One of the best ski-trips this year
Peaks visited:
| Peak | Height | PF | Municipality | Location | WCP |
| Kongsvollen | 683m | 200m | Ulstein | GPX | WCP |
| Blåtind | 697m | 697m | Ulstein | WCP |
First of all , this trip shouldn’t be possible in late April! Not this far west. There are only a couple of smaller islands that separate Hareidlandet island from the Atlantic ocean. Secondly, we could ski from the car, and this was probably the only place on this island we could do just that today!
We’ve received snow for the last few days, and people say that the Sunnmørsalpane mountain range has received as much as 50cm of fresh snow. But with that much (sticky) snow, life would be very hard for my dog Karma. So Anne and I agreed that we should see if it was possible to ski across Kongsvollen, Blåtind and Haddalshornet.
We drove to Løsetvatnet (approx. 200m) in Ringstaddalen and found that we could ski directly from the car. Let me say it like this; there was too little snow for skiing and too much for hiking. But the snow conditions improved as we ascended up to Kvamstua (419m). From here, we got the route up Kongsvollen’s northeast ridge in clear view.
Dangerous cornices could have made us turn back around. But the cornices were negotiable and “Bukketrappa” (the steepest part of the ridge) didn’t offer any problems (like hard snow). Our only “issue” was deep snow, and we had to “dig” a tunnel for Karma.
When we got past cornices and had Bukketrappa ahead of us, I knew that we would make it to the top. That was a good moment!
Once above Bukketrappa, the rest of the ridge up to the summit was easy. Which does not mean that the ridge is not airy in this section. The narrowest point is … narrow.
Our next stop was Blåtind – the highest point on Hareidlandet island. To our delight, there was plenty of snow on the mountain, which allowed us to ski withou worrying too much above rocks just beneath the snow.
Anne and I had regular mountain skis (Nordic skiing, but not Telemark skis). My pair is in serious lack of gliding, which had an upside today – I didn’t need skins! Anne had to use skins, and the wet snow stuck to them like glue. She had a strenuous trip up to Blåtind!
We climbed Kongsvollen in a light snow shower, but the trip to Blåtind was done in gorgeous weather and a fantastic light. I had hoped that the sun would shine for the rest of the trip (which was meant to include Haddalshornet), but from Blåtind we could see that another snow shower was moving in.
From Blåtind, we skied down to the foot of Grøthornet. The snow was excellent and the view just the same!
Below Grøthornet, we observed the snow shower moving in. While it would no problem to get to Haddalshornet, the steep descent would have been more cumbersome. So we decided to call it a day and descended into Klungsdalen valley.
Klungsdalen offered nice snow all the way down to 300m, where we had to put the skis on the backpack and continue on foot.
It was snowing when we arrived at Indre Haddal. It felt like a mix of first autumn snow and Christmas Eve. It felt weird. We had left Anne’s car at the Haddal school so we didn’t have to walk all the way back up to Løsetvatnet (4km). THAT would have NOT been a nice ending to this very memorable trip…
Trip statistics: 11,7km, 730 vertical meters, 4,5 hours
Pictures from the trip:
