15 June - Jektvik to Lofoten Links. 254 miles


It is not often that one feels good to be alive, but this morning was one of them. I had to leave early to catch the ferry from Agskardet if I was to reach Bodo in time for my 11.00 crossing to Lofoten.


If the latter half of yesterday was superlative, the drives from Jektvik and then from the other side of the ferry to Bodo exceeded it for eye-turning scenery. I could have stopped for photos every mile. It is the final and best stretch of what is often considered the finest of the Scenic Routes. We passed snowbound mountains of the Svartisen ice sheet (this view of the glacier tongues dropping down off the icefields towards the water was taken just after the ferry from the road alongside Holandsfjorden)


the same, plus Toad



to islands, islets and skerries too numerous to count.



It was not all beauty. A rose between two thorns


Anyway, we got to the Agskardet ferry in good time.


Not a bad view while we were waiting. 


The Captain came over and chatted about the M3W. He told me that I would have to push it to get to Bodo on time. Goodee


Like the road from Jektvik, this one was fast and largely empty - but it was in constant competition with the landscape for our attention. 

But we made it and left the mainland behind.

The E10 taking us to Lofoten Links is the principal artery running the length of the Islands but would be classed as a minor B road back home. Views as on the mainland but here the mountains seem a little closer and the water is Caribbean blue. This is what one one gets straight off the boat at Moskenes. Ranges of dragon's teeth mountains rising from the sea and split by lakes and fjords.


My camera decided to offer some fancy effects on this one.


In several places we saw (and smelt) racks of Stockfish hung out to dry



I stopped to fill up at a station overlooked by a cloud-shrouded peak and on its other side was an empty, pure white beach lapped by azure waves. 

But of course you only wanted to know about the golf. I have wanted to play Lofoten Links since reading about it a year ago. The clubs were covered in dust after 2000 miles as my passenger.


But at 9 pm off we went. I hope these photos do the setting justice. The camera certainly enhances the light. It was actually quite dim from around 22.30 and although I am typing this without the lights on at half past midnight one should not get the idea that Midnight Sun means it is bright for 24 hours. There is a long twilight, the Sun disappears for a moment and rises again.


The 18th green. Midnight. Made it.

To be honest, while the setting is magnificent and I had it to myself the condition of the course was poor and many of the tees were unusable - I should have played it a month later because growth comes so late in this climate. But when one considers the battering it must get for most of the year it is a pretty good effort that anything is there at all.

We cover the length of Lofoten tomorrow and end up in Tromso. And I cannot find my hat.

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