A fine, but rainy Sogndal week
Index
| Date | Peak/Place | Height | PF | Location | WCP |
| 09.05.2021 | Andhovden | 512m | 9m | Sogndal, Norway | |
| 10.05.2021 | Skjeggen | 738m | 25m | Sogndal, Norway | |
| 11.05.2021 | Around Stupshølen tunnel | – | – | Sogndal, Norway | |
| 12.05.2021 | Hesteggi | 907m | 149m | Sogndal, Norway | |
| 13.05.2021 | Stedjeåsen | 625m | 123m | Sogndal, Norway | WCP |
| 14.05.2021 | Vetleskoghovden | 723m | 220m | Sogndal, Norway | WCP |
| 15.05.2021 | Sonvesåsen | 654m | 106m | Voss, Norway | – |
| 15.05.2021 | Andershovden | 394m | 128m | Voss, Norway | – |
| 15.05.2021 | Grauaåsen | 472m | 121m | Voss, Norway | – |
Andhovden (512m), May 9 2022
Monday: Sogndal (almost) all week, and after work I felt like doing the annual hike to Andhovden above Hermannsverk. I really like this path and while up there, I normally find new places to visit.
I particularly like the path from Njøs and up the forest. One day, Karma will find part of this path a bit challenging. But not today…
At approx. 350m, this path merges with the path from Grautviki and takes you to the tractor road higher up unless you turn right towards Andhovden at ~400m (there is a signpost). Along the way you pass the nice viewpoint Bjørgahaug. But, there is an even better viewpoint higher up!
Andhovden is just a small hump, but a hump with a name and hence it’s one of my hiking destinations in the Sogndal region. The real goal today was to visit the top of the Fatlafossen waterfall.
I couldn’t really find a good viewpoint above the waterfall, but it was nice to have been up here.
Afterwards, I followed the river upwards for a little while and found a small twin-waterfall.
We then sat course for the Våkeldahaug viewpoint (~650m) and the view was clearly better than from Bjørgahaug!
I considered going towards the Kyrafossen waterfall but concluded that I’ve had enough of waterfalls today and sat course for the tractor road that would take us back to Njøs. Parts of this tractor road is really steep! I would never have dared to drive a tractor down this road.
Trip statistics: 6,4km, 730 vertical meters, 2 hours
Pictures (Canon EOS RP) from the hike:
Skjeggen (732m), May 10 2022
Tuesday: I had visited Skjeggen earlier in the year, but then on skis. In deep, deep snow. Today, I figured it was time to enjoy this nice forest top above Sogndal without too much snow, and on foot.
We started out from the Røvhaugane trailhead, continued up to Åberge and then followed the path to Bjellastølen. I have never found the start of the Skjeggen path, always joined it higher up in the forest. I assumed it starts at Bjellastølen and that’s where we would have gone hadn’t it been for the amount of snow in the forest.
After some off-trail hiking we found the path – still not sure where it began.
We followed the marked path up to Skjeggen and went to the viewpoint above Sogndal.
It was a bit boring to return the way we came, so we descended a little bit and then followed the path to Hølsete.
But I didn’t want to go all the way to Hølsete and started looking for a way down to the Hølsete – Åberge road. The terrain was a bit complex, but eventually we found a nice route down to the road.
Passing Åberge, I enjoyed the sound and sight of the lambs…
Trip statistics: 7,9km, 660 vertical meters, 2h:20m
Pictures (Canon EOS RP) from the hike:
Around Stupshølen tunnel, May 11 2022
Wednesday: This hike was a bit weird from the beginning. I was desperately looking at the map for new places to visit and Anne and I agreed that it would be fun hiking near the Stupshølen tunnel.
The plan was to park in front of the tunnel on the Sogndal side, walk around it, follow a tractor road from lake Hafslovatnet and return via Dvergadal.
But we couldn’t walk around the tunnel. A fence made it impossible to get the dog across and so we had to figure out a plan B.
We would for sure have to cross the river and found that it was easy to cross it via the dam a bit further down.
We found a path that took us to an old forest road that eventually led us up to RV55 by lake Hafslovatnet.
We had to follow RV55 for 0,6km (lots of traffic!) before we reached the other side of the tunnel. The hike was already weird. After 2,1km of hiking, we were now 100m away from our starting point. But I was never tempted to hike through the tunnel during the Sogndal rush hour.
We could now head for the tractor road up from lake Hafslovatnet. As far as I could remember from the map, this road would take us to another tractor road that would take us down to Dvergadal.
I should check my GPS more often, because when we saw the Myrhaug farm, we thought it was Dvergadal and started looking for a way down the cliffs.
The terrain was much more complex than I had imagined, but we were lucky and was able to descent the very first place we attempted.
Looking back on this place, it seemed like it was the only place we could descend!
It wasn’t until I could see my car in front of the tunnel that we realized that we hadn’t been to Dvergadal at all! Oh well, next time…
The hike was quite fun though. Made us forget all about the rain…
Trip statistics: 4,3km, 200 vertical meters, 1h:20m
Pictures (Canon EOS RP) from the hike:
Hesteggi (907m), May 12 2022
Thursday: It was not a good weather week in Sogndal, but the dog had to be walked. The question was only how high we could go before it got … unpractical – in terms of weather and snow.
So today, I had plan A and B. Plan A was Hesteggi, which seemed like a stretch given the amount of snow and the unpredictable weather. Plan B was to hike until we reached snow and then go off-trail to Synarhaug (665m) south of Hesteggi. A small hump in the forest, but as stated earlier – I visit humps with a name!
We followed the normal path up from Kjørnes. The path was nice and dry in the beginning…
Then the path got a bit wet…
A bit after passing Jeskadalen, we joined the tractor road coming up from the Kaupanger side and this is where we met snow. But the snow seemed to (for the most part) carry my weight and then I decided to go for Hesteggi. Karma had no issues with the snow, whatsoever.
It was a huge satisfaction to reach the top of Hesteggi, as I really didn’t think we would get here.
And the weather seemed to be gradually better and better…
We stopped by the popular Sogndal viewpoint along the tractor road before heading down on it.
The plan was now to stop by “Masti” – an antenna in the forest, which is a place people go. Afterwards, we returned to the normal path and enjoyed a little bit of sunshine on our way down to Kjørnes.
Trip statistics: 8,7km, 760 vertical meters, 2h:42m
Pictures (Canon EOS RP) from the hike:
Stedjeåsen (624m), May 13 2022
Friday: Anne left this morning for a bachelorette party in the Aurland-Flåm region, and I had the afternoon all to myself. After an intense working day, I had a strong feeling that there was something I had to remember. But what?
While I was preparing to go for an afternoon hike to Slakkafjellet, I suddenly remembered! I was supposed to pick up Anne’s car at a car repair shop. A 1km hike from Anne’s house.
OK, a favor for mommy and Karma would get a nice 1km walk. But what about daddy? Daddy matters too! So, I had to see if I could possibly extend the walk. I figured a hike across Stedjeåsen would satisfy daddy’s needs…
And every time I hike in the Stedjeåsen forest, I try to cover some new (off-trail) ground. And sometimes, it gets a little steep.
It was raining today as well, and I certainly didn’t mind being in the forest…
Eventually, we reached the top and while there was still snow up there, the snowmelt since mid-April was quite astounding. Perhaps it’s just like any given spring, but still … astounding.
For descent, I picked the route down to Skjeldestad, which would take us straight to the car repair shop. I like this route. There are parts where you seriously would regret a stumble.
But mission accomplished! I picked up Anne’s car, Karma got a really good walk and daddy was happy!
Trip statistics: 5,5km, 570 vertical meters, 1h:56m
Pictures (Canon EOS RP) from the hike:
Vetleskoghovden aka Bondehaug (723m), May 14 2022
Saturday: As I was visiting good friends in Solvorn, I figured I might as well do a hike in the same area. Something new and something familiar at the same time.
I hadn’t been to Vetleskoghovden for 12 years so that became the destination. As for the ascent route, I decided to start out from the top of Solvornvegen and follow the Fevoll route – via the Huarplassen viewpoint. Then I would go off-trail for 0,5km, join the tractor road from Stolpen and just make my way through the forest. As for the descent route, I had two options. More on that later.
It was a nice day – at least where Karma and I were – and we both enjoyed being in the forest above Solvorn.
Our first stop was at Huarplassen – which offers a mighty fine view towards Solvorn.
Next was the off-trail part, which only lasted 100 meters. I found a perfectly good path taking us to the Stolpen tractor road and I could not understand why this path was not on the map.
We joined the tractor road at “Gamlestølssvingen” and followed 1,3km up the forest.
The plan was just to go off-trail from Vetleskog, but when I saw the “Skårane” signpost, I just had to check where that path would take us. It took us to a might fine viewpoint!
From here, we headed into the forest and soon found snow. Which – more or less – carried our weight. We followed the terrain wherever it was rising (not using the GPS) and found the high point without any navigational blunders.
Now it was time to figure out the descent route. One option was to hike across Storehaug and descend via Fevoll. This meant that we would return to Huarplassen and our ascent route. Which I didn’t really want to. This meant that the return route would be considerably longer, as we would take the steep forest route from Sie and down to the Luster fjord. A route we did back in 2017 (Storehaug), but then in the opposite direction (from Solvorn).
But first, we had to get to Sie and the 1,6km involved snow, thick forest, light snow from the air (!!) and a barb wire fence which we had to find a way around.
But eventually, we could get on the Solvorn path and although it had been 5 years since the last time, I still remembered it to be steep!
Fortunately, this route is very well marked. This is not the place you want to get astray!
The descent went quite well, and we made it down the fjord. I felt that Solvorn seemed FAR away.
The distance was only 2,2km but the route went up and down all the way.
When we reached Solvorn, I looked forward to getting the ice-cream at the local store, that I had been thinking about for the past hour. But the store hadn’t opened for the season!
Oh well, only 3km back to the car (and 200 vertical meters) and then the YX store along RV55 would be just a one-minute drive away. I could certainly wait.
The ice-cream never happened. Instead, I settled for a hot-dog and a cold soda drink. I figured I had earned it. It was a fun and memorable hike!
Trip statistics: 13,3km, 950 vertical meters, 4h:02m
Pictures (Canon EOS RP) from the hike:
Sonvesåsen (654m), May 15 2022
Saturday: I left Sogndal early morning and picked Anne up in Aurland just after 9am. The Bachelorette party had been successful, and now we were on our way to Voss and a stay at Park Hotel. And hopefully – one or two nice ski-trips.
As we couldn’t check in to the hotel before 3pm, we had to kill some time. Anne doesn’t like that expression. Time is valuable and shouldn’t be killed. But she understood what I meant and didn’t offer any objections to my proposal to visit “three modest pf100 tops – with hardly any effort at all”.
Coming straight from a 2-day Bachelorette party and into my weird life can’t be easy.
Sonvesåsen is an easy walk by any standard, if you drive as high as you can. We parked at 550m elev. near Voss Ski- og Tursenter.
The hike across the forest top was for the most part wet and we got to the top I wanted to take any other route down, even if it meant walking in snow.
The wet terrain wasn’t what annoyed me the most. It was the fee for driving up from the Rong side. NOK 105,- (!!). We thought we were paying for driving on the road, but afterwards I found out that we were paying for parking at certain spots. But where we hiked from, no fee was required. Oh well…
Trip statistics: 2,2km, 105 vertical meters, 38 mins
Andershovden (394m), May 15 2022
Saturday: In order to get to our next forest top – Andershovden, we had to get on the Raundalen road and then then up Vinjadalen.
At the top of Vinjadalen (270m), we found the “Storåsen” signpost, which was good enough for us.
But we didn’t follow the Storåsen trail. Instead, we turned left in the very beginning and followed a path that took us up Øyjordi (the northernmost) – crossing the road twice.
We then followed a forest path until it started to move away from Andershovden and found the high point after a short off-trail pitch.
We returned the same way we came.
Trip statistics: 2,2km, 125 vertical meters, 40 mins
Grauaåsen (472m) & Voss, May 15 2022
Saturday: Back at the car, we looked at the map to figure out where to drive in order to hike Grauaåsen – the 3rd and final goal for today. It turned out we didn’t have to drive anywhere. We could just hike from exactly where we were.
Instead of following the forest road (which was locked by a gate, but we didn’t know that), we followed a trail that joined the forest road 100m higher up. And then we decided to just continue off-trail straight up the forest.
This meant finding the best route through a felling field.
Eventually we found the top of Grauaåsen, but it was difficult to say which of the two humps was the highest. We visited both, of course…
Upon descent, we decided to follow the forest road all the way back to the car.
Then we sat course for Voss, checked in to the hotel, made sure Karma was comfortable in the room and went down to the hotel cafeteria for a meal. Afterwards, we took a walk along lake Vangsvatnet outside the hotel, threw our frisbees around a little bit and returned via town. I have to say – there has been a dramatic change since I last walked around here. I don’t even remember when, but I did spend the night at Fleischer’s hotel.
Trip statistics: 4,2km, 250 vertical meters, 1h:14m
Pictures (Canon EOS RP) from the hike (and from Voss):
