IS THAT RAIN,DEAR?....NO,IT'S JUST A REINDEER

3rd June 2016

Thursday
At leisure in SOLLEFTEÅ. An uninteresting town but nice riverside parks with cycle tracks. The weather has been gorgeous since last Saturday with temps in the mid - high 20's and clear blue skies.....still light at 23.30 or 02.30.....but we're getting further north and snow forecast at Nordkapp this weekend. The scenery has improved...but not a lot. There are so many pine trees but when we pass a lake, the water is a beautiful deep blue. Passing lakes often but the trees are endless, lots of pine and silver birch. We had a nice cycle ride along the river,round an island and through the town. Have had a rear/brake light go on the Thule bike carrier. They are a Swedish company but can I find a replacement. ....clear bulbs a plenty but this is red and nobody sells them. Have resorted to a clear bulb and red marker pen and emailing Thule HO.  They sent me to a dealer in the town who sold the same rack as mine (2 other people have similar racks which also have red bulbs)but they looked blank even though the raks on sale had the identical bulbs. I toured all the auto garages with no result. Have sent strongly worded email to Thule threatening Twitter/Facebook/YouTube exposure ...as if I knew how to.
Nice dinner in the camp restaurant at very reasonable price apart from the GF'S glass of wine which was nearly the same price as her dinner......I am being very well behaved and not drinking before driving days as the limit is so low as to be nil. Well nearly every driving day.

Friday
Last of the long drives, 230 miles to ARVIDSJAUR. Passed a sign saying Nordkapp 1021kms but we are going by a more circuitous route via the Swedish coast and Finland.
Weather still cloudless blue skies but temp dropped to 13. It'll be cold tonight.
And having signally failed to see a Moose we saw 2 herds of reindeer including some young and a calf that ran across the road in front of me....I thought it was a goat kid at first until we spotted the adults in the ditch at the side of the road...very hard to see as we had been warned. Unable to stop for photo with cars behind but managed a few shots of the larger herd we saw later disappearing in the woods. We are now off the motoways/dual carriageways on A/B roads and with the lack of towns,habitation and traffic progress is very good and the 230 miles was much easier than had been anticipated looking at the map. Reg&V are very helpful re the Geocaching and the Travel Bug I picked up in Stockholm is now progressing northward with reports of its progress. It started in Ile De France in October 2015 with a goal of getting to Buxton in Australia. So far it has travelled over 3000 miles through 125 stages.
Lost at cards but evened up the score by only paying 2 Krona so now up just the 2€ over 13 days.