I caught a bus to the bottom of the mountain, nearly. The guy issued me a ticket for a stop some 3km before the mountains. I tried to explain where I wanted to go but no. I was off the bus and walking along a pretty fast & dangerous road. My next group of mountains skirted the north side of Valnesfjorden. I found the path up through the trees, it was pretty faint. I wasn't bothered by mosquitos any more - but I was by black flies instead. The flies didn't bite, but accumulated in larger and larger numbers above my head, annoying to say the least. Above the trees, the flies persisted. I followed a fresh fast flowing stream up the valley to camp in a high corrie in the Stordalsfjellet massif. It was lunchtime and I simply couldn't spend the afternoon getting bored. So there went my rest day! I chose to climb an isolated peak known as Kvalhornet so after I set up my tent I set off to this mountain. It took 1hr 15mins to reach the summit (962m) from my tent (600m), pretty good going. The terrain was a mixture of grass and expansive slabs, it made for easy progres. As I reached the crest of the summit I whole new view suddenly appeared - WOW! This was well worth the effort of climbing the summit. The peaks had smooth cliffs plunging hundreds of metres to the valley bottoms. Some of the ridges were narrow, some peak were genuine spires. It was the place on the map that I was dying to visit. One thing's for sure, it's probably the bet scenery an airline ticket can buy! 1hr later I was back at my tent. The summit had another one of those letterboxes. The wilderness I saw up there had no marked 'T' trails or any huts. It suprised me as the mountains were the best - better than Saltfjellet. My chocolate bars had now all turned to drink, it was hot! I eventually got some sleep when the sun fell behind the mountain, but I was up again at 5am. Tuesday 14th July
 Looking west to Heggmotinden and Heggvatnet Returning to my rucksack, I now descended to a saddle to the south before heading up steepish slopes of slab and snow. It was easy, but looked harder from the previous summit. On the ridge I spotted a solitary reindeer, it spotted me. It looked like it was simply keeping cool on the snow, but it wasn't bothered by my presence at all. I reached the summit of Kistrandtindan (979m) before heading west to the saddle before Innertindan.
All these summit slopes looked steep when seen from other summits. Perhaps the slabby terrain just looks steeper than grassy terrain. Once you reach the 'steep' slope, it isn't all that bad. I think the message is 'trust the map'! So I left my rucksack again at the saddle before Innertinden (982m), climbed it and got back. Now I had to descend southwards and then skirt westwards round the bottom of Innertinden's cliff.
I had lunch by a stream and another reindeer appeared. This one was quite curious of me, edging closer, quite hesitant. It probably got with 20 - 30m of where I was sitting. My final summit was the highest Midt-Mjørnestindan (1068m). I had a line of posts to follow up a broad steep ridge. I was parched so the ascent was a little struggle. As I got higher, more evidence of man's presence showed itself - metal posts gathered in piles, steel loops embedded in the bed rock & cables.
I reached the summit. There was a concrete foundation so obviously there was a building here once. I'd be interested to know what was here. At last I could see my final destination, the airport was clearly in view. The mountain itself was nice, the westward ridge was supported by a vertical cliff - I'm sure it overhang slightly. And so I descended to my campsite but it had a clear northward view and so I wasn't going to get much sleep. It was the end of another hot sunny day! Wednesday 16th July
I set off whilst it was still cool down easy slabs down to the end of Heggmovatnet to a track. There was some road walking here before I went off on a path upto Heggmotinden. The path was distinct, marked on the map but not a 'T' trail. The mountain slopes above were prodominantly slabs which gave excellent friction. I dumped my rucksack a third of the way up and continued with just my camera, a mars bar and a bottle of water. I realised early on that I needed to find more water - it wouldn't last to the bottom of the next mountain.
Ascending the peak was a steep plod, and again I was attracting the flies. Curious beasts, they love you on the way up but aren't interested on the way down. I think they like carbon dioxide from your breath rather than body odour. I got to the top and took the mandatory photos. A new beast revealed itself on this summit - winged ants. The summit was infested with winged ants, all flying around the summit cairn. I passed close by these creatures and must they have caught my scent. I found myself covered in ants, but they were easy enough to wipe off once I cleared the summit. On the descent I topped up with water with a stream that was just a slight trickle. Getting back to the sack, I descended a different route down, on another path through an artillery range. Thankfully it wasn't operational otherwise things could have been interesting! Getting back to the road, it was nice to have a developing breeze from the north. The planes were now much closer and I could see some of them heading north east from Bodø quite easily. I now had a long road walk to the next path at a place called Vatnet where a nunnery of sorts exists. From the nunnery I took a path northwards, it's marked as a track but got a little narrow at times through the undergrowth. Thankfully I wasn't bothered much by the insects but I did once get a shock when a huge grasshopper landed on my shoulder!! I got to the bottom of Steigtinden. After filling up with water, I started the steep ascent up through the woods. The higher I got, the more flies I attracted, it was getting unbearable, there were loads of them - arrrgh. Things weren't helped by the steep step-ups breaking my rythm, I was exhausted and compelled to go as fast as I could by the flies.
I got through the woods upto a small tarn and rested there. Slowly the flies disappeared but there wasn't any wind so the air was still thick with my breath. Eventually I set off again up the bare rocky slopes now. The gradient was now easier and slowly the flies dissapeared a bit more. I could now see the final summit ridge, I didn't know whether to climb it or not so I dumped my sack at the bottom of the final rise up and investigated. It was easy, there was a zig zagging earth path going up the side of the ridge - quite steep though. It was quite popular actually, about three groups on the ridge itself, probably popular because it's the closest proper mountain to Bodo.
So I got up, no way down the other side - vertical with 'rock cornices' lining the top. I was parched, time to get back to my sack. The drink was a welcome relief, but was now low on water. I pressed on to my campsite for that evening - my final wild camp this trip! Today I drunk 6 litres of water and was probably the hardest day of the trip so far with 1600m ascent, never mind the hottest! I camped at the lake of Skauskardvatnet and spent the evening watching fish jump out of the water. Thursday 17th July
Out with the compass, I had to navigate across a broad ridge looking for a path that would take me to Bodø. I found it, but had to track its direction to check that it wasn't just a sheep track. I broke through the cloud and I had lots of undulating moorland ridges over progressively lower tops. It remained cloudy, but later it showed sign of thinning and on the final summit, the cloud finally broke to clear sunshine. I stood on the final summit of Keiservarden (366m) overlooking Bodø. I watched the life bussle below whilst sat above. The summit itself had a complex network of forest tracks and some military buildings / aerials. And so after watching my 12.30 plane take off, I descended down to Bodø walking through the suburbs. I noticed that the buildings here were so much bigger than those in england, even low income families enjoy pleasant neighbourhoods and huge balconies. Though I have to say, their gardens all look half done. It all suddenly makes sense when people call Britain 'the garden isle'. So I crossed the busy main road, past the end of the runway to the campsite just off the runway edge. It was certainly handy for my plane tomorrow, though that AWACS jet practising circuits wouldn't allow me much peace! So that was it, walk finished! But the trip certainly wasn't finsished oh no! Friday 18th June
I passed the Norwegian Aviation Museum, a place I'd love to visit at a later date. It's set in a modern building where an observation lounge styled like a control tower is placed at its hub and two long slender building extend out from the tower like propeller blades. So I got back to the Bodo airport, walk finished! How's that for a completed walk! Travelling home, I sat next to a person who had lived in Bodo all through his childhood. He told me that I had been very very lucky with the weather, it was rare for it to be this nice for so long. I also had an insight into the road journey times to get up to Bodo - 21 hours drive from Oslo - no overnight stays! Him and his little daughter had a bet as to whether I'd pour milk into my tea because I was english! How can you have no milk!?! You've gotta have milk, only time I don't have milk is when the fridge is empty! So I got back to Oslo, 6hours of patience to go. Apparently the morning Manchester flight was cancelled because the door wouldn't shut and so I waited anxiously, I didn't want to be stranded. So we were ready to board, poor people waiting for the cancelled BA flight to Heathrow at the next gate - later found out that there were industrial strikes at Heathrow airport. It was a relief to hear the engines power on, at last I knew I was going home! And so after landing at Manchester I took the last train to Preston and felt relief and fatigue at arriving at my door, yes! My bed was waiting to be slept on just inside! It's dark, what a strange concept! So, conclusions conlusions. It was my best ever foreign trip abroad. Would I visit North Norway again? Definately! Next year? Probably not, I think next year I want to get a taste of Austria and also the Andooran Pyrenees using budget airlines - two foreign trips rather than just one. I'll get more bang for my buck and better access to walking information. I have a strong feeling that I'll be lured back to Norway. Sure it's an expensive place, the Norwegians pay the highest taxes in Europe. But the mountainous land and thinness of the population makes the country intrinsically expensive to run - it's a civil engineer's dream come true! What you do get is a friendly welcome in Norway, and despite the high expense of campsite fees and bus fares, you won't get short changed with poor products or service. So in short - I'll be back! |
