Summer vacation, day 15
Index
| Date | Peak | Height | PF | Location | WCP/FP | MAP |
| 27.07.25 | Leirviktinden | 507m | 125m | Gildeskål, Norway | – | MAP |
| 27.07.25 | Hestdalsfjellet | 592m | 210m | Gildeskål, Norway | – | MAP |
Continued from summer vacation, day 14…
Sunday: The time had come to check out of our rented house at Finnes. it felt really sad to wake up without our beloved Karma.
We spent a few morning hours to clean up properly after us. We wanted the owners to find the house just as they left it.
We left around noon and then the owners came just as we were driving out. We thought they would come later in the afternoon, but now we had the chance to get to know them. We had a nice talk. They were sorry for our loss (they also had a dog) and they welcomed us back. That was much appreciated. Maybe we will return. At least to the region. We have to pay tribute to Karma at some point in time, and we need to be in the region where she ended her days.
We didn’t know where we would end up in the evening, but we knew which mountain we were heading for – Leirviktinden.
While we were waiting for the blood samples at the Vet’s office, the day before, the Vet said – after realizing we did a lot of mountain hiking – “this is maybe something you don’t care about right now, but Leirviktinden is a really nice hike”.
I figured – of all the mountains that were available to us – Leirviktinden was the only peak we now could connect a story to. It was just bizarre, but also “logical” that we would be discussing mountain walks while our dog was dying. It’s hard to explain.
In any case, we drove to the western entrance of the Vindvik tunnel and parked there. There was a couple of cars parked there, and in one of them was a guy Anne knows well, from Sogn. He was on a road tour with a car full of sherpas, doing trail maintenance here and there. It’s a small world.
We crossed the road and followed a visible path (signposted) 420m S/SE until we reached a hunting shelter.
Here, we turned north and followed a forest ridge 1,6km until the marked route turned east – towards the top.
The Veterinarian may have exaggerated how nice that forest ridge was, but at least the forest path was nice!
After a while, the path took us up to the top.
We never miss out on a good scramble, when we find one…
And then we were up!
Anne then told me that she was up for more hiking and looked towards Hestdalsfjellet. It looked an easy walk along a nice and easy ridge, and it didn’t look too complicated to get down from the mountain either. Just follow the “sibling” ridge back to the hunting shelter.
I certainly didn’t protest about getting 2 pf100 tops instead of 1…
It was a very enjoyable route, and I would certainly recommend it.
The route was primarily on rock, and even if there were some sudden drops here and there, it was an altogether easy route.
When the ridge splitted, we did the same…
Every now and then, routefinding was necessary…
It was a long ridge, but eventually, we reached the top of Hestdalsfjellet.
Now, the question was – how do we get off this mountain? It was quite steep down to the ridge below, that we had planned to follow back to the hunting shelter.
There is normally a solution to most problems, also here and we found an OK route down.
We also joined a marked path down the mountain. But while the marked path seemed to follow the valley, we decided to stick to the ridge.
This ridge was quite enjoyable, but eventually it ended, and we had to go into the forest, where we quickly picked up a path that took us back to the hunting shelter.
It was altogether a very enjoyable hike! It was nice to think of something else than losing our beloved dog, the day before.
But where would we go next? We kept on driving and eventually, we decided to check into the new “Wood” hotel in Bodø. Another signature hotel from Petter Stordalen. We checked in for two nights.
It was nice to “land” again, after our stay at Finnes.
The thing about this hotel, is its close proximity to “Bodømarka” – the forest behind Bodø. We looked forward to going hiking the next day, straight from the hotel.
The hotel was very nice indeed and the dinner at the restaurant was excellent.
The first problem occurred when we tried to get some sleep. The room was so hot. I decided to go down to the reception and ask them what they were thinking in terms of the temperature.
They offered to open the window fully (it couldn’t be done by us) and offered us a fan. Very good service! But when I returned to the room with a guy from the staff, Anne had managed to open the window by herself. Not according to protocol! But in any case, we got air and a good night’s sleep.
Trip statistics: 8,4km, 685 vertical meters, 3h:11m
Pictures (Canon EOS RP/Iphone 13 Pro Max) from the hike:
