Skagerrak crossing and Landfall Langesund

Up early for the ferry across the Skagerrak, Hirtshals is only 20 minutes down the road from our overnight stop. A damp start again but I always feel the pressure when getting close to immovable deadlines and/or relying on a third party - like a ferry sailing.

Ferry across the Skagerrak ~15 mile drive, ~99 mile ferry

When checking in to ferries the scene in Star Wars always comes to mind, Leia first sees the Milenium Falcon when being rescued and has a line something like:
  'You came in that? you're braver than I thought'.
RL13 usually generates a smile even with steely faced passport control!

I do like belt and braces 'you are travelling to Langesund' in my face on the car hanger.

Ferry 3 point turn into the dock.

First order of business - get outside and monitor leaving port and a chance to look around Hirsthals from afar.

Followed by some general wandering on the Helipad deck before settling into a relaxed crossing.

Langesund

A good 3-4 hour crossing. Land ahoy, blue skies and plenty of people on deck taking pictures.

Some WWII fortifications visible off the port side...

...alongside interesting layered/countoured rock formations...

Then the town itself both sides of the inlet

We decided to pause after disembarking, to explore a little, have lunch and avoid following the contents of the ferry down the road for the rest of the afternoon.

By the time we're parked the ferry is still unloading in the distance.

Always interesting to have a mooch around boats...

Small cafe for lunch which doubled as a wool and craft shop. Bonus is inside its more like a front room - sofas, kitchen tables, good and informal.

...and walk it off for half an hour or so on a woodland walk back to the fortifications we saw on the way in at Tangen Fort.

I'm not sure if this would have been a good place to be stationed for the relative peace away from an active front, or worse for being in a rural area surrounded by local resistance?

Nothing here now but broken concrete lined trenches and gun emplacements turned into viewpoints and picnic spots.

Sea legs replaced with land legs we're ready for some more driving.

Update - With hindsight, and sailing out from Kristiansand at the tail end of the road trip, Langesund is a perfect first landing into Norway - small, stereotypical Norwegian town rather than large city. The perfect spot to pause before venturing further in to the country.