Thursday 6 feb: a detour of 200 km extra due to a closed road

Narvik -Jokkmokk 581km (instead of 389 km)

Today we had a very, very early start, the alarm went of at 04:00 hours. Due to the still closed road at Abisko we had to take the much longer northern route. This meant 200 km extra to drive and it was still snowing and storming very hard. But we really needed to be in Jokkmokk in time because the group of the second raid would arrive today.

We drove off at 05:00 exactly together with Gertjan ofcourse and Jeff and Sien in their green speedy Aka.





First part of the trip was intense. It was still dark and snowing so driving was hard. And even though it was early their was already a lot of traffic on the road.

Even though it doesn’t look like it....


The bad weather continued until the Swedisch border, after we passed the mountains the sun came out and now more snowing and clouds. But first we had a little part of Finland to cross.

first the Finnish border, still in bad weather.

It became a bit lighter went we got over the Finnish border but when we entered Sweden the sun really showed herself.

It made driving more fun and easier. But i must confess that I slept most of this part of the route. Waking up this early is really not my cup of tea, and I was so tired than the sun and beautiful scenery where not enough to keep me awake.

At our petrol and coffee stop we drove into the new prototype Auston Martin, al covered with tape an filling material to keep the shape secret. The driver insisted that we put the two 2cv’s on either side so he could make a beautiful picture.

At this station/ shop they also sold these nice bikes for in the snow. 

Icicles in the rims

We continued our drive to Jokkmokk after this nice interruption. It was still a long drive. 

Sun going down again already.

We got company of the lost three teams for the last 50 km of the route. So nice to see them again save and  well. Gertjan left to pick up his sister from the bus station. She will be his companion for the Classic Raid.

We arrived in Jokkmokk well in time. Out two tipi’s were waiting for us on the campsite. Unfortunately the heaters and fires were not on yet so it was pretty cold, but it looked great. As soon as we got out of the car we started heating the tents nice and warm. In the meantime we made our beds with reindeerfurs, and our own mattresses and sleepingbags.

Then it was time for the save arrival drink with all the teams from both raids. It was quite impressive to see all the teams together. Offcourse the new arrivals first got their own glass, roadbook and hats. After the drinks we had a meal together and then it was time for the award ceremony of the Extreme. All drivers got a certificate and a nice reminder of the raid.

After that we went to the campfire between the to tipi’s to share stories and adventures.

When I went to bed I discovered that we had been a little to enthusiastic with heating the the tent. All the ice on the inside of the teent started to melt and drip. Dome people moved their beds to the dry conference room where we had dinner. We decided to stay in the tent, our bags are warm and pretty watertight so it was no problem. 

We had a very goog night sleep, despite the water dripping down.