Göta Kanal

Famous Swedish landmark :)

Shopping with a Brompton in Norrköping

Passed Norrköping and hour ago and bought some energy bars for tonight. I'm planning to stay on the road until dusk and then get some sleep, we'll see how it goes.

Day 1, 100km

I left Gamla Stan Cykel (the bike shop) at 9am and getting out of town took some time. It was hot and sunny all morning so I considered stopping to rest and cool down for a couple of hours but that never happened. The GPS knows the way all the way to London, so if everything goes according to plan and technology doesn't fail me, all I have to worry about is pedaling on. I only slept 4 hours last night, so I'm going to bed early tonight. The tent is already up but it's still quite warm outside. Sometime during the day, the thermometer showed 26C! Time for bed!

Good night!

 

Data:

Distance: 100km

Average speed: 13km/h

Top speed: 49km/h

 

Less than 34 hrs to go!

Now rolling on a six-speed!

With less than two days until I get going there is still some preparations left to do. Today I spent all afternoon fitting a new back wheel, the bike is now a six-speed Brompton, a M6R. I've also fitten new handles and a GPS tracking device that will update my position every 10 minutes when I'm on the road. Other than that, my new clothes from Helly Hansen fit perfectly and I will post a detailed review of each piece of clothing as I go.
My good friend Karl Hallin has kindly lent me his Garmin Edge 800 GPS for this trip, with that, finding good bike friendly roads to London should get a whole lot easier.
At the front I've also fitted a 1400 lumen head light, at night, it looks like daylight in front of me.
To power up my iPad, GPS, MP3 and phone I've mounted solar panels (860mAh) on top of my new front bag, they charge up a 6600mAh battery which in turn charges up my electronics on the road.

Testrun, 70km

This is where I'm sleeping tonight after over 70km in about 6 hrs. The tent is up and I'm currently in it trying to eat a sandwich before sleeping. I've got another 70km to go before I reach my target, but plan to get up in 4-5 hours to eat some breakfast and get an early start before it gets hot. Today I started at 19:00 and made 2 stops, each about 15 minutes. More to follow when I reach my target.
Good night!

New tail light

Today was a great day, my new tail light arrived from S. Korea. It's a normal extended seat pillar from Brompton with 5 LED lights, one of them is also a button. They are more or less custom built for each customer, so not just for Bromptons. Check out their website.
They are very bright and have a bunch of different modes, so they should keep me safe during endless nights of pedaling.

Tent delivery

Got my new tent today, a Snugpak Ionosphere which my friend Erik was kind enough to send me from England. It weighs just under 1.5kg and should accommodate me on the road. If the weather is nice however, I will be sleeping in my hammock. I have yet to decide how to mount the tent securely onto the Brompton, it rolls up nicely and could be strapped up behind the saddle, but I'm going to try out some different places. I'll try out the tent sometime next week, I'm hoping for some bad weather to test it under some bad conditions.

Until then, here is a picture taken from the product catalogue :)