Vadsø is the main town of the Varanger peninsula, and it feels like it knows it is on the edge of things. About five thousand people live here, on a low, treeless shore facing a fjord that opens straight into the Barents Sea, and the light off that water in summer is flat, silvery and long. It is the administrative centre of Finnmark, which explains the solid public buildings, and it has a harbour, a main street, a church and the sort of supermarket you start to appreciate when you have been riding the empty tundra for a day or two.
The town has a layered past. For centuries Sami, Norwegians, Russians and Finnish-speaking settlers known as Kvens traded and fished along this coast, and Vadsø became the centre of the Kven community in Norway. There is a museum devoted to their story, which is a good rainy-day stop. Out on the edge of town stands a mooring mast for airships, built in the 1920s when polar explorers like Amundsen and Nobile were using the north as their testing ground. Nobody has moored an airship there for ages, but it is a nice piece of improbable history, and it makes a good photograph against a pale sky.
The riding along this coast is long and open. The E75 comes in over treeless hills and wide plains, with distant fjord views, gentle curves and little traffic, and the surface is generally good. The main hazards are wind, which comes off the sea with no hills to stop it, and reindeer, which wander the road in summer and have no concept of right of way. Winter is serious, with snow, ice, darkness and sometimes closures, so only ride out of season if you have the kit and the experience. In June and July the sun stays up all night, and a ride at midnight is a real thing.
Vadsø has everything you need: fuel, banks, shops, cafés and a few hotels. This is the place to top the tank and buy food, because the next stretches are long and thin on services. The local fish is excellent, especially cod and king crab, which was introduced into the Barents Sea from Russia and now thrives off this coast. Try it, if you can, in a simple café by the harbour.