Afternoon hikes
Peaks visited:
| Peak | Height | PF | Location | WCP |
| Blåtind | 697m | 697m | Ulstein, Norway | |
| Meraftafjellet | 578m | 578m | Skodje, Norway | WCP |
| Rjåhornet | 598m | 105m | Herøy, M&R, Norway | WCP |
| Rundebranden | 294m | 141m | Herøy, M&R, Norway | WCP |
| Lidaveten | 592m | 439m | Volda, Norway | WCP |
| Blåfjellet | 156m | 20m | Ulstein, Norway | |
| Garnestua | 653m | 415m | Ulstein, Norway | WCP |
| Veten | 521m | 13m | Ulstein, Norway | WCP |
| Sneldelida | 633 | 104m | Ulstein/ Hareid, Norway | WCP |
| Signalhornet | 627m | 83m | Hareid, Norway | WCP |
| Skolma | 635 | 483m | Ulstein/ Hareid, Norway | WCP |
BLÅTIND, APR 16 2018
Monday; I had noticed a small “avalanche” on Blåtind – the highest top on Hareidlandet island, and decided to take a closer look. The avalanche could possibly have killed a hare, just to put it into the proper proportions. But any avalanche on the coastal islands is a rare one, as it almost never happens. But this winter has been quite exceptional, in terms of amount of snow.
I headed out from Haddal and took a route up to the summit ridge that I haven’t done before – passing the avalanche close by. A hare would definitely have been in trouble, and *possibly* humans too, worst case scenario considered…
After visiting the top, Karma and I took the steepest possible route down, allowing me to slide quite far on the snow. A very nice round trip.
The trip: 6,1km, 680 vertical meters.
Pictures from the trip:
MERAFTAFJELLET, APR 17 2018
Tuesday; Ålesund day, and today I would definitely visit Meraftafjellet. Because of the amount of snow, I had been postponing this trip. Today, I was prepared to carry the skis for quite a while, but when I reached the snow, it should be doable for Karma, even if it would be super-rotten. The snow melt had already begun…
My Iphone had suggested that I should find my umbrella, as it would be raining today. First of all, I couldn’t believe it would rain and secondly, who’s using umbrellas in these part of the country? It’s almost always windy and the winds would wrap any umbrella inside and out in seconds.
I decided to try a route I’ve never done before, parked the car just before Gudmundset and followed the forest road towards Gudmundsetsætra. It didn’t take long before I ran into snow, but as it melted on the sides, I could proceed on foot.
Below Gudmundsetsætra, scattered snow made skiing impossible and walking difficult. I stumbled upon a path that took me up the ridge and onto the normal path. Right away, I was forced to put the skis on.
Karma seemed to do OK in the deep, rotten snow and I was – for the most part – find pitches of snow to ski on. The high ridge seemed unfriendly – as in steep, but I couldn’t understand that it should offer any problems. And it didn’t, although there was a short pitch that might be called a bit steep. Once on the high ridge, the summit was 0,8km further west.
I always enjoy round trips over going back the same way, and as I am somewhat familiar with the forest south of the top, I decided to descend into the valley near Heggebakksætra. The upper part was easy, but after a while there were less and less pitches of snow. Eventually, I had to put the skis on the backpack and walk down. Once back on the main road, the car was only 0,6km away. And 2-3 minutes after I started driving home, it started to rain…
The trip: 6,8km, 550 vertical meters.
Pictures from the trip:
RJÅHORNET, APR 18 2018
Wednesday; really, really tired after working hard and hiking was the last thing I felt like doing. But the eyes of the dog is really hard to ignore. OK, I could possibly drag myself up the local mountain Rjåhornet. I had to time it so I could be at the local fire department’s garage at 5:30pm. The local government is threatening to shut the local brigade down, and this was an event for the local media to report that the locals were standing behind their fire brigade. I got there 5:33pm, just in time for the group picture, and then it was all over. I had expected a speech by someone, but no.
The trip: 6,4km, 600 vertical meters.
Pictures from the trip:
RUNDEBRANDEN, APR 19 2018
Thursday; Anne returned to Sunnmøre, for the first time since before Easter. Her first task was to visit Lundeura on Runde island (bird mountain) to check if people were behaving well in front of the puffins (she’s the Park Ranger for Jostedalsbreen glacier, but keeps an eye out for Runde when she’s in these parts of the world).
On the way up from Goksøyr, we took separate paths. I took the long route to Rundebranden, fighting a STRONG headwind, before joining her at Lundeura. At this hour (9pm), there was nothing to see. There were no puffins and there were no spectators.
The trip: 6,3km, 350 vertical meters.
Pictures from the trip:
LIDAVETEN, APR 20 2018
Friday; I’ve been rock bottom low on energy since Easter. This is a recurring pattern, year after year. I suspect spring allergy, but up to now I’ve assumed it was the medicine that slowed me down. So this year, I skipped it. Without any seemingly positive effects. Going hiking this afternoon felt like “a mountain to climb”…
I had to rest after work and while resting, I was thinking about dozens of mountains, searching for energy. When I came to Lidaveten, something happened. There was a route from outside Eiksundtunnelen that I wanted to explore. Any new route gives me a certain energy, and this was enough to get me going.
Anne decided to go on a bike trip, so I took Karma and drove through the Eiksund tunnel and parked below Eidheim. From the trailhead, I took a direct route up to Eidheim, before following the normal route up the south ridge. When I left Gurskøy, it was a fierce wind, but here it was completely calm. And, the route was *almost* free of snow
On the way down, I followed the forest road back to Eidheim (opposed to going straight through the forest), just to get some variation.
The trip: 5,9km, 540 vertical meters.
Pictures from the hike:
UGLESÆTRA & BLÅFJELL, APR 21 2018
Saturday; working day (part I) from 7:30am to 11:30am. At lunch time, I invited Anne to outdoor lunch at Uglesætra, a very popular and funny place on Dimnøya island. We took the path east of Ertesvåg (0,8km from the parking) and I hoped no one else was there. It would have been crowded inside the small cottage.
I had brought a camping stove to warm up the dinner from yesterday, which (almost) tasted better in the open. Karma was very interested, but gave priority to the pig ear I gave her. Anne liked the place, but had comments about the plastic flowers. Plastic has got a bad rap (righteously) in Norway these days. It’s definitely a movement…
Afterwards, we went across Blåfjell, and had a nice round trip hike back to the car.
The trip: 4km, 200 vertical meters.
Pictures from the hike:
GARNESTUA, APR 21 2018
After the hike to Uglesætra, I took Karma and drove to Haddal to hike Garnestua. I could see that the entire forest route was snow-free, but I was curious about the 1km summit ridge.
We went quite fast up the forest, and when I got to the summit ridge, I could see that there had been some snow-melt on the side facing Ringstaddalen valley. Thus, we got to the top without (almost) touching snow.
The trip: 5,3km, 600 vertical meters.
Pictures from the hike:
VETEN, SNELDELIDA, SIGNALHORNET, SKOLMA,
APR 22 2018
Sunday; the weather forecast wasn’t too promising, so I decided to do something in the local mountains. When it turned out that the weather was better than forecasted, I decided to do a round trip hike across Skolma and Sneldelida. Anne wanted a bike trip, and I suggested that I should drop her off at Gåsneset, then she could bike to Flø (my starting point for the walk), pick up the car, do whatever she wanted and pick me up later.
The parking at Flø was full, so I had to drive back to the start of the road up Midtflødalen and park there. Once there, I decided to do my hike in the opposite direction and start with Veten. I was very curious about how much snow I would have to suffer during my hike. It’s not that long since these mountains offered skiing terrain.
On the way up Veten, I met buddy Martin, who had done the route I was on my way to do, but in the opposite direction. He could report that there wasn’t much snow left.
After passing Veten, Karma and I moved on towards Sneldelida. I was jogging, as I don’t enjoy walking flats for a long distance. When we reached the top of Sneldelida, I still hadn’t touched snow.
But on our way towards Signalhornet, we had to cross some sections of wet snow. Karma found it utterly enjoyable, but me, wearing terrain shoes, wasn’t overjoyed.
More snow awaited in the pass between Signalhornet and Skolma, but from Skolma and back to Flø, the route was free of snow. All in all a very nice round trip.
Anne didn’t pick up the car, but instead biked to Ulsteinvik, where she was waiting for me at a cafeteria. I was quite hungry, but not in the mood for sitting down there, so I was mighty pleased when she pulled out a napkin with 3 bread slices that I could enjoy on our drive back home.
We ended a couple of nice days together with a cosy dinner at Folk Spiseri in Ulsteinvik…
The trip: 14,7km, 900 vertical meters.
Pictures from the hike:
