable, we're good at that, we're well organized, everyone has their job. The can of beer at the table and now we discuss what to do next around the campfire.

We had to buy beer twice, dear Ernst lost a whole pallet of the gold water during the trip, just left it, how can something like that even be possible? It was a hard blow to our household budget, and of course we couldn't ignore it so easily. A tribunal followed, how can a biker lose the beer, you can lose everything, but not the good beer!

We agree that we will go through to Turku , that much is already certain, now we just have to keep our fingers crossed that our reservation goes through. We have a really nice evening, the weather is good, not cold and we can go fishing too, but it's no use.

However, that's not that important, the main thing is that the fishing rod has been cast once if you've been carrying it with you for thousands of kilometers.

The sun slowly sets and our fire goes out, exhausted from the strenuous day, the sleeping mat is now waiting for us in the tent. The day was another pure adventure for us.

Accommodations:

Midnatsol Camping

Further accommodation in the North Cape

Cabin rental Duottar Camp / Viddas Camping in Suomaluodda 12, 9520 Kautokeino

Campsite by the river, Lohitie 12, 95200 Simo, Finland

Thank you for the kind support of our tour partners, Visit Norway , Color Line , The Rokker Company and Tallink Silja Line .