Guest Blog: Bike-packing Across Scandinavia at 64 (Days 29 and 30)

Day 29: Depart Bodo for Stockholm, Sweden (2 miles, 633 total miles)

5 July 2024: Friday

My train wasn’t scheduled to depart until 12:27 pm. But I set my alarm for 5 am to ensure I got everything done. I worked on the blog and transferred photos. I cleaned up apartment, washed dishes, bagged trash, showered, and packed Heidi tightly, before riding the bike to the train station two hours before departure. Arriving early with plenty of time to spare is how I keep my stress levels low. I sat for about ten minutes in a nearly vacant lobby. Three backpackers were sleeping beside three mounds of luggage. I figure their colleagues were out exploring the city. A young cyclist couple were reading a travel book and discussing plans in some language I didn’t recognize. They had taken up much of the lobby with their two bicycles blocking at least eight or ten seats. 

With two hours to spare, I rode half a mile to a Kiwi and bought a set of wireless airpods. I broke my earphones yesterday when I hopped off Heidi quickly on the shore of the Norwegian Sea. Forgetting they were still connected to my phone and my ears, I inadvertently snapped the volume button. A few weeks ago, I lost one airpod of a pair just a day after I bought them. 

I figure that since this train trip will last nearly two days, I can use some music and streaming distractions. Maybe they will even help me sleep.

So I invested another $50 for a new set while wondering how long this pair will last before I destroy or lose them.  

At least nowadays, every gas station and convenience store carry a whole host of electronic accessories for phones. 

What you don’t find readily available in Scandinavia are baggies or soft bread. I think they prefer hard bread. Also none of the kitchenettes I have rented has had a lid for the frying pans. 

Back at the Bodo Train Station, I met Dimitro, a 20-something Ukrainian soldier who suffered an injury to his leg in the war against the Russians a year ago. He had ridden a bike five days around Bodo. During that time, he has been in a rehab program at Trondheim, which was part of Norwegian military program. I didn’t ask for specifics, but he did say that he still needed some time for his leg to heal before he could return to Ukraine. 

The train ride was just as beautiful on this trip as the previous one. At one stop, I saw a cairn, or mound of stones, marking the Arctic Circle. 

We changed trains at Trondheim around 11 pm. It was chilly, around 50 degrees with a brisk little wind. So, I sought shelter in a glass enclosure, presently for this reason, I suspect, on the platform. 

Day 30: Stockholm, Sweden (0 miles)

6 July 2024: Saturday

After my first 650-mile bicycle trip in 2020, my younger brother Darren told me I should get a better bike. If I was going to bikepack crosscountry, he recommended I get the best bike possible. Lightest one made with narrow road tires. With every subsequent trip, he was also worried about my safety. “There are a bunch of idiots (drivers) out there… I see them everyday,” he told me when I rode from Indiana to Florida. 

That’s what Darren did. He worried about those he loved, helped them any way he could, and often did without himself. A Sri Lankan mechanic told Darren’s family and me that during the worst days of COVID he and his entire family were sick with the virus. They couldn’t get out to even go to grocery shopping. Darren, who fell into the high risk category because of certain health issues, delivered groceries to the mechanic and his family, saying that those kids had to eat. 

That was Darren.

Naturally, I was worried about Darren’s health and wellbeing, and his safety while driving. He spent too many hours on the road. Late hours and long hours. But Darren was a good driver. Had driven professionally most of his adult life. 

I never imagined that a summer construction bottleneck on Interstate 69 and a faulty airbag would steal him from us. 

“I will work till the day I die,” he told me more than once over the past few years, but road construction accident is not what he had in mind, I am sure. 

Darren and I never spoke about funerals, but we both hated them. With the best intentions of raising courteous, God-fearing young Hoosiers, our mom dragged us to a host of viewings and funerals, at times against our will. 

This is just what good, conscientious Christians (I use the term loosely here) did. You paid your respects to those who have passed on. And you do it for the loved ones left behind. 

Mom was fascinated with death and frightened of it all at once. She just couldn’t look away when it brushed up against her. 

And I must admit that I too became infatuated with all things related to the hereafter. Still am in some ways, I suspect. In Vallonia elementary school, when Mr. Zabel instructed our 5th grade class to construct a building out of egg cartons, shoeboxes, and cardboard to insert into the tiny model town we were assembling, I built a funeral home. On the side of it, I posted promotions on signage that read: People are dying to get here and Sale: 2 for the price of 1. 

Darren and I also had our share of childhood tragedies, as did almost all of Brownstown school kids. When the three Skaggs brothers were killed, I was devastated. Darren’s best friend died out on Sand Lane while crawling through a sand tunnel. 

I teetered on the razor’s edge of my fascination with death, wanting my distance and protection from the grim reaper while exploring the afterlife through fiction writing, watching Sammy Terry movies, and a few hours work at a funeral home, when I would open the door for stricken loved ones. 

When I reached high school, I largely stopped attending funerals. Or, perhaps more accurately, I selected which services I would attend: Precious few. The year I graduated, I refused to attend my grandfather’s funeral. I had paid my respects to him in many ways while he was alive. And I could comfort the family in other ways. I didn’t need to attend official services for that.  

Due to a spate of farm robberies during funerals in Jackson County in 1978, I sat at that same kitchen window where men in the family had been sitting for generations on the day Guy Coleman was buried. With a shotgun in the corner, I guarded the farm. The vigil was justified. Despite the most recent farm robberies, a year or so earlier, a thief stole my grandfather’s newly-purchased ton truck right out of the barn lot while we were sleeping. He’d paid cash for it and had only carried liability insurance, so the loss was calamatous. 

Fortunately for me, no thieves showed up on the day of Guy’s funeral, and I was never put to the test. At 18 years old, I was not mature enough to make good life and death decisions with a shotgun. 

When my son died, we had a little memorial at the Kurtz cemetery in the freezing rain. We didn’t want a viewing or funeral services. In grad school at Indiana University, I helped a professor teach a course called “The Living and the Dead.” The class explored various rituals and practices that survivors performed for loved ones who passed on throughout history. For example, ever wonder why so many old cemeteries surrounded churches? In Europe and the US the “righteous” were buried in hallowed ground around the church to ensure entry into heaven. Certain categories of sinners could not be interred within the church property, and therefore could not be assured a spot in heaven. In various Asian cultures, families venerate relatives by arranging the departed’s photos, food, and flowers to a shrine. In Egypt, I researched the destitute farmers who migrated to Cairo decades ago and took up permanent residences, established businesses, and raised families in graveyards. 

Despite the curious fascination with death, Darren and I tried our best to avoid viewings, funerals, and services. Just after he passed in April of this year, I learned that just like me, he told his family that he did not want a showing or funeral services. 

When his wife and kids decided they would host a tiny private viewing for a dozen or so loved ones, I immediately opted out. Instead I took the youngest grandkids to Dave and Busters. The last thing I wanted was to visit the funeral home. I suspect Darren didn’t much want to be there either. 

Again on this 18-hour journey from Boda to Oslo, I managed to squeeze out three hours of sleep. I finished reading book one of Wayward Pines. It was good, but not great. 

It didn’t take me long to drop an earbud in between the two seats in front of me. I had to wake the man in front of me up and go around and finagle the earbud out while my seating companion used his phone’s flashlight.   

For the last three hours of the trip, two women past retirement age talked and talked and talked in some Nordic tongue. What is there to talk about for so long?

We arrived at Oslo Station on time a little after 6am. I had given myself about 6 hours just in case the earlier trains were delayed. I knew I had time to break Heidi down and put her in the bike bag.

Immediately, off the train, I bought two chocolate croissants and a coffee, then found myself the most unassuming patch of concrete under an escalator to sit and enjoy my breakfast.

The bathroom was way around the other side of the station and cost $2 per visit. Outside, I found an even more secluded corner where I dismantled Heidi, wrapped her in bike bag, and sat on the floor for the next couple hours, booking a hotel in Stockholm and ferry from Stockholm to Helsinki, Finland with a cabin. I checked out potential routes, distances, inclines, and accommodations from Helsinki to Turku, Finland.

I was nodding off, so I got up, lugged Heidi through the station to get lunch at a convenience store: A sausage and two of the thickest, chewiest chocolate chip cookies I have ever eaten. Like biting into a semi-baked slice of cookie dough. Heavenly. 

I donated a total of $6 to the Oslo Central Station lavatory system, one of the few things I dislike about Scandinavia. You need surgery; that is free. But you got to pee, you must dish two bucks. 

The train running 200 miles from Oslo, Norway to Gothenburg, Sweden is really a commuter trainer, designed for short trips. There are no assigned seats. There are grab straps dangling from the ceiling for the seat overflow. On my car, there were two talking vending machines. One for good coffee and the other for snacks. 

For a Saturday, the noon train busy, packed with tourists, a few on bicycles like me, and families with strollers, families with older kids, couples, teens, and others. Most came prepared with food in their bags. They shared bread and snacks and drinks. 

Unfortunately, trains in most parts of the US don’t operate this way. The commuter from Point of Rocks, Maryland, where we used to live, to Washington, DC, for instance, didn’t operate at all on weekends. And through the week, the schedule catered only to workers. So trains to DC in the morning and from DC in the afternoon. 

Imagine a family-friendly, affordable train that ran every hour to and from Seymour, Indiana to Louisville, Kentucky, or to Nashville, Tennessee daily. To Indy and Chicago and Cincinnati. Now, imagine that it stopped at every significant city or big town down along the way. So, you could hop on a train in Seymour at noon, and be in Nashville, Tennessee at 6pm for $90 per adult. No driving, no traffic, no gasoline, no parking fees, or hassles. You could catch a show, spend the night, and come home for another $90. For $300 round trip, you could take the whole family to Kings Island or Pigeon Forge. For $500 you could all go to the St. Louis Zoo and Six Flags. And so on.

Scandinavian trains have good charging outlets at every seat. Even in US airports, electrical outlets at your seat are hit and miss. 

On this Saturday, a little blond haired girl, probably in the first grade, sits with her mom and brother in the seats in front of me. They play cards and sing some songs in a Scandinavian language. 

As soon as we cross over into Sweden, the internet on my phone stops working. I moved to another seat and switch the SIM card Comviq, my Swedish SIM card. But it registers no data. My 30-day plan ran out. The WiFi on the train is not working. 

While mother sleeps, little girl plays by herself, sings silently to herself, making circles and figures in the air with her hands.

Most of the feeling is coming back to my fingers in my right and, and the rash on both hands is better since I haven’t been on the bike more than five hours in past week. 

I started and stopped about four novels. None of them were gripping. I start reading Wool, first book in the Silo series. My daughter and I watched Season One and loved it. So far the book is good.

The train barrels through several miles in Sweden at a speed that I haven’t seen since the Amtrak trip back from Arizona in January.

When I reach Gothenburg, I lug Heidi and the other bags into the train station. At the second convenience story, I buy a data top up plan. My phone works again. 

For this last leg of the trip, I bought a first class ticket. It wasn’t much more. Waiting outside Car One, an American couple about my age are the closest to the door. They speak to an intelligent European woman in her 60s for a few minutes. Somehow, I assume this woman is a university professor or intellectual of some time. She is polite. Informative. But somehow I get the impression that she has entirely too much knowledge in her head than she can effectively communicate to others. 

After she leaves for a second class compartment, the man becomes impatient. We are scheduled to depart in 10 minutes and the doors are not yet unlocked. The man walks up to the compartment window and peers through, not out of curiosity, it would appear, but to let the train officials know that he and his wife are out here on the platform, they are first class passengers, and it is time to open the doors. He returns to his spot beside his wife. After a minute, he tries again. Still it does not speed up the process.

When the cabin official gave the green light, the man presses the button, the air cylinder releases pressure, and the door swings out and to the side. He and his wife wasted no time in stepping on board and shoving their suitcase into the bottom rack. 

I am miffed at this American couple. But the truth is my bike wouldn’t fit into this tiny space anyway. Amtrak has an entire car for oversized baggage. I put my bike there. In Denmark, there is a special car where you can park your bike. In most Norway passenger trains, the system is even better. There is a tiny compartment in the dining car where you can hang your bike on a hook. Train officials lock the room, so everything is safe. But Sweden is another matter.

I ask the cabin official—a short, thin man in his late 20s, short red hair and trim mustache, “Can you help me with my bike?”

He suddenly has a grim look. “It is too big. It won’t fit.”

“I took it apart… It is 140 centimeters.” It is. I measured it twice. 

“Bring it,” he says and leads the way, while pulling up some specifications on his phone. “It can only be 80 cm x 40cm…” 

“On the website it says 140 cm,” I remind him.

He checks another page, maybe the public page. “140 cm x 85 cm…” he confirms.

About four cars down he leads me into the dining compartment and consults a strong, stern lady in her early 50s. She does not seem happy to see me. Staring at the bike, she looks up to appraise me, and says, “It’s too big”

“I am sorry for the hassle, but it is 140 cm. I measured it.”

The man leaves. He has important First Class passengers to attend to.

The problem is that the “information on the website is too big. We don’t have the room.”

She opens the doors and examines the baggage racks on the adjoining car. They were filled with large and small bags.

 “I can fit it up there,” I say, referring to the top shelve that reaches about to my shoulder. “If we can move those [other bags] around.”

“Are you sure it is 140 cm?” she asks.

“Yes, I am.”

She addresses the entire carful of passengers when she tells them, “Move all of these smaller bags and put them in the overhead bins.” Some people come and move the bags. Most ignore her.

“Whose is this yellow one?” she asks. And she continues until all of the smaller ones have been removed. 

After she’d left, I wrestled with Heidi and put her on the rack. She didn’t quite fit. 

A couple facing me in the front seat were laughing and looking at me. 

A young woman passenger helps me. Then she goes to her seat. I pull Heidi out, remove my helmet, turn her around. That doesn’t work. I turn her back, then find a way to fit her inside. Then I reinstall the helmet, zip her up, and head to my seat. The train is already moving.

“Thank you again,” I told the woman managing the cafeteria car. 

“Did you get it in?” she asks.

“I did.” 

Back at my seat, I finally can rest. In this car, I have a meal coming and there is free water and coffee and fruit. I grab an apple and the red headed man brings me a tray of food. By now, he is the perfect host. His sternness regarding Heidi’s size has been replaced with first class politeness.  

From behind me, I am privy to a conversation that a second man hailing from Alabama has with an American woman. They are both of retirement age. He sounds a little like, Dr Phil. “I’m a 20th century relic,” he tells her. He is showing her photos from his phone of “my oldest granddaughter, just graduated from high school. She is eighteen… Then her brother is 15… And then the youngest is 12. There’s a pretty good gap between them.” I don’t follow his logic. “My children like to relate themselves with what I did in my life…” So, he begins telling her how exciting he is. 

It is easy to imagine the man is a retired judge or a business owner of some importance in his circles. He is a large fish in his small Alabama pound, always quick with the judgement and tightfisted with the tact and empath. “Ignorant people…” he says. “In my opinion, it started with Watergate… Journalists became folk heroes… there’s not a single journalist I respect for because they” just tell lies.

I remind myself to observe human behavior without judgement. If I am going to become that better person whom I am always talking about, then I need to practice a little more tolerance myself. 

When I fall captive to these boisterous conversations, I must remember my experience many years ago when flying from Amman, Jordan to Baghdad, Iraq, in a tiny CPA-contracted aircraft run by a South African company, if I am not mistaken. It was operated out of Marka Airport, a small civilian airport. Only later when commercial airlines began traveling into Baghdad did flights operate out of the much larger Queen Alia International Airport. 

While returning from Jordan around 2003 or 2004, I was the unfortunate prisoner to a tortuous three- or four-hour conversation between two young American women that began while waiting in line. They were unintentionally loud, speaking nonstop about casual topics, more appropriate for sorority sisters than professional humanitarian or development workers. They shared gossipy tidbits about different CPA workers. 

This did not really surprise me. The Bush Administration had recruited a number of political debutants for CPA work, looking to add a stint in Iraq, no matter how brief, to their CVs. 

A couple years later, I was working for IREX in DC, and my work brought me into contact with an expert in Conflict Resolution and Peace from a well known think tank in DC. I was impressed by some of her Peace-building work that I read about on their website. We arranged a lunch and as soon as I saw her, I knew who she was. She was one of the flippant young women from that plane ride from Amman to Baghdad. Throughout the sushi meal and conversation, I struggled to reconcile that chatty sorority girl with this young professional sitting in front of me. She was articulate, modest, and intellectual. Gone were the garrulous conversations and immature comments, and in their place were thoughtful and logical analyses and insights. 

I came to realize that her personal conversations, flippant and crude as they may be, were her own. Not for public consumption or scrutiny. Certainly, nothing I heard on that day was anywhere as barbaric as some of my own comments when with trusted colleagues, particularly during my drinking years.

This young woman had done nothing wrong. And I shouldn’t judge her from personal conversations. I had been overly judgmental based on one seemingly endless conversation with another trusted counterpart. And whereas I kept my private conversations more isolated to match my introversion, she was an extrovert who didn’t mind others overhearing her conversations.

When we arrived at the Stockholm Train Station, I removed Heidi and reassembled her right on the platform. Pushing her into the station was much easier than carrying her in that stupid bag. 

I then rode three blocks to the Comfort Hotel Express.

From Amanda’s apartment in Bodø to the Comfort Hotel Express in Stockholm, the four-train journey took 34 hours. I had slept about 3 of those, so when sleep came at around 10 pm, I didn’t fight it.

Comfort Hotel Express ($84/night)

Kungsbron 1, Stockholm, 111 22 Sweden