Most stunning road - or shall I say forest-way

In Ruka I realized that my back tire wears off really quickly when riding my sidecar on the gravel roads. It was seriously time for a new one. Of course it was Friday and no tire in Kuusamo area before Monday. We did not want to hang around for an entire weekend in Ruka because of the tire. So we thought whether we can continue more north in hope to get a tire there off the shelf or - if ordered - the tire would be there by Monday. Good plan and then reality hit. I called some shops in Inari and Sodankylä and the answers were always similar. If ordered today, the tire would be there for mounting earliest Wednesday. What a disappointment!

Worn out back tire

So we turned West and checked the situation in Rovaniemi. Great they had one tire for me in the shelf, so I reserved it. We made it to the shop 10 minutes before closing and I got my tire. Now the only problem was to get it changed. Remarkably I just bought all the tools from RM Heino so that I would be able to change a tire by myself. However, I left all those tools at home, since I though that the tire will last this trip. Porkana!

Lucky for us, Petri & Petri (one Petri is Ilta's friend) had rented a cottage in Rovaniemi and granted us some shelter in their 5-star deluxe cabin. They also had good connections to other folks in the town and they tried really hard to help us. All the best intentions did not open up any shop, always the same answer - come back on Monday. So not much difference to Ruka. Then they found a friend who had a big metal work repair shop and there were plenty of tools, so Jussi became the hero of the day as he sacrificed his Saturday morning and help changing the tyre. It was quite an act to get the tyre of the rim, the rest was easy. After two hours the new tyre was mounted and we were good to go. It felt great to be back on the road without worrying about the worn-out back tire.

Petri & Petri - ready to go out

On the way from Ruka to Rovaniemi we found the most stunning gravel road. It was marked grey in the big street map of Finland (1:800 000) and when we came drove there, we saw a welcome sign

Unmaintained street - driving at own risk

The road was really nice, narrow and peaceful - check the video clips:

http://youtu.be/VVzWdjFCi8c and http://youtu.be/FzEay6R4NAo

In the evening we arrived at the deluxe mökki and girls were so dead :)

Tired girls after a day's hard ride

~ Wolfi