In Sogndalsdalen “back country” + goat problems…
Index
| Date | Peak | Height | PF | Location | MAP |
| 25.08.21 | Oksli | 1286m | 46m | Sogndal, Norway | MAP |
Wednesday: I had a massively good hiking week in Sogn og Fjordane county this week, and one of the highlights was this after-work hike to Oksli – in the outskirts of the Frudalsbreen glacier.
I drove to the Anestølen trailhead, and my plan was to cross the river immediately and head up along the south side of the Langedalselvi river.
But the local goats forced me to change my plan. I didn’t want to walk through the herd with my dog and so I decided to hike up the valley instead. I could only hope that I could find a place to cross higher up.
I really enjoyed being here. This was not unfamiliar terrain, as Anne and I had been skiing Steindalseggi and Sogndalseggi back in 2012. But I had not been hiking Langedalen before and it was just beautiful here.
After a while, I still hadn’t seen any place where we could cross the river without getting wet, and so we just kept on walking. This was slightly annoying, as now were moving away from my planned ascent route to Oksli.
But after 2,2km, I found a place to cross and now my focus was on picking the best route up the mountain. It was easy to pick the place where we should top out on the high ridge, but another thing was to avoid bush and forest while getting there.
The terrain was strenuous. The only “comfort” was that we would not be returning the same way…
No complaints, though. This was big terrain and of course I loved being here.
It was also fun finding our way up to the high ridge. We could certainly not go wherever we wanted…
When we finally reached the summit area, it wasn’t quite clear to me where the high point was. I hadn’t bothered checking the map, as I thought it would be obvious. But from what I could predict, the western point – where we got up – seemed to be the highest. But to be sure, we would take a hike across all humps and bumps.
Writing this report, more than 1 year after the hike, I don’t remember if there were than more than one cairn. There is a trig. Point cairn, and I can only assume that the high point was also marked some way.
Once satisfied that we had been to the highest point, we began our descent.
At 1040m, we left our ascent route and took a direct course down to the valley. The descent was at times a nightmare. But our problems were not over yet.
I could see that the goats were moving up the mountain. They formed 3 “divisions” and we would be outflanked. I love goats but have had some bad experiences. Like, one time I had a herd of 100+ goats following me down a mountain because they liked my company. I was quite sure that the farmer at Anestølen would not be happy if I came down with all his goats on my tail.
So, Karma and I took shelter by a creek, hoping they would not spot us. A creek – because I know goats won’t easily be crossing them. After a good while, I decided to stand up to see if the coast was clear. It wasn’t.
Damn! As a last resort, we crossed the creek and hurried into some nasty terrain hoping the goats wouldn’t follow. They didn’t.
It was all in all a good hike – which I think back on with pleasure.
Trip statistics: 8,2km, 865 vertical meters, 2h:40m
Pictures (Canon EOS RP/Iphone 8) from the trip:
