Day 3 - Astorp to Stockholm, Sweden

It’s come to the end of the third day and we STILL haven’t got to use the camper van as it was meant to! We left the quaint little village of Alstorp this morning fully intending to reach a campsite in Stockholm late afternoon that would still be open. On day one our intended campsite turned out to be a fairground that didn’t revert to tents and caravans until well into summer. Day two we simply arrived too late - the reception shut up shop at 4.30 in the afternoon. This time we were full of optimism but again were left sorely disappointed when we turned up to find that the campsite was a temporary boatyard that wouldn’t see any happy campers until well after spring! Hey, you lose some and win some... but it would be nice to deliver something more than an own goal. Things are going so far off the beaten track that we reckon if the four of us went to pick our noses, we’d all poke our eyes out! Haven’t seen that many dogs on our travels so far, maybe our stench has driven them away. Hamburg was very quite and, in Astorp, there were a few signs on the pavement and by the odd post to suggest that they were there. The one thing about Sweden is its general cleanliness; we were all impressed with the coastal scenery and the woodland views en route to Stockholm. Jimmy honed the music, Isaac honed his dance moves and Mike ensured that his tapeworms were not tapping on his rib-cage in desperation. “I can’t stand it when people buy things and don’t eat them straight away,” he quipped, as he asked Jeff whether he had planned to eat his salami roll any time soon!

Given a few pitstops, it took us just over five hours to reach our destination tonight. We ended up booking into another dog-friendly hotel (only just... thanks Mark) and we are looking forward to our 10-hour ferry trip to our dream target Finland, where it all started for Osa’s dad Tuukka. We will be hopefully meeting the Finnish family who bred Osa’s grandfather, Nori, on Thursday.  The good thing with Osa is how he perks up when he is out of the car. He bounded around like a dog half his age in a field on one of our pitstops and he is the centre of attention wherever he goes. People just can’t believe he is 13 and a half years old. Onwards and hopefully upwards. It would be nice to finally sleep in the van even though there is still a sharp chill in the air. Don’t forget we are raising money for Dogs For the Disabled so any support we can muster will go to a very worthy cause. To donate visit our JustGiving page www.justgiving.com/4menandadog

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Please visit www.dogsfortedisabled to see the charity that we are supporting. And if you would like to donate to the Dogs for the Disabled charity, then please visit www.justgiving.com/4menandadog