Blown Away by Hardangervidda
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21-31/03/19
10 days and 200 km with a pulk and skis, crossing Hardangervidda with a friend. A fantastic expedition into the wilderness, including a full week without seeing another person. We faced 55 mph winds and whiteouts, but also enjoyed amazing days with clear blue skies and little wind.
Finse to Haukeliseter - the long way round.
D1: 13.7 km, Started at Finse train station at 1245
D2: 26.5 km, past Krækkja and camping not far from Heinseter
D3: 12.4 km, from near Heinseter to Rauhelleren (cabin), the day of the strom
D4: 20.1 km, Rauhelleren towards Mårbu, then west (the day the sun came out)
D5: 22.2 km, stunning weather and several peaks climbed en route
D6: 17.9 km, from just west of Lågaros to south of Sandhaug
D7: 20.4 km, going south, climbing many tops on the way
D8: 22.7 km, sunny morning with a great top tur, then into the hills, wind and whiteout in the afternoon
D9: 18.5 km, another windy day with less visibility
D10: 15.4 km, ski out to Haukliseter cabin
D11: 10.5 km, bonus sunny ski while waiting on the bus to Oslo (then sleeper train home)
The red dots on the map above mark our campsites (or cabins at Rauhelleren in the storm, and Haukliseter to end)
Day 1
After months of preperation, an overnight train from Trondheim to Oslo, and a train from Oslo to Finse, our trip finally started at around 1230. It was fantastic to get underway after nearly a year in the offing. The poor visibility and winds of up to 15 m/s did nothing to dampen my enthusiasm.
It was a fantastic feeling to finally be underway on the trip we had been thinking of for almost a year, and working towards for the past five months. The poor visibility and winds of up to 15 m/s did nothing to dampen my enthusiasm.
We were delighted with the snow conditions “føre”, which allowed good glide over the snow despite the skins, and good grip. The snow was also well packed which meant we did not sink more than a couple of cm into the snow which enabled us to head out with a good pace.
The visibility was fluctuated as we skied, never less than a few hundred meters, and sometimes clear enough to enjoy the hills valleys we were walking through, but unfortunately never clear enough to see Hardangerjøkulen glacier. Around an hour into our trip we paused, impressed, to watch a pair of ski sailors pass, the first skier had the sail, and was towing the second skier, who in turn was towing two pulks, with added stabilisers to keep them from rolling. They whizzed past with a quick greeting, and sped up the hill in front of us.
By 1525 and we had reached the area which we had planned to find a campsite, however we had plenty of daylight ahead and no shortage of energy, we decided to push onwards and by 1645, having decended a little, found ourselves much more sheltered from the wind in nice scenery, and decided to pitch camp.
Day 2
It was a grey day, but much less windy that the first. We had a gradual descent to start the day, allowing me to just use wax on my skis for increased efficiency. Before long we reached the steepest climb of the day. It was only 300 m horizontally, but about 50 m up, and heaving 50+ kg of pulk up was heavy work, but with long skins on it was fine. From there it was mostly downhill towards Krækkja, but I ended up swapping back to skins as I was not getting enough grip for pulling a heavy pulk on the uphills with just wax. Shortly after skiing past Krækkja we reached the last sign of "normal" human civilisation for the trip when we crossed the road from Oslo to Bergen. This was also the last point on the trip where we had any phone signal, and would rely on our InReach satellite communicators for weather forecasts and sending updates about our progress to those waiting at home (and getting encouraging messages back from them). I believe that anyone completing a trip like this should always carry some form of satellite communicator, and the InReach has worked very well for me (much better that the alternative "Spot" devices have performed for those I know who have used them).
From there we had a nice ski along a few lakes, as the skies cleared. There was a fair side wind as we skied along Øvre Hein, and it seemed to be picking up. The next day the winds were forecast to be up to 21 m/s, so we wanted to find a sheltered spot to camp, in case we had to wait out the storm in the tent. By the time we decided to stop for the day (after 26.5 km) we were quite tired, but put a lot of effort into digging down the tent and building a snow wall to protect us from the incoming storm.
Day 3
It was stunningly beautiful conditions when I first emerged from the tent, after filling up on buttery porridge - very windy but clear. The visibility dropped before we left camp, and was below 30 m most of the day, but occasional views upwards to the peaks above us in the morning. The wind got quite ferocious during the day and we decided to make our way to a cabin, rather than spend a night getting battered by the wind. So after 12 km in a storm facing 55 mph winds and 15m visibility, we arrived at a cabin where we decided to spend the night.
Once inside we discovered that not only had the manned period started (we thought it might still be unmanned, accessible via the universal DNT key), but there was in fact a folk music gathering there that weekend! We were warned by staff that there would be a little noise and commotion through the night - no complaints from us! All participants had arrived by snow-scooter the previous day. We were therefore able to enjoy Hardanger fiddling throughout the afternoon and two free gigs after dinner!
Fortunately when we were out in the storm it was only -8'C so the windchill had not been too extreme. We were the only ones to arrive or leave that cabin that day - all the other skiers we met there had decided that the storm was not worth facing. While challenging, it was awe inspiring conditions to be out in, and all our gear held up well.
Day 4
It was a change to spend the night indoors, but the breakfast served by the cabin staff was fantastic, and it was nice to chat with others out skiing. Before breakfast I took a walk around the outside of the cabin, and it looked set to be a stunning day - there was still patches of fog and spindrift blowing along the lake, but blue skies and sunshine made for stunning views of the area. It was still quite windy, with a cold bite, but nothing to compare with the previous day.
We had diverted from our planned route when we decided to go to the hytta. Perhaps the most obvious plan would have been to continue south towards Lågarås, skipping out the eastern part of our planned route, but we had been making good time, and even with the shortened day due to the storm, we were ahead of schedule. We therefore had decided the previous night to ski east, towards where we had initially been planning to be. We were aiming to get a little west of Mårbu, and had been considering two options. Either following the marked trail over the pass between Kosadalsnuten and Kosadalsbrotet, or avoid any climb by following Skrykkemyre and Skjortemyran. The forecast which we got from my InReach (satellite communicator) suggested that we could be lucky and have good views, and the cabin keeper stated that he thought that "high" route was one of the best in ski sections in the area, if not the whole vidda.
The initial ski across Langesjøen gave us some spectacularly atmospheric views as the spindrift swirled along the lake. The ski over the high ground rewarded us with lovely views. A few hundred meters away we saw a small, dark, four-legged animal scurry across the hillside, and subsequently came across its tracks (pictured below). We think that it was probably a wolverine, and we saw many more traces of throughout the trip. At the high point of the route we left our pulks and climbed the last 30 m or so to a small peak, with great views, and a fun ski back down. As we started our long decent towards Mårbu said "hei" to a pair of skiers coming up the hill towards us as we whizzed past. Little did we know that that would be the last human contact until our final day on approach to Haukeliseter a week later!
We enjoyed lunch with a view over Kosadals Vatnet. We were now nearing the "minimum-good-distance" for the day, but had energy and time left so decided to continue, almost doubling back and heading up hill following Hetteåe. Here the snow conditions were not quite so nice, a bit icy, and some patches of shrubs sticking through. Sb struggled with his pulk rolling over a few times. As we continued up the valley the snow improved somewhat, and I was keen to press on, but Sb wanted to stop, so we found a suitably picturesque spot to pitch camp. There was only a slight breeze, so once the tent was up, I decided to set up our "kitchen" outside, and prepare one of our two "fancy" dinners. We usually ate RealTurMat (freeze dried ration packs that are surprisingly tasty), with added butter, but I had brought along "proper" food for two nights. On the menu was tortellini with a tomato, onion, garlic and chorizo sauce.
To make a comfortable kitchen and dining area, I sat my pulk "top bag", containing my sleeping mat and bag on the ground for a seat, and dug a trench in front for our feet, making a comfortable bench, with the trench ensuring our feet were protected from the breeze. With the snow from the trench I built a small wall behind the pulk bag, which Sb expanded with blocks of snow as I started boiling the snow. This was one of the two most scenic camp spots on the trip and the only time we cooked totally outside the tent - I ended up very happy that we had not pushed on as it was a very pleasant evening.
Unfortunately during the evening the zip for the map pocket on my jacket (large pocket on the chest) burst. I had to find some way of fixing it as with this open, the jacket provides far less wind (and snow/rain) protection. Due to the design of the zip, it was not possible to simply re-thread the zipper - I had to unstitch part of the structure of the pocket around the bottom of the zip, to be able to free the end of the zipper. In a cold, dark tent, it took a lot of patience to unpick the stitching with my pen knife, and it was a fiddle to get the zip re-threaded. Once it was back on I had to get out my needle and thread to stitch the jacket back up. Fortunately the material used in Paramo's waterproofs is not destroyed by stitching, and do not required taped seams - a GoreTex jacket would have been ruined if I had attempted to do the same thing. None-the-less, sitting up for an hour fixing my jacket - while Sb was quietly snoring next to me - was I would have liked to be doing (I should have been snugly in my warm sleeping bag!).
Day 5
We had a gentle start to the day - it was glorious weather, still, cold and sunny. As we leisurely got ourselves sorted we could set our sleeping bags out to air. When we were packed up, at 0915, Sb was ready a few minutes before me, and his feet had started to get cold. He decided to leave me finishing packing the pulk to ski his feet warm. I set off a few minutes later, following the trail of his skis across lovely snow conditions - a contrast to the previous afternoon. As I skied I was entertained by the footprints of a wolverine or fox, which had followed a similar route not long before us (but much less directly - with many detours).
I was skiing quite quickly to try to catch up with Sb, and although the air was quite cold, the sun was providing some warmth. When I caught up I needed to take some layers off, and we soon started the 100 m climb from Hettefjorden to Viuvatnet. We were now ahead of schedule, and it was a gorgeous day, so we had decided that we would ski up several tops along the route. We had looked at what looked interesting and suitable on the map - there were several options, so we decided to go with whatever looked most tempted as we skied along. The first top we climbed was the 1398 m summit, south of the 1328 m lake. We left our pulks at the lake for the trip to the top. We were rewarded with stunning views over the areas we had skied for the last few days, and the sea of white that lay ahead. We took our short skins off and had a fun ski down.
Once down I decided to try waxing my skis to get better glide than with the skins. I just topped up the wax that I had had on already, and got good results, but Sb decided to start from scratch as he had struggled last time we had used wax. While he was spending quite a long time waxing his skis, I headed up another peak, NW of the first, at 1403 m, and got a slightly different perspective on the surrounds. Just as Sb reached my pulk that I had left at the bottom of the hill, I got back and we continued on to a long flat crossing of Viuvatnet.
At the far end of Viuvatnet we stopped for lunch before the final top of the day, a side peak of Viuvasshuvdun, with more spectacular views, including back to Hardangerjøkulen - the glacier we had skied along on the first day. After that top we transitioned back to "distance-covering-mode" and skied to, and past the Lågaros cabin.
Just after the tent was up, a very threatening bank of clouds appeared to the south, accompanied with increased wind. We feared worse could be on the way, so built up a large, sturdy snow lee-wall. The sky cleared shortly after, and no storm ever arrived, so the effort was in vein - but did give us a nice spot to sit for some whisky before getting into the tent.
Day 6
This was the grey-est, and least eventful day of the trip. We had some enjoyable skiing, but the weather only cleared once the tent was up and we were done for the day. We sadly missed out on any views over the vast expanses of Bjørnesfjorden, seeing only the area reasonably close at hand, but in some patches we enjoyed very atmospheric scenes with white mountains peering through thin cloud and fog.
We started the day slightly further on than our rough schedule suggested. So far we had been roughly following the longest of our planned routes, but from here we only had one planned route with slightly shorter days than we had been doing so far. Given we were ahead of schedule and it was so grey, we decided not to push too far, and set up camp at around 1430, few kilometres further along than the plan suggested, with plans of taking some top-tur the next day.
Day 7
A good breeze was blowing by the time we set off up Lakadalen. The snow was fairly firm, so there was only a little spin-drift, but as we skied we disturbed the snow, which blew across the valley and up the slopes to our east, looking almost like wake from a boat! It was quite a surreal phenomenon.
Just before we turned right, to cut towards Store-myr, we saw another pair of skiers appear in the distance, over Lakadalsstruppen - a rare reminder that there were other humans on the vidda. As we reached the top-point of our crossing to Storemyr I realised why my crotch had been feeling so chilled - I had failed to do up my flies on my trousers, and had been skiing through the nippy, windy weather with no wind protection! It was quite a relief to discover the cause and warm it up.
We were slightly ahead of schedule, and making much better progress than we had planned for, so today's main activity was not to be making progress, but climbing several tops, and enjoying the descents. We took in four tops through they day, and enjoyed the slightly different vantage that each gave. From some tops we could see across to Hårteigen, a strangely shaped mountain, known as the "King" of Hardangervidda. For all the trips to the top we left the pulks, taking only some essentials (extra clothes, some food, cameras, emergency shelter and first aid gear). We enjoyed the skiing, but by the final top, the clouds had thickened, giving a very flat light, which made the descent very tricky as we struggled to make out the contours in the snow.
Once we finished playing on the tops, we still had some way to ski. The initial descent to Hansbuhylen was a little trickier to navigate than expected, with lots of narrow gullies, slowing progress, and limiting route choices. We were able to find a good path through, and found a slightly more open route to descend. It was quite steep, so I was glad of the pulk-break I had constructed (a thin rope that could be passed under the pulk when I wanted to slow the pulk), as it allowed me to take a quick by easily controlled descent with big swings. Sb did not engage his break and had a much more tiring, and slower, descent.
We found that the river was slightly open and decided to fill our water bottles from it to save on the snow melting. It would add to the weight in our sleds for the climb to cross Jakobsbudalen, but would save a lot of time and fuel in the evening. It was challenging to get close enough to the water without breaking trough the snow into the river. I manged to get the water bottles filled, but at one point the snow gave out slightly where I was resting my hand, and soaked my glove. Fortunately I had a spare easily accessible.
The ski across Nedsta Krokavatnet and over Jakobsbudalen was pleasant, and we found what was easily the prettiest campsite of our trip, just as the sun was sinking behind the hill at around 1630. Around 200 m from the tent was another open stream, so filling the water before the final climb was futile, but we could not have know for sure that the next water would also be open, and it did save quite some time.
According to our plan, we would camp here for two nights, so that tomorrow we could have a rest day, skiing without pulks, and doing some more top-tur, so it was especially rewarding to find such a nice campsite. We had another dinner of RealTurMat (tasty de-hydrated ration packs) with butter, as we thought that tomorrow we would have more time to spend on our second "fancy" meal, cooked from scratch. After dinner, however, when I was looking at the maps, considering top-tur options, I also found and proposed a new suggestion - packing up camp and heading up to the Skroene hills, which were not on our plan. I had been looking forward to spending two nights at this pretty campsite, however Sb was keen to press on - now that I had proposed the idea - so we decided to see how we felt in the morning.
Day 8
Our campsite was around 120 m lower altitude than where we had been skiing for the previous days, and the open stream brought with it other hints of spring. Over night dear had passed by the tent, and there was a little bird song in the morning. It was a serene scene, and I was still tempted to leave the tent here and have a gentle day skiing without pulks. We were however still in good form, and Sb was keen to press on, so we packed up and set off with pulks in tow.
It was initially overcast, but soon started to clear and we had fantastic sunny morning. Around an hour into the day, Sb suggested that we take a pause from the progress, and ski up, as the light was great, and the snow seemed promising for a fun descent. We headed up towards Brasfetnuten, unsure how high we would climb. Sb suggested turning back once we were about half way up, but by that point I was keen to make it to the top if we could. On top we were rewarded with fantastic views, and a very strong wind. The descent was easily the best downhill skiing of the trip, with easy snow and perfect, bright, lighting. When we arrived back at the pulks, I was ready to do it all again, but we had a long way yet to go, if we were to follow our new plans. We tried waxing out skis, but failed to get good enough grip to pull our pulks, even on the relatively flat valley floor. The snow had clearly warmed and frozen a few times, and was very coarse, and the air temperature was probably a little over zero, and the sun was warm.
Sb wanted to try to see if we could utilise the strong tail wind we had, so tried holding up his Jervenduk to the wind - he was getting almost enough force to pull him and his pulk along, but was unable to keep the "sail" properly open on his own. We then faffed a little trying to get it to pull us both - we did better at keeping the "sail" open, but the force we could get from it was not enough to let us progress at any reasonable speed, so we gave up on the project. Sb is a sailor, and keen to try ski-sailing at some point - but I think he would have much more success with a proper sail, not just a Jervenduk! This had wasted quite a bit of time, so we put on our short skins, and tried to make up a little time before lunch.
After lunch, Sb started to complain of a sore thigh on one leg, and we realised that this was because he no longer had a short skin attached to that ski! I therefore had to re-trace our trail many hundred meters, to before our lunch spot, until I found his skin, which was lying fur-side-up in the track. With skin in pocket, I made a beeline back to Sb, which was fast progress along the flat ground. As Sb was re-attaching his skin, I checked that mine were well attached, just to find one of mine missing too! We both skied back along the tracks (now there were two routes to check), and I found mine only a few meters away from where I had picked up Sb's one. It did not take long for us to each loose a skin again, which was very frustrating, especially as we had already discovered that wax was not an option today, and we were getting significantly behind time for the first point on the trip. We realised that they were pulling out from the front of the ski, so resorted to strapping the front of the skin to the ski with Gorilla Tape. This reduced our glide significantly, but at least our skins stayed on.
The weather had also turned slightly drizzly, with sinking visibility. It was very dismal grey as we climbed up, to the east of Flakenuten. Once on the plateau, the glide was poor, the clouds were sinking and thickening and we were faced with a significant headwind. Sb was struggling with a sore shoulder, and put one pole on his pulk, continuing one-armed. He followed behind me, with the slightly easier skiing in my trails. I later learnt that he was completely zoned-out, sitting in his "happy place", working on instinct, and relying on me to set the pace and course.
As we started to climb into Grasnutane, visibility had reduced to full whiteout and the wind had picked up, and I was starting to tire. As I attempted to navigate through the whiteout and wind, I felt our progress slowing, as I was having to make regular stops to check the GPS, and psychologically it felt we were getting nowhere as the view remained stubbornly white. At one of my pauses Sb "woke up" from his "happy place" and started to assist in the navigation. We had been planning to camp at the 1386 m lake, but it seemed that it could be a hard climb up, especially as we could not see through the snow and cloud to plan a route. Instead we decided to camp at almost the top of the valley. At 1383 m this was our highest altitude campsite of the tour. There was a strong, cold wind blowing down the valley, and our tiredness made us a over-cautious, so we spent quite a while digging our tent down into the snow and building a small wall, to shelter from the wind. Already exhausted after a long ski on poor snow, with tape round the skis, we expended far more effort on the wind shelter than the conditions warranted. For a while Sb took full charge as I needed to consume many calories and rest a little, before I re-joined the joint effort.
The problems with the skins, the poor visibility, the slow snow exacerbated by tape round the skins, and the strong headwinds, made this day my toughest of the trip. Needless to say, the "fancy" meal I had planned was swapped out for freeze-dried rations, chocolate, and a small dram of single malt. The morning's top-tur, however, was one of many highlights from the trip, which compensated for the challenging afternoon.
Day 9
The wind was less harsh when we emerged, and we were able to enjoy views down the valley we had skied up in the whiteout yesterday - but only for brief moments when the clouds cleared. The snow had suffered from the warm morning yesterday, and frozen into icy sheets overnight. It was not a fun descent from the campsite to Store Urevatnet, and once we got there it started to rain, which stayed with us for much of the day.
We were now skiing on thick, slushy snow, so progress was not efficient. Our track down to Nedre Hellevatnet took some finding as it was not obvious how to descend the relatively steep slope, while avoiding all gullies. Once on the lake the wind was strong in our faces, and the snow was deep and slushy. Half way along the lake we stopped for lunch, by a small island. We were unable to find any lee from the wind, so built a small wall with snow & our pulks, and sat in the wind shelter, with our feet in a ditch we had dug. It was not the most enjoyable lunch stop of the tour, and Sb was struggling to keep his feet warm enough.
We re-joined the marked route part way up the steep climb to the north west of Simletind, with plans of following them all the way to Haukeliseter on our final day. At the top of the climb the weather opened up slightly, but Sb was struggling with numb tows again so we had to take break for him to warm them up. We skied down the valley, knowing that the further we went today, the less was left for the final day. We knew that we wanted a good ski on our final day, so did not want to push too far, but did not want to leave too much to do. We also hoped that the snow conditions might improve overnight. Again we struggled with snow catching in the front of our short skins, and pulling them off. I noticed just as one was about to detach (see picture below) to confirm our theory of the cause. Fishcher's short skin system looks to be better designed to avoid this problem, but I have never tested it. Åsnes's new skins seem a little improved, but I'm not convinced that the problem is fully solved.
We decided we wanted to camp soon, but found nowhere that gave shelter from the westerly wind, so again spent far too much effort building a lee wall. Later in the evening, the poorly build lee-wall blew over, but the tent had no problem standing up to the increased wind. A major learning point from this tour for us was that we should rely on our tents more. Lee-walls are great to reduce the force of the wind, but take a lot of of effort to construct. I know my tent is designed for very strong winds, so it did not make sense to put so much effort into building the snow defences. The fact that tent barely showed the difference before and after the wall blew over served to emphasise this point. Unfortunately we were lazy when the rain started - we knew that our pulk bags were not waterproof at the zips and seams, but we skied on in the rain regardless. This led to damp sleeping bags and mats. Fortunately it was our final night, though we were trying to be prepared so that we could be able to camp for another night if something went wrong the next day.
Today could have been a stunning ski on another day, but was mostly trudging through wet snow, in the rain, with strong winds and little visibility. We enjoyed occasional glimpses of impressive mountains around us, but they were largely shrouded in cloud.
Day 10
We started out in good spirits for the final day of the tour. While packing up we knew that most likely we would most likely be back in Trondheim before unpacking, but tried to pack up as if we had many more days, in case we were forced to camp before reaching the cabin at Haukliseter.
The snow was much nicer than the previous evening and we made good progress initially while enjoying good visibility in the floor valley, but with clouds hiding the hills most of the time. Just as we started to feel that it was going to be an easy ski all the way to the cabin, following the branches marking the way, the stakes suddenly stopped. They stopped just as we needed to start the steep climb towards Mannevatn. As we climbed the visibility reduced as we the clouds lowered and we climbed towards them. Just before the climb levelled out, and just before we entered thick whiteness, we saw two other skiers behind us, about to start the climb, with one pulk between them.
Sb asked if he could lead and navigate in the whiteout. I agreed, but carefully followed the route from behind. It did not take many steps before he began veering off his bearing, but he was skiing faster that I was, so it took some time to alert him to his mistake. Once alerted he improved, but I had to make some corrections from behind as we continued into the whiteness. As we climbed the slope to the shoulder to the west of Velse Nup Sb decided to put on his long skins, but I did not want to faff with them for the short climb, so I continued up using herring-bone technique.
Just as we were about to start the decent we met two other skiers - the first people we had spoken with in over 7 days! They had been staying at cabins, so were sharing a pulk between them. We had a short chat with them before we all started our descent to the cabin. Shortly after we started to descend, we met a large group of skiers coming towards us. They were using Rondane skis (skis designed to be able to be used cross-country, but focused on downhill performance, with an option of clipping in your heal). They were aiming to ascend the highest peak on Hardangervidda the next day. On the steeper downhills I applied my pulk-break to good effect, as did Sb. We seemed to have a much easier time of it with our breaks and rope tows, than the pair who were skiing near us had with their fixed tow and no break.
As we continued to design, our route joined the route of a large group of Rondane skiers. It felt very strange sharing the hills with them: partially as we had been away from any groups of people for so long; and partly as they were decked out with helmets, goggles, and downhill-style skis, where we were skiing with pulks and woolly hats. As we descended the weather also improved, with the contrast in the snow improving along with the views. I enjoyed the descent, and before long we reached the final hill down to Haukeliseter. We were very excited to reach this point after 10 tough but enjoyable days, but had one steep hill still to go. We knew that it would be steep, as on our avalanche chart it was marked as over 30'. I had so far found that a single break rope under my pulk was plenty, but for this slope a second was in order. With the two ropes slowing the pulks, and all the practice from the last 10 days, the steep descent was much easier than anticipated, and actually quite fun.
The cabin was on the other side of the road, but having been away from civilisation, I almost forgot to look for traffic until a lorry came whizzing past in front of me! From there it was a very short ski to the cabin where we checked into a large, open room with around 30 beds. I was a little miffed to have to pay per minute for the shower, but it was worth it to wash the grime of the last 10 days off. I also removed the blister plasters and tape which were protecting my heals, and was very pleased to find that I had very little in the way of blisters. We had a nice meal from the cafe before heading out to the sauna. Strangely despite having to pay for the showers, the sauna was free! By this stage the wind was up again, it was snowing, and the major road which passed the cabin was closed. The Norwegians who we shared the sauna with were of a similar-ish age to us, and had variously been on avalanche or ski-kiting courses, and were very interested and impressed by our tales. Apparently we had earned some cans of beer which they provided - a rare occurrence given the prices of beer in Norway. They were also surprised by the enthusiasm with which I rolled in the snow between sessions in the sauna.
The showers, sauna, food and beer of Haukeliseter felt well deserved - and we were most satisfied with an excellent trip well executed!
Day 11
The bus to Oslo did not leave until the afternoon, so while Sb sat in the bakery, I stretched my legs, without a pulk in tow, and enjoyed stunning views of the area. It was a nice way to wrap off the trip, before the long journey back to Trondheim (bus from Haukeliseter to Oslo, heave pulks from bus to train station in Oslo, then a bed in the nigh train up to Trondheim, arriving at 6 am, and back to work by 9).
Planned vs Actual Route
We planned a few alternative length routes (various colours on the map below), so what we could easily adjust plans based on weather conditions, and our physical conditions. The blue line shows the actual route we took, plotted from my GPS. We ended up skiing further than our longest planned variant, despite shortening the third day due to the storm.
