Norwegian Summer 2026 – Day 13: Vikersund to Kongsberg

A three-part day on the bikes today. But first: we woke up to a beautiful blue sky and warm temperatures, the first of either since way back around Lillehammer. I’d gotten dressed with arm warmers in mind, and then the moment we stepped outside they came right back off. And shorts! Crazy.

Part 1: Our first hour or two was just nice paved riding, working to connect up with a multi-day Telemark gravel route that we’d only nibble about twenty miles out of. Quiet roads, traffic thinning out the whole time, slowly climbing away from the lake and river valley our hotel was sitting in.

We stumbled onto some nice separated bike facilities early on, near the town of Åmot.

Part 2: Eventually we started our gravel segment in earnest, which felt good. Something about being on nice dirt and gravel roads just relaxes us. You can hear cars coming a mile away, they don’t move fast, and with the weather so nice (about 75F) we were just feeling lucky to be out there. No aggressive schedule, and really only one long, slow climb to concern ourselves with.

As we worked toward the top of the gravel mound we were climbing, we’d get flatter stretches running along mountain lakes and ponds.

At one point the road devolved into little more than double track. Our hackles went up briefly as we flashed back to bushwhacking down a mountain a few days ago, but aside from the “road” routing us straight through a farmer’s back yard, it was really just a matter of dealing with some looser surface.

Near the top we pulled over for a late lunch. After that, there was one last little push onto a plateau, and then we began a long descent. Pretty glorious, though at the very end it was steeper than it needed to be. Why not lower those grades just a touch, Norway!

Part 3: We got spat out onto a paved highway that happened to be Norway cycle route number 5, which was very fortunate. It was a steady downhill with a slight tailwind, and we had a bit over 10 miles to cover.

At one point, climbing a little rise, we heard a “ka-chunk, ka-chunk” repeating behind us, and then this guy on roller skis just hammered past like we were standing still.

I asked the cyclists in the video if they were with him, and they laughed and said no, and they all left us behind pretty easily too. Maybe the skier is an Olympic-level athlete, I wouldn’t know. How efficient are roller skis, anyway? Can amateurs really put out that much power that easily? I’m just going to assume we had a close encounter with Johannes Høsflot Klæbo doing his summer training!

The road was beautiful, and good pavement is always a nice change of pace. It’s all good, isn’t it? We made quick work of the rest of our mileage and rolled into Kongsberg. And there we had a tough decision to make.

After some deliberation we decided to stick to cycling and leave the Jazz to the other campers. We found our hotel, a 10-story high rise, and were happy they encouraged us to just bring the bikes right up into the room. That saved us the usual routine of pulling all the necessary bags off the bikes. It’s been about 50/50 on hotels letting us bring the bikes into the room; sometimes it’s just not feasible, no bike-capable elevator and so on.

Overall, a short day, under 40 miles, but a good one, with plenty of climbing as usual at about 3000ft and 4.5 hours of ride time. Fun, and we’ll be ready and rested for a longer day tomorrow!