A nice hike and a sad ending
Peaks visited:
| Peak | Height | PF | Municipality | WCP | GPX |
| Årvikveten | 458m | 258m | Ulstein | WCP | GPX |
| Fyre | 389m | 66m | Sande | WCP | |
| Laupsnipa | 558m | 380m | Herøy | WCP | |
| Gyrinakken | 365m | 157m | Herøy | WCP |
Today, I was in the mood for a longer hike, while Anne felt low on energy. We agreed that we should hike Årvikveten from Drageskaret on Gurskøya (3,4km one way). Then Anne would return to Drageskaret, while Karma and I would continue towards Laupsnipa – and just see where I would end up.
I had done the Drageskaret – Laupsnipa – Voldnes route a few years ago, but along a slightly different route than I planned today.
After saying goodbye to Anne, Karma and I followed the marked path across Torsethornet to Keipen. From here, the path was no longer marked, but fairly easy to follow.
From Keipen, we went east in the direction of Fyre, and I passed 80m north of the top of Fyre. That’s quite unusual, being me.
We continued down to the south end of lake Slokevatnet, and I didn’t know if there was a path onwards. The last time I hiked from Drageskaret, I passed north of Slokevatnet, across Vasshornet. But fortunately, there was a path just behind the cabins, leading up to the ridge towards Laupsnipa.
After a while, we passed Keipen and reached Laupsnipa 3:55pm – 2h:40m after leaving Drageskaret. Laupsnipa is my favorite top on Gurskøya – in winter! Skiing down to Voldnes is just amazing! But I have to admit – the view from the top isn’t bad even without snow…
Now I had to make a decision. Should I descend to Voldnes and call Anne to pick me up there? Or should I continue towards Leikongeidet? Should I perhaps hike all the way home? That would be stretching it, and I would definitely have to do some hiking in the dark. I ended up with targeting Gyrinakken and take it from there.
The hike from Laupsnipa to Jøsokdalen was all off-trail, partly cumbersome. The ascent from Jøsokdalen to Gyrinakken was also VERY off-trail, and when I reached the top of Gyrinakken at 5pm, I decided that this would be the last top for the day.
I called Anne and asked her to pick me up at Leikongeidet. She arrived there just as I was arriving at the main road. I had been hiking 15,7km, across 1100 vertical meters and it took me 4 hours. It was a nice workout and especially nice as I got to hike parts of the island where I hadn’t been before.
On the way home, an owl smashed into the side of the car. It was a huge BANG, and we didn’t understand what happened. We had drive a little while before we found a place to turn the car. When we returned to the “scene”, a family of four had stopped the car in the road and held a Tawny owl in their arms.
The owl was quite hurt, and blood was coming out of its eyes. We called the local vet and took it there. The vet didn’t find any “exterior damage”, and didn’t have a good reason to put it to permanent sleep. We then called Alf Ottar Folkestad – the local bird expert (bar none). He agreed to take the bird into care and then we brought the owl over to him. The bird was still totally disorientated, but we had high hopes for it. Unfortunately, the bird passed away the next day after fighting through the night. If we had just been one second early or one second late, this beautiful bird would still have been alive. Just too sad…
Pictures from the hike:
