Kjell's Trip to Friisvegen 2015

New trip to Friisvegen also this year.

I still find these “expeditions” a pleasure, but with my rapidly advancing old age, they have also become a kind of test of how long I can hang in there. This time was also successful, but I seem to be rotting from the top and not from the root: My short time memory made me spend a lot of time to find out where I have misplaced things.

I went into the mountains Friday the 13 and came down again Sunday 22. March.

There was relatively little snow and since it all the time was below freezing there were dives of dry snow alternating with ice and crust. This meant that my progress with a heavy sledge was a bit jerky.

The first three days the weather was beautiful. The two first ones I used to transport food and equipment from my car to the campsite. The third one I made it to the top of my beloved cairn at Hirisjøhøgda, which was decorated in such a way that I could not decide if it was figurative or non-figurative art.

Later the weather turned bad, with dense fog, snowfall and strong winds. It also was cold: One morning I woke up to minus 15 centigrade. So three of these days were so bad that that I could not go skiing. A few of the days there was a whiteout that made it so difficult to see contours in the snow and measure distances that it made skiing a bit difficult. Then the challenge became to keep warm inside the tent. My old kerosene burner worked well both for cooking and heating the tent. I had bacon and fried eggs every morning, while the dinners varied between fish carbonados and pork cutlets, sprinkled with half a liter of pilsner.

So I did not suffer. I listened to the radio a lot, to music from my new Sony Walkman and audiobooks from my old iPod.

Later I mad some great trips, i.a. to the summits of Skarvola and Remdalshøgda. The last trip on Saturday I made a beautiful long tour around Hirisjøhøgda to Hirisjøen (lake) returning via Brettingdalsbua, where I had lunch. Fantastic weather the whole day.

The photos I show below are from this trip, but I start with a picture from the Rondane national park, and then a series from Hirisjøhøgda back to 2006, to illustrate how much the snow conditions can vary.

There were several beautiful days, also during the weekend. Nevertheless I did not see one single skier for more than one week. This I find strange, because I cannot myself cease to be fascinated by these scenic mountains and plateaus. People who have cabins where I start the trip tell me that they see fewer and fewer skiers in these mountains. So I allow myself to ask what is wrong with people?

However, as pupils write in their compositions: When I came home I thought that I had had a nice trip.