Rotten shape, but still able to move…

Geitnausa, Ålesund

Index

Date Peak Height PF Location WCP/FP MAP
20.02.23 Rambjøra 132m 109m Herøy, M&R, Norway WCP MAP
21.02.23 Borgundgavlen 71m 68m Ålesund, Norway WCP MAP
21.02.23 Geitnausa 456m 102m Ålesund, Norway WCP MAP
21.02.23 Høgkubben 450m 62m Ålesund, Norway WCP MAP
22.02.23 Gyrinakken 365m 157m Herøy/Sande, M&R, Norway WCP MAP
23.02.23 Remøykammen 184m 41m Herøy, M&R, Norway WCP MAP
23.02.23 Vardane (Remøyfjellet) 188m 188m Herøy, M&R, Norway WCP MAP
23.02.23 Vasseidet 162m 69m Herøy, M&R, Norway WCP MAP
24.02.23 Klosterhaugen 20m 20m Herøy, M&R, Norway MAP
25.02.23 Storehornet 196m 74m Herøy, M&R, Norway WCP MAP
25.02.23 Igesundhetta 216m 216m Herøy, M&R, Norway WCP MAP
26.02.23 Eggesbøsteinen 68m 58m Herøy, M&R, Norway WCP MAP
26.02.23 Varden 76m 45m Herøy, M&R, Norway MAP

Rambjøra (132m), Feb 20 2023

Our hike across Rambjøra

Monday: Another week, still feeling rotten and still on antibiotics. The medicine feels like 50% good, 50% bad. The back is getting better, the rest of the body is chaos. Add a rainy day to this, and you can guess my inspiration level after work.

So, the choice fell on my local top Rambjøra once again. Karma loves this route and I can pull it off almost no matter how rotten I feel.

Towards Rambjøra

Around these days, I was wondering when winter would arrive. Yes, we had a few dumps in December, but it’s been “quiet” since then. Already in October, I stated that winter would come in March…

On our way to Rambjøra

We reached the top, and I felt I had energy left for some off-trail walk about.

On Rambjøra

We followed the path to Dragsund and just before reaching the road, we went off-trail in the direction of the sound by the bridge.

Towards Dragsund

Low tide today…

At Dragsund

And then we passed Jonseholmen on our way back.

Passing Jonseholmen

Trip statistics: 5km, 150 vertical meters, 1h:18m

Borgundgavlen (71m), Feb 21 2023

Our lunch-hike across Borgundgavlen

Tuesday: Ålesund day and a CT-scan in the morning. Another step in figuring out what is riddling me. Before returning to work, I walked the dog at Borgundgavlen – a place I frequently visited back in 2008 when my Hypothyroidism was discovered. I was flat out for a couple of weeks and Borgundgavlen became my Mt. Everest.

On our way to Borgundgavlen

It felt really nice to be back. Whatever reason you have for being here, it’s still a nice walk!

Towards the high point

For some reason, Karma seemed very skeptical. Like – “What? This is not our regular lunch walk! What’s up?”

View from the top

I didn’t remember anything from this path, which is a bit weird, given the many walks I did here. On the other hand, I’ve had some thousands of other walks since then…

Ålesund view

The weather was nice and I looked forward to a proper hike after work!

Returning to the car

Oh – by the way – this the home of Sunnmøre Museum – which tells the story of the way of life in the old farming community. In the idyllic Borgund gable is a large collection of buildings from all over Sunnmøre.

Trip statistics: 2,1km, 90 vertical meters, 0h:30m

Geitnausa (456m), Høgkubben (450m), Feb 21 2023

Our hike across Geitnausa and Høgkubben

Tuesday: After work (still in Ålesund), I drove to Blindheim to do my regular round across Geitnausa (aka Spjelkavikfjellet) and Høgkubben. I was curious about the amount of snow…

There wasn’t a whole lot of it in the lower forest.

The snow depth is acceptable…

Karma seemed to enjoy herself…

Whenever you’re ready…

There wasn’t a whole lot of snow on the upper mountain either. The little there was, was somewhat deep and cumbersome, but could often be avoided.

Top of Geitnausa in view

It was nice to be back on Geitnausa and enjoy the fine views!

Geitnausa view

On the way down from Geitnausa, I met Karl Egil Liaset – another fellow mountaineer and whom I hadn’t seen since my Ålesund years (2006-2008) and we had a good chat until I realized that I was running out of daylight. I hadn’t packed a headlamp for this hike.

Heading for Høgkubben

We then sat course for Høgkubben and reached this top 45 minutes after leaving Geitnausa.

On Høgkubben

Next, we aimed for the top of Høgelia before returning to the car via the slalom hill (which is very seldom open for business…)

Ålesund view

Trip statistics: 9,8km, 560 vertical meters, 2h:32m
Pictures (Canon EOS RP/Iphone 13 Pro Max) from the hike
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Gyrinakken (365m), Feb 22 2023

Our hike across Gyrinakken

Wednesday: Another rainy afternoon and I chose to go to Gyrinakken – where I actually hadn’t been so far in 2023.

Heading for Gyrinakken (background)

Everything was quite uninspiring, except for the fact of just being here – in the rain. Made me feel better!

To the top

On top, it was windy and snowing lightly.

On top of Gyrinakken

We returned along FV61 (on the safe side of the barrier) to the Leikongeidet lit trail and followed the gravel road (to become a skiing course later in spring(!)) back to the car.

Returning to the trailhead. I would soon be skiing here…

Trip statistics: 6,6km, 340 vertical meters, 1h:34m

Vardane (Remøy, 188m), Vasseidet (162m), Feb 23 2023

Our hike across the Remøy island tops

Thursday: It was a windy afternoon, and the weather was unpredictable. As I had played it “safe” in the Gyrinakken forest the day before I felt obligated to expose myself to the weather and chose to drive to Remøy island and hike across the tops on this island.

Heading up Remøykammen

It’s not as if these tops are high, but the weather can be quite rough.

Windy…

Arriving at Remøykammen, so far so good.

On Remøykammen

Remøykammen offers nearby shelter (forest) in case of violent hail showers, but we seemed to be safe and continued towards the island high point – Vardane.

I quite like this island. Just too bad there is no round-trip hike option on the mountain plateau. Guess I would have to stick to the roads for return, this time too.

On Vardane

When we reached Vardane, I had already decided to pay Vasseidet a visit too.

View from Vardane

At Vasseidet, there wasn’t really anything left to do, so we had to set course for the car – 4,3km away.

On Vasseidet

First, we had to get down to Sævik before taking on the long and boring road back to the east tip of the island.

To Sævik

We took a detour down to the shore before calling it a day. A nice hike altogether!

Down by the shore

Trip statistics: 8,1km, 450 vertical meters, 2h:00m
Pictures (Canon EOS RP/Iphone 13 Pro Max) from the hike
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Herøya (20m), Feb 24 2023

Our walk across Herøya island

Friday: Anne had arrived, and none of us had much energy for any hiking. But we had to walk the dog and decided to drive out to Herøya island – a place we both enjoy visiting.

A nice afternoon

While there are good paths on this island, we both like it best off the beaten track…

We like to do it our way…

On the tip of the island sat an eagle. We were curious how close we could get before it took off. Not so close, it turned out…

Countdown to lift-off…

The ocean view was … dramatic!

Ocean view

On our way back – on the other side of the island – we noticed that there were no sheep on the islet next to Herøya. As we had never been to this islet before (as we didn’t want to disturb the sheep), we went over there. The bridge was super-slippery!

Ultra-slippery!

We got to the high point, which was approx. 12m above sea level. After some research – it seems the name of this islet is Anhangeren.

Anhangeren has been conquered…

Then we headed over to the Herøyspelet arena where I tried to entertain the … tough crowd!

Can I have some love, please?

Afterwards, we returned to the car and went home for Taco night. And the last antibiotic. Hopefully – for a long time!

It’s hard to explain, Karma. Just sit tight…

Trip statistics: 2,7km, 90 vertical meters, 1h:06m
Pictures (Canon EOS RP) from the hike
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Storehornet (196m), Igesundshetta (216m), Feb 25 2023

Our hike across Storehornet and Igesundshetta

Saturday: This was not a good day for me and I had to aim low for outdoor activity today. The choice fell on a round-trip walk across Storehornet and Igesundshetta on Bergsøya island. The weather was still unpredictable, and we expected to run into a hail shower or two.

Heading out

Already on the way to Storehornet, we realized that something was around the corner…

Bad weather moving in

Halfway across the ridge, we got wind and snow, but fortunately no hail.

I enjoy this round-trip hike around lake Storevatnet

We passed across Storehornet and eventually, we reached Igesundsvarden.

Igesundsvarden

From here, we had a really good view towards Nerlandsøya island.

Nerlandsøya island

Next up was the Bergsøya island high point – Igesundshetta.

To Igesundshetta

There was still a whole lot of weather “out there” and we hoped it didn’t come our way anytime soon…

View towards Leinehornet on Leinøya

On Igesundshetta, Anne probably expected that we would take the shortest route back to the trailhead, but I had other plans.

Panorama view from Igesundshetta

My proposition was to follow the northeast ridge towards Fosnavåg and return to the trailhead on roads. Anne said OK.

To Fosnavåg

My goal was just to get some new tracks on my GPS map and in these parts, I would have resort to streets to make that happen. But I’m not picky.

Descending to Fosnavåg

It was a fun variation to an otherwise classic round-trip hike on Bergsøya.

Trip statistics: 7km, 490 vertical meters, 2h:30m
Pictures (Canon EOS RP/Iphone 13 Pro Max) from the hike
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Eggesbøsteinen (68m), Varden (76m), Feb 26 2023

Our hike across Eggesbøsteinen and Varden

Sunday: This Sunday started out just like Saturday. Not on a good note. But the trend was that my body felt better after some exercise, so I started to look for another “low key” route, preferably one in new terrain and that had some elements of “bonkers” to it.

I found my route not far from where we hiked the day before. We would hike Eggesbøsteinen (a cool knob) which neither Anne nor Karma had been to earlier. Then we would find our way to Varden – a small top closer to the ridge we hiked yesterday. None of us had been to Varden before.

The hike started by crossing a really annoying meadow.

Big Aarrrgh!

Things got a bit more interesting when we reached the south tip of Bergsøya and could follow the forest ridge.

Almost at the very south tip of Bergsøya

I kind of expected to find a path along the forest ridge but found only deer tracks.

Let’s pretend we’re deer…

But the terrain was fun and soon we were on track to Eggesbøsteinen.

Heading up Eggesbøsteinen

A few minutes later, we could celebrate our first “top”.

Hoorray!

We found it a bit too cumbersome to continue along the forest ridge and decided to head for the shore.

Hmm… let’s stay clear of the ridge…

From the shore, Eggesbøsteinen presented itself from its coolest side.

Looking back on Eggesbøsteinen

After a while along the shore, we had to pass through civilization where we attracted some attention from neighbors not used to seeing hikers here. There were enough sheep fences to make walking here no fun at all, and we were happy when we were back at the shore and could focus on finding a route up Varden.

Interesting pier…

The route up Varden was not fun at all.

To Varden

But eventually, we reached the top and I guess we all looked forward to return to the car along roads.

On top of Varden

But first, we had to get off this hump and fortunately, it was easier than getting up.

Descending from Varden

It was a fun hike and had definitely some “bonkers” sides to it…

Trip statistics: 5,4km, 245 vertical meters, 2h:15m
Pictures (Canon EOS RP/Iphone 13 Pro Max) from the hike
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