Fjord Scenery on the way to Narvik

28/08/2025

The drive north from our campsite in Rognan was spectacular. This was the point when we really got hit in the eyes with the fjord scenery that Norway is so famous for. We may have had some lovely and varied landscapes up until now, but this was a step up.

Filling with LPG

Our drive took us to Fauske where we topped up our gas. We needed less than expected, we’ve had quite a few nights on Electric hook up so gas consumption has been low.

LPG isn’t widely available in Norway and most suppliers are specialists of some kind rather than fuel stations. This gas facility was in the car park of a garden centre. It was self service with card pre-payment, so pretty easy to get the pump working, but for some reason we didn’t seem to make a tight connection at the filling point. It needed the wide dish connector which we’ve used quite often so I don’t think it was an issue at our side. Quite a bit of gas escaped when the tank was full, creating a supercooled frost on the side of the gas locker. Fortunately that didn’t have any negative consequences although the smell lingered for a while.

After Fauske the route took us alongside fjords where we stopped now and again for Paul to do some fishing, no fish caught still. He really needs to get a move on and catch some fish as our grocery bills are pretty high! Then we had a section of climbing up and driving through a tunnel into a fantastic amphitheatre of mountains around the lake of Kobbvatnet. It was totally unexpected, like a trip into another world, so we stopped at the viewpoint. In hindsight we wished we’d stayed for a walk. Never mind, it’s another spot to add to the ‘next time’ list.

Our First Ferry Experience

The E6 then took us up through forests and alongside fjords to Bognes. We bought some unexpectedly cheap fuel here. We didn’t realise until we checked the receipt that we had only paid 16.99 NOK per litre rather than the 19.69 that was advertised. Someone had obviously programmed the pump incorrectly that morning. A minor transposition of two digits made it our lucky day. After filling up and a quick essentials shop we followed the E6 straight into the ferry pier on the shores of Tyrsfjord.

Tyrsfjord almost cuts Norway in half, it comes so deep into the country (which admittedly isn’t very wide at this point), and mountains lie at it’s end, so that the only way around by road is to drive into Sweden. There are two ferry routes from Bognes. We wanted the ferry to Skarberget which becomes the E6 for it’s 40 minute journey across Tyrsfjord.

We double checked that we were driving onto the correct pier for our route and drove under a gantry that read the signal from our toll tag (we’ve since checked that we were charged the right amount and yes, it all worked as expected). Vehicles had already started lining up so we slotted in behind. The rule here seemed to be to fill the queues from the left.

I put the kettle on, thinking we had 15 minutes wait but soon we could see the ferry approaching. The small number of cars on board unloaded and we were soon moving forward in the queue. I quickly stowed the kettle away and Paul popped out to turn the gas off as soon as we were on board. Lesson learned for next time. The ferry may not have been departing for another ten minutes but everyone is shepherded onboard as soon as possible.

The scenery from this ferry was incredible. We were lucky enough to have a glorious blue sky day and could see all of the mountains rising from the sea around us. We stood out on the top deck and stared for the 40 minutes of the journey. One of the mountains in the distance was Stetinden, voted Norway’s national mountain in 2002. It has a very distinctive pointed shape. Getting to the summit requires a little mountaineering experience as the summit is a steep rocky crag.

Arriving in Narvik

Narvik is a reasonably large town (for Norway) built around an ice-free harbour. Because it never freezes over (due to the gulf stream) it was valuable for trade and was developed as a port for the Swedish iron ore industry. This also made it a strategically important town during the second world war.

We had originally put a pin in the town because of the downhill mountain biking possibilities, but the ski lifts haven’t been operating all summer. Narvik are getting ready to host the 2029 FIS Alpine Ski World Cup and they have decided to do all the work during the summer seasons, keeping the resort open in the winter for the more lucrative skiing season.

Undeterred we decided to head up to the ski area to park overnight. I’d been looking at a few possible bike routes and with luck at least one would be possible without venturing into the restricted zones. We checked out the information boards on arrival so that we knew where we were allowed to go.

The parking at Narvik ski area (Narvikfjellet) is barrier controlled, but it does have some perks as a consequence, including EHU, motorhome service point, and access to a hut with showers, toilets, lockers and even a small kitchen area. On top of that we had an amazing view down over the town.

We settled in for the evening with quite a few other vans, including one hire van which arrived very late with a group of lads who were very noisy as they tried to get set up.

A bike ride around Narvikfjellet

In the morning I had a message from work asking if I could dial into a meeting at lunchtime. How inconvenient! We decided to head out sharpish on a bike ride so that we could get back, get showered and give me time to get logged into my work laptop.

The route we chose followed a cross country ski trail around the mountain, traversing (slightly uphill) to Pumpvatnet where we got a spectacular mirror image of the Tøttatoppen peak. It was a good workout, the ski trails seem to have a lot of undulations.

Fabulous Tøttatoppen

On the way back we diverted a bit further uphill so that we could venture onto some single track trails we’d seen from the main track. We hit a bit of a blocker when we found ourselves at the edge of the work zone, but we managed to circumvent it and had fun getting some rock under our wheels.

We ended up a lot lower down than our parking spot and had a sweaty uphill ride back to the van. It was lovely to get into the shower and have unlimited warm water and enough space for both of us to get changed without having to take it in turns.

I dialled into my meeting and then we moved on. After being surrounded by mountains for the last couple of days it was time to go and climb one.