Norway - A road trip - Part II

I just decided to post the second part of the post even if it is not finished yet as it is already end of August and if I do not publish it now maybe I do not do it ever.
I will try to update this second part with the rest of the information as soon as I have the time to do so.

Campings

We were having the intention to alternate resting at a camping place and on our own. It turned out that the possibility for the second was not so obvious without a more deep knowledge of the area than the one we were in possession of, basically a detailed map of the Lofoten Islands. We managed, however, to find a nice spot in one or two occasions.
The camping places we visited were in general terms good to very good, with, of course, the usual small thing here and there. All of them were able to provide fresh water, electricity, cooking, shower and toilet facilities, however not all of them accepted cards as payment method, or were prepared for the deposition of waste water (both, the "grey" water and/or the septic tank) or had internet access.

• Lofoten Hammerstad Sjøhuscamping, located a few kilometres north of Svolvær, this camping was our first point of contact with Norwegian hospitality. The owner, a very nice guy called Kjell, was happy to help you with anything, from advise about fishing up to withdrawing cash from your credit card for you. The camping place is not so big, it is located down hill looking to a small and rocky beach, has a pier and it is very close to a bridge over the fjord waters were you can try your luck fishing (on the way back, with proper fishing rods, we got a nice codfish here). The entry to the camping area is well indicated but easy to pass by if you are driving to fast. We stayed here two different night, one on the way to Å i Lofoten, the other on the way back from there. The shower runs with 5 NOK coins, the only camping place we were which used this coin, the other were using 10 NOK, for 3 minutes. There two shower rooms and four toilet spaces on an annex to the cabin number 3, which is hill up from the place were the campers are parked. That is also the place to empty the septic water, so if your septic tank does not have wheels, you will need to heavy it up to there. To empty the grey water you will need to manoeuvre a bit with the camper, but is easy done. We did not use the washing machine but according to Mr. Kjell it was possible, we just need to go to him with the stuff and his wife will help us. Internet was available all over the place. A very nice place to stay on a trip to the Lofoten, we liked it, specially the cover kitchen with barbecue inside :) The price was 185 NOK per night with electricity, 145 NOK without electricity, plus an extra per person.
• Lyngær Lofoten Bobilcamping, easily the biggest camping place we stayed. According to the brochure we got it has space for around 200 campers. The people at the reception were very friendly, and able to communicate in German and English. As around 70% of their customers are from Germany, their German was obviously better than their English. Of course, this applies only to the Norwegian stuff, as a guy from Pakistan or India was also working there as well as a Spanish girl. The place overlooks the fjord, has a pier and owns a rowing boat which one it is possible to go fishing (we got nothing here, however). There are a lot of facilities here, empty of the grey water and septic tank is easily done at one service building, together with the refilling of fresh water. Another service building houses the washing and drying machines. Both service buildings have a kitchen, toilets and showers (10 NOK for I think 3 or 4 minutes). I can not remember for sure if the place was having internet available, but I think so.

Norway - A road trip - Part I

We just came back from holidays in Norway, a road trip which started in Romaniemi (Finland), went to the Lofoten Islands and ended back in Romaniemi. The trip was great, with some fantastic moments but also with some down moments. This is, more or less, the story :)

Background 

We were two families with kids. One family was of three members, two adults and a baby girl of 16 months of age; the other family was of four members, two adults, a girl of 4 years and a boy of 2 years old. Both ladies were happily  pregnant.We rented two campers from the company Touring Cars which has branches all over the Scandinavian countries. The reason to take the campers on Romaniemi (Finland) instead of directly on Norway was the price difference. In Norway the high season includes already the first two weeks of June, whereas in Finland only the two last weeks of June are considered high season. Therefore the rental price was around 95€ per day instead of 270€ per day.The campers were Hymer-Ford, of the "capuchine" type, they were not identical but very similar. The main difference was that one was having a permanent bed on the back of the camper whereas the other one was having a living space which could be transformed into a bed. On the middle of the camper there is the main table, which can also be transformed into a bed and then on the front roof, there is the other bed. So, every camper was having three beds, which was more than enough for our needs.The family with the two kids got the camper with the living space on the back site. This configuration reduces the storage space accessible from the outside of the camper, but once the living space in transformed into a bed, gives a lot of space for storage just below the bed. The distance from the bed to the floor of the camper is not so high and a little one falling from there to the ground will suffer only a minor scratch (real case). As the two kids were sharing this bed and the parents were using the upper one, the table in the middle was always open as table, so no modification of the camper was needed on a daily basis.The family with the baby girl got the camper with the permanent bed on the back side. The distance from this bed to the floor of the camper is higher than on the other model, maybe more than one meter (4 feet, even), and there was a indication that the bed was not suitable for a baby between 0 and 6 years, the same applies to the bed on top of the driving seats. So, the whole family shared the bed on the back so that the baby was not able to fall down to the ground. So, in this case the camper was probably oversized for us but still not a big problem.

Route

This here is a image capture of a google map with the relevant points on the trip. As stated, we arrived to Rovaniemi by plane, took the campers and cross into Sweden following the road to Pello (Finland) toward Narvik (Norway). Short of Narwik we went north into the Lofoten. At the Lofoten we visit some places that are not in this picture, but the main path is accurate. In Andenes we stop to take a boat to see the whales (more on that later) and cross towards Senja with the ferry (more on ferries later).

At the end we travel 2108 km at an average speed of 62 km/h, which I think it is quite good.

Practicalities

The Scandinavian countries share a lot of features, such as an amazing landscape, but also differ in a lot of small things which can make you live not so easy.
Currency: Finland is in the Euro-zone and therefore uses Euro as currency. Norway and Sweden on the other hand still have their own national currencies. All the three countries take credit cards and even debit cards, but not everywhere. For example, in Norway, on Henningsvær, we were almost not able to buy dried codfish as the factory was not able to accept cards and we were having not enough cash and the absence of a cash machine (we were told that the closest one was in Svolvær, which was a few kilometres out of our way having passing that city already the previous day).
Gas bottles: the camper uses gas for heating, cooking and for the fridge if you are not plug to the electricity network in a camping area. Our one was equipped with two bottles of around 15 litres each. It is possible to buy gas bottles on any petrol station. However, the connection piece on the top of the bottle differs in each Scandinavian country, so our Finish camper required Finish gas bottles. I was a bit worried that we were going to run out of gas in the middle of Norway, but at the end, we arrived to Rovaniemi without having emptied even one of the two.
Mosquitoes: They say Finland is the country of the thousand lakes, better say the country of the million of mosquitoes. They manage to get inside of the camper even with all windows closed. We were only on Finland upon arrival and prior to our departure, so in total not more than two-three days, but it was enough for us to get devoured by the mosquitoes. Norway, having not so many lakes, but more running water and specially salt water fjords is basically mosquitoes free.
Reindeer: As with the mosquitoes, they are absent from Norway, at least from the Lofoten area, but plenty on the border area between Sweden and Finland. You will find them on the side of the road, walking, crossing or just looking to you. They are look tamed and quiet, but we did try to approach them, just took some pictures from the camper. Other drivers can flash you the lights to indicate you that you are going to find some reindeer on the road ahead of you.
Camper drivers: According to the guy in the rental agency, it is a common custom between the drivers of campers to greet each other on the road. I tried to do every time, but I will say that only three quarters answered, although I also have to say that I was not always the first one to initiate the greeting.
Road: The E10 which we followed is quite narrow. It has two lanes, one in each direction but there is no space on you right further than the lane. Once the lane finished there is a more or less abrupt drop in the terrain. You should picture the road as slightly elevated over the surrounding terrain, so if you drive out of the lane you will fall with the camper maybe a good meter in some places. The main road, E10, is pretty well maintained, however some irregularities and holes are to be expected, as well as the required maintenance works, which in one case, when we were driving towards Å i Lofoten were quite annoying as they were quite extensive and intensive.


I also wanted to talk a bit about the camping places and the places we visited and the activities and so on, but I will do in other posts, otherwise this post will be enormous and I will never finish and publish it.

Say "yes" in Vallejo

Probably I will expand later this post or maybe write another one about the topic and other related phonetic issues, buy for the moment I will try to keep this post short.
The Spanish proper name Vallejo, which happens to be also the name of a quite popular brand of paints is usually mispronounced by English speakers (also by German and Dutch, and in general any speaker of a Germanic language).
The word Vallejo has three syllables: Va-lle-jo
"Va" should be pronounced as the "ba" in Baltimore or in badminton
"lle" should be pronounced like the "ye" in yes and not as "le" in Lex (Luthor)
"jo" there is no close sound for this syllable in English, but people more or less got the idea from other Spanish words like "jamón" or "Jerez" (not only a kind of alcoholic stuff but also the city where it comes from)
The main issue of mispronunciation is on the "lle" syllable, so please don't say "le" in Vallejo, say "ye(s)".

Tau Sept Colours

Following my acquisition of the new Codex for the Tau Empire last weekend I am again in the mood of playing Warhammer 40K and more importantly of painting further my Tau army.

I have some models I got second hand and I just got 12 Fire Warriors more and a Hammerhead with removable and magnetized parts which looks very nice, it is almost assembled and not even primed.

My idea so far is to keep the models which are well painted as I will not be able to do such a good job even if they are either in the usual Tau light brown or in a kind of camo pattern based on grey and green (five metal  Stealth suit models) and try to remove the paint from the others and choose a colour pattern myself. I am still not sure which colour combination I will prefer but for sure not Tau brown, maybe something like the urban colour schema that you can see in the new codex or in the White Dwarf issue 400.

However, one thing that is really important for the Tau, more that the colour schema of the armour is the Sept colour. This colour is present as geometric motives or lines on the armour and is common to all the Tau soldiers from a specific Sept, so it sounds like a good idea to have a list of the colour of each Sept so that you can know which one to use or to choose.

The new Codex includes the colours for some Septs but not for all of them, this is the list I was able to compile so far with the reference where to find the information, the names of the colours are Capitalized as on the source:

1st Sphere

• T'au - White Scar (White Dwarf issue 400); old codex (2006), page 59, Skull White
• Tau'n - new Codex (2013), page 87, dark grey
• D'yanoi - new Codex (2013), page 89,bright blue; old codex (2006), page 59, Ice Blue 
• Bork'an - Sotek Green (White Dwarf issue 400); old codex (2006), page 59, Hawk Turquoise
• Dal'yth - no information available
• Fal'shia - new Codex (2013), page 89, unnamed colour, looks pale yellow
• Vior'la - old codex (2006), page 59, Blood Red 
• Sa'cea - Troll slayer Orange (White Dwarf issue 400); old codex (2006), page 59, Fiery Orange 

2nd Sphere

• Au'taal - new Codex (2013), page 89, bright green; old codex (2006), page 59, Scorpion Green (now Moot Green)
• N'dras - Abbadon Black (White Dwarf issue 400)
• Ke'lshan - new Codex (2013), page 89, yellow; old codex (2006), page 59, Golden Yellow
• Elsy'eir - no information available
• Tash'var - no information available
• Vash'ya - new Codex (2013), page 89, unnamed colour, looks lila or pale purple
• T'olku - new Codex (2013), page 89, unnamed colour, looks emerald green

3rd Sphere

• Ksi'm'yen - no information available
• Fi'rios - new Codex (2013), page 87, unnamed colour, looks very pale green-grey

Update:

from the link provided in the comments by anonymous: