... and suddenly the road was gone

Our destination today is the city of Alta. We have reserved a hotel room there and really want to make it today. Weather: 25 degrees and clear skies. We are surprised and grateful every day, but it also makes one reflect on what this heat so far north above the Arctic Circle means. Our journey today mostly follows the gigantic Langfjord. As the name suggests, the fjord is long, very long, about 31 kilometers long and 1 kilometer wide. The road is hilly and goes uphill slightly at times, which you quickly feel in your legs. The endlessly seeming fjord is breathtaking with its crystal-clear water and the mountains that seem to fall into the water. There are many tunnels on the E6, but they can all be bypassed, and some even prohibit cycling through. Most of the bypass roads run steeply alongside the tunnel, but we enjoy the peace and accept the effort. During one bypass, we get a huge scare when suddenly the road in front of us is missing, a giant hole, the road is in the sea, and the street lamp is dangling on the line. Oh sh... escapes us both. There is a footpath above the hole. What an adventure that is not over yet. A bit further, suddenly in the forest on the road stands a reindeer and refuses to move. On one hand, it's beautiful, finally seeing one, but on the other hand, it looks rather threatening. We sneak past silently. Further on the E6, there is another Sami shop. No comment on the reindeer and bone chains from yesterday. The road signs here are written in 3 languages: Norwegian, Sami, and Kven (a Finnish minority living in northern Norway). The day demands a lot of energy from us, especially dealing with Alta, which always appears and then disappears, is not mentally easy to handle. Then you see it quite close on the other side of the fjord - on the road sign it says 15 kilometers, and behind the next turn, there is a tunnel with a cycling ban. Morale is briefly down, energy has long been depleted. The bypass goes to the end of the fjord, which means you have to go back to the beginning on the other side. 12 kilometers and you're there, where the car tunnel comes out of the mountain. Despite the late hour, we manage quite well and arrive very tired in the northernmost city with over 10,000 inhabitants. We don't really know what to do with Alta, at first glance, it looks like a small town sleeping on a Sunday with ugly buildings. Maybe we are unfair to Alta, but we don't find it beautiful, not even the futuristic Northern Lights Cathedral, which looks a bit like something from Star Wars or an Airstream camping trailer. With difficulty, we find something to eat, a kind of pizza/hamburger restaurant. The kitchen is almost closed, but they still make us a large pizza, probably with all the leftovers of the day, but we don't mind. 1000 kilometers in our legs, woohoo, we celebrate with pizza à la Alta, beer, and red wine. We are proud to have made it this far, and we don't care that we won't get dessert anymore, a 200-gram Freia chocolate, almond/sea salt flavor, is waiting in the hotel ....
Today's kilometers: 95
Elevation gain: 950