Finally – new tops in the Sunnmøre Alps!
| Peak/Place | Height | PF | Location |
| Saurdalsnibba | 1342m | 292m | Stranda/ Sykkylven, Norway |
| Bolten | 1158m | 228m | Stranda, Norway |
Sunday (Prologue): My shape and form has gone up and down since (at least) the beginning of this year. It’s been mentally and physically hard to deal with this weird phenomenon that fills me with fatigue, causes “chest pressure” and the whole body just feels riddled by hyper-stress. I’ve had multiple medical examinations of all kinds and if it hadn’t been for my analytical approach to this, my Doctor is frank enough to say that he would have pointed towards the door a long time ago.
The analytical approach involved logging everything I’ve been eating and drinking since March, and used color codes to mark how my days have been. For long, I closely studied the relation between food and shape/form, but found no indicators.
But recently, I decided that it wasn’t a coincidence that I always felt fine during my vacations. I told the Doctor about this, and (as expected) he was going the “how life’s at work?” route. Understandable as that is, I felt it was the wrong route. Life at work was just fine, so there had to be something else. But what?
Then I started to look at what I had been drinking. What did I drink at home, and not away? I almost gave up on this until I started to think about the Nespresso coffee machine. Then I started to look at # of cups per day. I noticed that 1 cup ended with an “orange” day (not good, but not terrible either) and if I had 2-3 cups, the days were mostly “red” (bad). So, on this day, I unplugged the machine and was curious about how my next month would be.
As I am writing this, almost a month has passed and I have had *only* “green” days. It feels like a small miracle. I have a strong belief in that the problem has been found, and I am of course curious if my body got sick from metals, bacteria or something inside the capsules. But it’s really not that important.
After a week, I called the Doctor and told him about my theory and the results so far. He said; “there is a reason I never drink coffee from coffee machines“.
Sunday (hiking): So, the day started out on a pretty good note and then I noticed that the weather was gorgeous too! I decided that I had the time and opportunity to make a long drive (1,5 hours) to Strandadalen valley and hike two tops that had been to my wish list for quite some years.
From Strandadalen, I followed the road to Engeset and then the toll road up Habostaddalen valley. There were a lot of cars there already and I wondered where they all were going. After a couple of minutes I realized that this was of course a natural starting point for the Patchell hut – from where many hike Slogen the next day. One can also hike Storhornet from here. And it wasn’t until I wrote this trip report I realized that I climbed Store Brekketind in 2007, starting out from this very place!
Karma and I headed out 11:02 and followed the trail up Åndalen. I walked along with an elder couple and they helped me stay on the vague path. After a while, Karma and I were well ahead of them and eventually reached the upper valley where I had a clear view towards Saurdalsnibba.
After a while, we were on the east ridge and I wondered if there were any obstacles ahead of us. There were!
The ridge had a sudden rise and I figured it was a bit risky getting the dog up the ridge route and started to look for alternatives.
After a short descent, we found a place to cross the snow and had no other obstacles ahead of us but VERY UNSTABLE rocks. It was super scary! The loose rocks were so big that they would have fallen all the way to the valley floor, where the trail to the Patchell hut was. I maneuvered Karma with detail precision until we were above the steepest part.
Now, we had an easy walk on rocks and fresh snow to the summit point.
Being in the heart of the Sunnmøre alps, my camera was running hot. So much exiting to look at!
It felt good to know that I had been to most of these tops, except for Brunstadhornet and Leirvasshornet. I need to fix that in 2021!
I had no interest in returning the way we came and tried my luck down the south ridge. It was a steep and rocky descent, but unproblematic.
The plan was now to visit Bolten, but I didn’t see an obvious route up. I definitely wanted to avoid the snow, which was hard. If need be, I would curve around the east ridge (far left on the below picture) where I surely would find a route up.
But first, we had to get down to the saddle.
On our way up Bolten, we had a good view towards Saurdalsnibba.
We ended up on the east ridge, where the ascent was easy and the views pretty good!
It was nice to be close to Store Brekketind again. I will never forget that top!
After a round of pictures, we headed back down the east ridge. It was difficult to find an easy route down to the valley, and I had to actively search for a safe route.
But eventually, we reached the valley and could look back on Saurdalsnibba – mighty pleased about the day so far. And – I had beer in the fridge – and hopefully a prosperous future in terms of shape and form!
Trip statistics: 11,9km, 1160 vertical meters, 4h:46m
Pictures (Canon EOS RP/Iphone 8) from the hike:
Very nice post with really nice ohotos.
The photo on top of Bolten also is very nice as all the others with the surrounding peaks.
Hei Arnt, forhåpentligvis holder formen din seg som du hadde i feriene og nå på denne fantastiske turen! Takk for de nydelige bildene i trip rapporten! Det er kjempeflott å lese hvordan Karma klarer seg på alle turane med deg, ho er flink altså!
Hei Ellen. Takk for hilsen (igjen)! Ja, nå ser jeg lyst på formen fremover 😉 Skal hilse Karma. Hun liker å få skryt! Ha det så lenge!