A mini-tour de Gjemnes
Peaks visited:
| Peak | Height | PF | Location |
| Heggemslia | 427m | 134m | Gjemnes, Norway |
| Blikåsen | 299m | 131m | Gjemnes, Norway |
| Randa | 315m | 182m | Gjemnes, Norway |
| Høghaugen (Høglia) | 248m | 110m | Nesset, Norway |
Sunday; my primary hiking goal – which is to get at least 100 new tops per year – seems like a bigger challenge than ever before. The reason being that I have to travel further and further away from home, to find a new top that allows me to bring the dog. This is approx. 2 new tops per week. After 15 weeks, the total was disappointing; 8.
But I can’t give up without trying. So this morning, I took the 3,5 hour drive (incl. two ferries) from Gurskøy to Fosterlågen/Angvika in Gjemnes to “bag” some of the smaller tops in that region. The plan was to return home with 3 new tops. The reason for picking small tops was because the snow was so incredibly rotten that Karma would have to swim up and down. Literally.
HEGGEMSLIA
I started out with Heggemslia. I drove to Heggem and then up to Hanaset, where I rang the door bell and asked for permission to park. I had a nice chat with the woman in the house (originally from Volda), who told me that her husband was probably out skiing on Heggemslia.
I followed his tracks up the forest road, while Karma was fighting for every step in the super-rotten snow. I normally would have felt sorry for her, but she was on a different planet. She didn’t even bother to follow my tracks to make life easier. She was ALL over the place. A fox track here, a deer track there…
It was indeed a good thing that I hadn’t gone for any higher mountains (hence: longer trips), because Karma definitely started “getting it” higher up in the forest. Still she insisted on checking out tracks, even if it would cost her a LOT of energy to get back to me.
The ski tracks didn’t go up to the top, so I had to break my own trail. Not much to complain about, given that it was only 1,5km up to the top. Very nice views!
I could see over to my next top – Blikåsen. I decided to let Karma sit that one out…
The trip: 2,9km, 210 vertical meters.
Pictures from the hike:
BLIKÅSEN
From road 665, I took the road to Åbakkan. I stopped by a random house near the Åbbakan/Blikåsen fork, to ask where I could park. A Polish woman came out. She could hardly speak Norwegian, but got by in German. When she noticed that I had a dog, she started calling for someone in the house to come out. Like – calling A NUMBER of times, but the person inside the house wouldn’t come out.
She said I could park in front of the house, which offered some shade for Karma. When she realized I was to go skiing, she pointed somewhere in the distance. She had no idea where Blikåsen was. I pointed up the forest and said “Ich gehe auf den Gipfel“. “Gipfel – a ja …” she replied with a confused face.
So I was off, with Karma left in the car. I had skied for two minutes when I slipped and ripped a binding right off the ski. Back at the car, I heard “nicht ski fahren?” behind me. It’s been a while since I could construct a sentence in German. 35 years, to be more precise. I showed her the broken binding and said “kaputt“. She understood. Fortunately, I had a more pairs in the car, and I ended up skiing Blikåsen with randonee skis. The only reason being is that I had waterproof skins for those skis.
I was back at the car 25 minutes later, now with “den Gipfel” in the bag. The woman came out and started calling for the person inside the house again. I politely thanked her for her hospitality while getting the car back on the road. I didn’t want to wait for whoever it was inside the house…
The trip: 1,9km, 150 vertical meters.
Pictures from the hike:
RANDA
Next stop was Randa, and I had already decided to follow a forest road going up the southwest ridge. At the trailhead, I met a guy chopping wood. I was happy when I learned that he was Norwegian. I had my share of German for one day. The man was very precise. Told me where to park (as in: right here!) and described the route accurately. That’s how I like it!
I decided to bring along Karma, and she seemed eager to get going again. The forest road part was easy for her, as the snow had melted on the sides. After the road ended, she was swimming through the forest, but definitely not trailing behind. Her appetite for following tracks is phenomenal!
The nice weather made all these short trips very enjoyable, despite the terrible snow. I really enjoyed skiing in the forest and enjoy the battle between spring, with its nice temperatures and 1,5 meters of snow that has to go away. Preferably before autumn…
With Randa “in the bag”, my original goal (3 tops) had been met. It was still early in the day, so I decided to drive to Raudsand to get one more forest top before taking on the 3,5 hour journey back home.
The trip: 3km, 190 vertical meters.
Pictures from the hike:
HØGHAUGEN (HØGLIA)
I drove to Raudsand and then to the Bersås farm to ask for permission to park. I had noticed a snowy forest road going from the farm and up to the top of the forest. The owners had just returned from a ski-trip to Grønfjellet, and parking was not a problem. The farmer told me that with great certainty, I would be the first one to ascent Høghaugen on randonee skis.
And the name of the top was Høghaugen, not Høglia, he told me. Høglia was on the other side of the valley. Økonomisk Kartverk is in line with this; the top is named Høghaugen.
It was a really short trip to the top (1,1km – including a detour because of a fence). Near the top was a barbed wire fence and I managed to get the dog under it, without injuries. I have to say, I find barbed wire a horrible thing. Animals would not by instinct understand the danger, so they have to get injured in order to learn?
There was not a piece of snow on the other side of the fence, so we had to walk the short distance to the top. There was nothing to see, so we turned around after making a GPS waypoint and taking a picture.
I was quite lucky with the two ferries on my way home, and was home just before 21pm – 12 hours since leaving home. Very happy with four new tops!
The trip: 2,1km, 125 vertical meters.
Pictures from the hike:
