Guest Blog: Bike-Packing Across Scandinavia at 64 (Days 33 and 34)

Day 33: Lohja, Finland (27 miles, 678 total miles, 919 foot incline)

9 July 2024: Tuesday

One morning in 5th or 6th grade—probably 1972 or so—I was delivering papers on bike before school in Brownstown, Indiana. Snoopy, my white dog, was accompanying me like he sometimes did, wandering ahead or trailing behind to sniff out a squirrel or find the perfect spot to urinate. As we reached busy highway 50 at the hill near what eventually would become the Candlelight tavern, he ambled off into the middle of the highway, standing on the center line looking back in my direction. As if unfolding in slow motion, I watch a semi coming up the hill sound his air horn in an attempt to warn Snoopy off the road. Unfortunately, it scared my dog to take three or four steps backward right into the path of an oncoming car. With no time to react, the vehicle passed over Snoopy, knocking his head to the ground and spinning him over and over trapped under the bottom of the car as if in the bowels of some sinister machine designed to torture small animals. 

When Snoopy came out the other side, I ran to him, and picked him up. He bit me out of pain, but I ignored it and carried him to the side of the road and laid him gently in the grass. He looked up at me in horror, pleading for me to help him. 

But we were poor. None of our pets had ever seen a veterinarian, I don’t think. Somehow he managed to get to his feet and make it home. Fortunately, he lived many more years, faithfully protecting me and my family. A loyal companion that never judged me for my many shortcomings. 

When we moved to Vallonia, he moved with us. When we moved back to the house on N. High Street, across from the funeral home, he came along. Around 8th grade, we moved to Hillview Trailer Park. Naturally, we brought him, but one day he wondered back across that very same Highway 50, likely at that very same spot where he was injured three years earlier, and returned to the vacant house on N High Street. He made his way inside the house and into my mother’s bedroom. He was always an outdoor dog, so we never brought him inside. But perhaps he was just following scents. 

Some weeks later, he was found in her bedroom with the door closed. Someone, perhaps some kid was in there smoking or exploring, and they felt threatened or were just being mean. In any case, he died of starvation and dehydration. 

I was sad for a long time over the loss of Snoopy, like we all are as teens, losing a family pet. 

I am reminded of this story because my granddaughter just messaged me from Indiana, telling me that one of her kittens was run over by a car. So, I told her about Snoopy. 

When I left Aseem’s apartment around 9:30 am, I met Bashir from Morocco. He wore a long, red beard, shaved over and under his mouth to the chin. He was friendly and we chatted for just a minute. He was on his way to work, I suppose, and I needed to get on the road to my next destination: Lohja. 

The day was beautiful, sunny, and warm at 62 degrees. This was actually perfect riding weather. Most of today’s route was along rural country highways. The first 18 miles or so were hilly, mostly along Highway 110. At times, Tennessee rolling hills, each one steeper than the one before. 

I peddled through many construction sites, past birch forests, and over hill after hill. 

At Nummenkyla, a repair shop shares a building complex with a defunct gas station and convenience store. Here is also where I depart Highway 110 and turn southwest on Highway 25.

Immediately, I spotted the Myllarin Grilli, a tiny food truck permanently perched on Iso Myllylampi (Big Mill Pond), which is really a lake. I parked Heidi between two picnic tables and ordered a hotdog with catsup and mustard and a tiny Coke Zero in a plastic bottle. 

When you twist off the cap of plastic bottle in Scandinavia, the cap remains tethered to the rim. It was annoying for the first several weeks, and I usually ripped them off, upset that the damn European manufacturers didn’t know how to manufacture a bottle cap. Two days ago, I read that the tethered bottle caps are intentional manufacturing design, responding to an EU regulation. In 2016, a clean up campaign along a North Dutch Shore found 128 caps per kilometer. As a result, an EU law went into effect in 2024, mandating tethered bottle caps. 

The young lady looked out the window to notify me that my hotdog with catsup and mustard was ready. But when I went over to pick it up, I realized the hotdog was wrapped in paper, but had no bun. Typically, the cashiers ask you if you want a bun or not before ringing up your order. I reckon sole hotdogs with catsup and mustard squeezed into a paper are quite popular here.

“I want a bun,” I told her. 

“It will be more,” she responded.

“That’s OK,” I told her. “Give me two of them.” I could tell that Heidi wanted one. Her frame has gotten as skinny as a rail.

She asked if I wanted relish, and I said, Yes. 

In the lake, I saw a large woman in her 60s swimming off a dock. In the distance I saw what appeared to be a huge inflatable Viking raft, but it could have been a unicorn raft or a My Little Pony raft. 

After going to all that trouble, Heidi refused to eat her hotdog, so I had to eat it. 

This next section of the road was smooth peddling. Almost no breeze, mostly flat, and on a good blacktop bike path. I really enjoyed it.

As I reached Lohja proper, it started to sprinkle. Naturally, a forecast of zero percent rain did not preclude mist, sprinkles, or even showers. The farther along I got, the evidence of a harder shower grew more and more clear. 

After getting turned around in downtown Lohja, I peddled up to a crosswalk button on a sidewalk. Part of the time, cyclists ride on sidewalks, part of the time on bike paths or trails, part of the time on designated bike lanes on streets and roads, and the remainder of the time on blacktop roads with no space at all. 

As I maneuvered to push the button, I noticed a lady in her 70s walking in my direction with the help of walker suddenly, but slowly, deviate from my direction. Although she was 20 feet from me, she feared I was going to run her over. When she realized that I had come to a stop and pressed the button, she smiled and joined me at the edge of the curb.

She proceeded to tease me in Finnish about our unusual encounter. When I told her, “English?” she shook her head. 

Suddenly, a tall man in his forties rode past on a particularly loud moped. She mocked him by imitating the noise of his scooter, “Putt, putt, putt…” 

A man her age arrived with is his own walker. They became so engaged in a conversation that they didn’t notice when the Walk light turned green. 

“Here we go,” I said to get their attention.

“Bye-bye,” I yelled as I peddled off.

“Bye-bye,” she yelled.

A few miles ahead, I found the apartment. Minna, the landlord, was actually on the street, leaving for doctor’s appointment she’d told me about.

She turned around and led me to the apartment. Showed me where to store my bike, waited while I locked Heidi up and removed the saddleback, and led me upstairs to the apartment. 

“My son just woke up,” Minna said. “He is taking a shower… He was waiting on you… He is 16… He is a good person.” 

She called through the bathroom door, “Mishka…” which I learned was short for Mikhail. 

Minna departed, and I began sorting my gear. I was really too sweaty too sit down in any of the chairs inside, so I sat on the balcony. 

Mishka greeted me and I returned to the hallway between his room and mine. 

Not really knowing what to say, I asked, “So you are 16?”

“Yes.”

“I have a granddaughter 16,” I added.

As soon as the words left my mouth, I realized that I had just rocked this teen’s world. I was sure he was thinking:

What are the odds? I’m 16. This guy standing in my hallway has a 16-year-old granddaughter. I’d have a better chance of winning the Finnish lottery or of getting drafted by the Indiana Fever or of meeting Justin Bieber eating a hot dog without a bun at the local food wagon than meeting an American with a 16-year-old granddaughter.

He told me that he would like to visit the United States, but it was very expensive.

To that, I added, “It is really nice.”

Again, I could read Mishka’s mind.

Now this guy can make conversation. Throw this old man into any awkward social situation with any 16-year-old English speaker in the world, and watch this guy perform his magic. 

After rocking Mishka’s world, I noticed my camel pack was leaking water all over the bedroom. That’s when my training kicked in.

“Mikhail,” I yelled. When he appeared, I told him I needed a towel or a mop or something. Meanwhile, I removed the throw rug and positioned it on the balcony where the wet edge could dry out. I took the towel that Mishka gave me, and without hesitation, I tossed it on the on the floor and dried up the excess water. I put the backpack in the sink. 

All the while, Mishka must have been thinking: 

Wait! What! This guy must be a Navy Seal or something. He just flew into action without any thought to his own safety, or any planning, he knew what do to. A true act of heroism. I hope when I reach 64 years old, my instincts are even half as good as his… Shoot, who am I kidding. That’s never gonna happen.

At the supermarket 600 meters away, I loaded up on the necessities, like Pepsi Max with a tethered cap, sausages, buns, and relish. I walked across the bridge over Lohjianjarvi Lake back to the apartment and passed Birch, Maple, and what looked like Russian Olive Trees. I washed clothes again and made four sausages. Ate two. Napped. Woke up and ate the other two. I ate some fruit, some yogurt. Then around 9pm, I was out for the count.

It had been a good day! I had motivated a young Finn—I like to think of him as Huck—to go out in the world and explore the world, ride down the Mississippi River, Huck, if you ever make it to the US, and be the very best version of yourself that you can be.

Salmenmäentie 1 B 10, Lohja, 08350, $79/tax) Finland

Day 34: Salo, Finland (39 miles, 717 total miles, 1060 foot incline)

10 July 2024: Wednesday

My trip today is 39 miles and up an incline of about 1060 feet. Just to change things up, I booked a cheap room at Rock Hotel in downtown Salo. More than anything, I wanted to see how the Salo Finns rock. 

I set my alarm an hour earlier, made coffee, ate yogurt, granola, and grapes for breakfast, washed dishes, cleaned up the mess, folded my air dried clothes, and packed everything up. 

I was so proud of myself for getting packed and out the door at 8:30 am, a half an hour earlier than planned. But I had not ridden a block till I realized that I left my helmet locked up in the apartment. I called Minna but she didn’t answer.

 

Shit!

Faced with waiting an hour or so till she woke up, I thought about riding ahead until I found a bike shop, where I could purchase a new helmet. In fact, I had started looking up bike shops on my route when Minna wrote me a message. Forty-five minutes later, she arrived. 

I am still a little divided on tomorrow. Turku, my final destination for the Finland leg is supposed to see rain all day. If I could reach there Thursday afternoon, I could catch the 8:45 am ferry to Stockholm on Friday morning, arrive at 6:30 pm on Friday evening. 

I would like to go ahead and book a cabin on the ferry for the 11 hour journey. But the threat of rain is giving me pause. Mist, I can ride in. Downpours are dangerous and painful. Spending an extra day in Salo may make sense, but right now they are predicting rain until about noon on Saturday. 

No sooner had I left the apartment, than I almost fell off the bike at a stop. I hopped, hopped, hopped on one leg while holding Heidi up. Then the first of many hills began. There were lakes on the left, lakes on the right, and hills everywhere in between. 

Then, I hit a gravel road. I didn’t like it at all. It brought back memories of my crash in Arizona six months ago. 

When I spotted an old woman, slightly order than me, perhaps, pushing her bike up a steep gravel hill. I asked her how long the gravel lasted. She told me 4 or 5 kilometers. I thanked her and then proceeded down that hill with extreme caution. 

The hills were steep and gravel loose, making each decline a stiff and arduous adventure in itself, balancing left-front brake and right-back brake to keep my velocity low, maybe 4 or 5 mph. But climbing them typically involved my dismounting and pushing Heidi up, sometimes stopping once or twice to catch my breath. It is times like these that I really feel my 64 years. Do I really have any business out here? 

When I found a mossy boulder with no weeds around it, I laid Heidi down and rested for four or five minutes. My first rest stop.

Then back on the gravel until I hit blacktop. 

The blacktop was equally hilly, but the hills were more gradual, more manageable by peddling in low gears. Finally, I found a restaurant at a tiny lake. I stopped and went inside trying to find a sausage. But they only had full meals. It was close to noon, but I didn’t want a full meal. So, I drank a Coke Zero and got back on Heidi and peddlede away.

My legs began to burn almost immediately. I slowed my pace a little, trying to progress always down the hill and up the next. They didn’t stop. About halfway, out in the middle of open fields, I found another Grilli in a red and white wooden shack. 

Inside, I ordered a makkara (sausage). The old lady, maybe 75 or 80 years old, who owned and ran the kitchen suffered from a stooped back from decades spent bent over the grill, taking and filling orders. When I asked her how long she had been running the grilli, she smiled like a teen, timidly and modestly admitting her accomplishments. 

“Thirty-nine years,” she said. She seemed genuinely happy.

I sat outside and ate a very, very good sausage. 

A gray-haired woman got out of a parked car, leaving her husband in AC. She approached me, asking for directions in Finnish as she walked. 

“I only speak English,” I said.

She waved me off. “Well, you wouldn’t know.”

The man opposite me was Finnish, and he gave her directions.

I was completely worn out by the time I reached the tiny city of Salo. The ride along the Uskelanjoki River was beautiful, in and of itself worth the journey. I crossed the bridge and found the Rock Hotel immediately. This hard, hilly, and sweaty ride of 39 miles had taken me six hours, just under 7 mph. 

I pushed Heidi up the steps into the Rock Hotel bar, got my key, and pushed her up one more flight to my room. I was too tired to shower, but too stinky to go outside as I was. 

I showered and put on some clean clothes and did something I don’t think I had done since Sweden: I walked to a restaurant and ordered a meal. I welcomed the wait at the Rikata, the riverside restaurant, enjoying the warm weather and the atmosphere. 

I loved the burger and fries. The waitress delivered a huge glass bottle of ice water. 

After the meal, I walked to a grocery store, bought a few things, and went back to the room.

Rain or no rain, I made my decision. I couldn’t delay another day in this room, hoping it wouldn’t rain. I would mitigate the risk by waking up early and departing the hotel by 6am. That gave me the best chances of minimizing the misery of riding during a downpour, according to the forecasts for Salo and my final destination, Turku. 

I booked a room at the MS Bore, a passenger ship built in 1960, that used to ferry people to and from Stockholm for the 10 or 12 hour journey back then. 

By 9pm, I was asleep. 

Rock Hotel Salo ($75 incl tax)

5 Asemakatu Rock Hotel, Salo, 24100