so, we survived the trip, though it wasn't ideal. i'm still glad i did it though.
that map is slightly incorrect but is right from Denmark on.
Eoin, Barry and I left Ireland Tuesday the 4th of January at 9 PM from Rosslare after what can only be described as an epic dinner from Eoin's Family in Waterford. Irish roast Dinner for the win. but the situation wasn't ideal. the car was immensely over loaded though. with the parcel shelf still in-situ in Waterford. the boot was filled up to the rear window and the seat behind me was jammed too. this had two effects on the drive.
1. i couldn't see out the Back window,
and 2. the suspension was massively over loaded at the back. with the exhaust nearly biting the bullet on more than a few occasions. See photo from the Harwich-Esbjerg ferry.
a bit low at the back :D
Fun on the deck of Ferry
so, we got into Fishguard at 0.30 am and after a few polite questions from the local constabulary we made for the motorway. the first stop came near Swansea for some air, the next on the Cardiff ring road when i just had to get an hours sleep. so then it was back on the road driving over the bridge from Wales into England. Which delightfully is only tolled going into Wales. As morning broke we trekked across England arriving in Essex around 8am. and in Harwich port at 9am. then we just waited it out til the 4pm boarding of the DFDS ferry to Denmark (Esbjerg). during this time it we created a list of reasons why we hated Harwich, a town which is notable for its complete lack of anything more than totally necessary. after losing our minds more than once we boarded the ferry for 18 hours of car free transport. the toughest part of the journey was as it turned out over.
Harwich to Esbjerg Ferry
so then we arrived in Denmark. a country i definitely want to visit again. from what we saw, the town of Esbjerg and the motorway stops, the image is very clean minimal and generally enjoyable. we headed trans-country for Copenhagen (København) skirting the city at sundown. then it was time for the Oresund bridge, except there were 2, which we didn't know...
Esbjerg Approach
Danish Motorway
Still though, impressive. we video'd the bridge from the dash but it is pretty boring to watch. its my one regret that we didn't cross the bridge in daylight. going again i would definitely have spaced the trip to allow for that. but hopefully i'll see it on the way home. so 10 hours and 700 miles after leaving Esbjerg we arrived in Stolkholm at 1am.
Sweden is a strange country. from the moment we came out of the toll plaza in Malmo (€40!!!!) i couldn't warm to it. i don't know if it was the poor roads with the fastlane heralding a fast and snowy death or the fact that i couldn't really see cos my headlights were masked to not blind people as i drove on the wrong side. but it never appealled to me. maybe it was that we didn't see it in the daylight at all. as our final ferry left Stolkholm at 7am. either way, i for one was glad to see the back of Sweden. hopefully i'll get to go back to Stolkholm and see it in a more casual way.
so after 13 hours abord a Tallink Silja Hyper Ship we arrived in Turku Finland at 6 pm Finnish time (two hours ahead). and it was dark. this was one of the scariest experiences of my life and equal in my mind with sitting my driving test at home. by this time i was the only right hand drive car i had seen since Denmark. i also had winter tyres on but everyone else had snow tyres, i still had very poor light and the car was still incredibly heavy. then, they opened the doors...and directed me off. now maybe it was a sick joke but sending the irish car with a plainly nervous driver off first into an empty port where the entire complex was under a foot and a half of snow and not ploughed with no english roadsigns seems a bit extreme to me. either way i span the car twice and somehow managed to end up in Russian customs before driving the wrong way down a one way street onto the main road. WELCOME TO FINLAND!!!
the drive up was interesting too. no moon, a blizzard in progress and icey roads. more than once i panicked as my brakes seemed to have frozen due to lack of use. stamp on the brake pedal and it'll be 10 seconds before anything resembling braking happens. 6 hours later and we arrived in Mikkeli. in -13 celcius and snow. Dave was already in residence. having arrived in Helsinki as we left Stolkholm. i have no photos from the drive cos it was night but this is what the car looked like the next morning.
and the roads when it wasn't a blizzard. and only -5 celcius
the janitor was called to let us in and already this place feels like home. it was a quiet weekend but once we went to orientation and got to know a few faces its been easy. this is long now so i'll continue this in another post :D
Jonnie Out
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