Harder than normal…
| Peak/Place | Height | PF | Location | WCP |
| Saudehornet | 1303m | 825m | Ørsta, Norway | WCP |
Thursday: As I am posting this trip prior to the week 35 report, the backdrop was that I went through an examination the day before, after fasting for two days. The night before the exam, I had a sudden drop in blood pressure (according to the Doctor), collapsed on the bathroom floor and hit my head in the fall. I was so sick that I thought for a moment “this was it“. The day before was clearly on my top 3 list of days I wish I never had…
But now I had started to eat again and I wanted to celebrate the nice weather with a proper hike after work. The choice fell on Saudehornet (Sheep’s horn) above Ørsta. This is a top I hike at least once a year, but I had not been up there so far in 2020. I should have understood on beforehand that the body wasn’t necessarily ready for a fast 1200+ vertical meter ascent, but I didn’t.
At the Vallabøen trailhead, Karma was eager to get out of the car, but then she realized that we were heading to Saudehornet and just sat down. She does not do that often, more like – very rarely! But there is something about Saudehornet that she doesn’t like. Perhaps it’s the combination of pace and vertical gain (we’ve had some pretty fast ascents up here). But, I hadn’t driven this far just to turn around and had to pull rank on her.
Once she clearly understood her position in the hierarchy, she got going. But, for the next 10 minutes, she stopped after 50 meters just to check that I was really sure about this. I was…
At the foot of Vallahornet, I *completely* ran out of energy. I found comfort that I could always call it a day on top of Vallahornet and dragged myself up the steep hillside.
When we got to the top of Vallahornet, I felt better and Saudehornet was just too tempting to resist. The fog on top was coming and going, and I hoped we could get there in a “going” moment.
It seemed like we were completely alone on the mountain, which was also a nice feeling.
This was my 19th visit to the top and it really bugged me that I never had found the opportunity to check out the lower tops on the massif. One day, though…
For the first time, I let Karma completely handle herself (no leash). Which she did, of course. It’s not as if she lacks training in this category…
And then we could celebrate another visit, although I don’t Karma would use that exact word…
I’m not sure I can say that the fog was “going“, but it wasn’t a complete white-out.
I got a glimpse of Bukkedalstinden, which was a real awesome hike!
We took a different route down. In the saddle just before Vallahornet, we went down the route leading to the waterworks building.
From below the waterworks building, I expected a hike through the forest in order to get back to Vallabøen, but was mighty surprised about what I found. I had to stop a person and ask what this was, and then learned that it was avalanche protection. It was quite clever to build a network of paths at the same time. Kudos!
Trip statistics: 9,4km, 1270 vertical meters, 3h:09m
Pictures from the trip (Canon EOS RP/Iphone8):
