"Snow Tales And Powder Trails" book preview

Epilogue

Hemsedal: A guy taking photo of a guy
taking photo of a guy skiing!

Idris skis getting stuck into the Norway powder!

So, here ends one trip, and begins another: a freeride trip to Chamonix...

It has been an interesting couple of weeks, with some good snow, some good turns in mediocre snow, lots of good times, and most of all many new experiences in a Northern land

I am very grateful to Frode and his buddies in Hemsedal for showing me around, and putting me up, and taking some of the photos. It was a great way to start exploring a country.

Of course, there were many places that I didn't get to, and places that I was which would have been even better with a huge snowstorm, but it can't be deep powder every day!

I finally made it to Ski!

I passed through the town on the train on the way to the airport from Oslo, and the train stopped at the station.

129.4 is the altitude in metres.

The sun came out as I was leaving Oslo airport on Thursday morning it was very welcome after all the rainy days that they had had recently in that part of Norway.

There appeared to be a storm heading for Lofoten and Narvik in the North, maybe hitting there right now. I should have stayed, maybe!

The trip ended up being a logical progression Northwards, which was perfect, as it gave me a linear trajectory to follow.

The area South of Oslo looks beautiful in the sun
- lots of islands and forest

I got a last look at some of Norway's Sourthern mountains as we took off. The light was a bit dingy due to a murky haze, and some clouds in the West. 

Then it was on South over Germany, covered in low cloud, until finally I saw this:

The alps were looking seriously majestic from the air, snowline about 2000m high, way up to the tops.

Getting to Courmayeur, the sun rose on Mt Blanc:

Courmayeur ski resort

And then I arrived back in Chamonix, my home and home of my Idris skis. It currently looks like this, with a snowpack building above 2000m:

Hopefully it is nearly opening day for the Grands Montets...

Hjerkinn pass: a breath of fresh air

I've just realised that the area that I've been in the last couple of days, up around Narvik and Lofoten, up to Lyngen, is the area of mountains that I flew over several years ago on the way back from Japan in mid winter. Back then I remember being really impressed by the steep pointy mountains from the air, and now I have seen some of them a bit closer. It kind-of completes a circle, somehow!

Now I need to go back there and explore deeper one day...

Meanwhile, further South in the more rounded mountains:

The voyage continues after a restful night train and a change of train in Trondheim.

A wintry scene 

A station en route

Approaching the high mountain pass of Hjerkin, where there is a train station, I came past Oppdal, ski hill again, and then in between some awesome looking mountains.

The view from Oppdal station

Arriving at Hjerkin station, it is a cute, quiet hamlet. There is a hostel here, presumably open only in summertime.

 The view from the station goes skyward:

I saw this little gem of a place on the train ride North the other day, but it was dark. All I could see was a bunch of snow, the altitude of 1000m, and not much settlement. I imagined that it was a plateau with some small terrain features, but getting here this morning, there is a lot more terrain around, so now I have something to climb and ski, to about 1230m.

Back to the same altitude as Chamonix

The station is just to below the centre of this section of map. The mountain is directly South West of there, high point 1233m.

Hjerkin hamlet from above

Some bigger terrain to the North: - oh, for a ski partner, and good snow...

 The snow isn't too special, but theres enough of it. Today the snowpack was pretty stable for avalanche conditions, as the ice has locked it in, but I wanted to avoid the obvious loaded pockets due to a weak layer of faceting crystals near the base of the shallow snow. Its going to get dangerous here when it snows a lot more and the temperature rises again...

Eventually it got tricky to skin uphill...

Boot-pack time

 It ended up being more like ski-mountaineering, especially with the high wind. It wasn't a very big descent, but it was plenty enough given the snow quality.

The climb

The top... and the sun!

The line

There was even a nice line to ski from the top point:

    

The avalanche slope had already naturally slid, when the temperature was high, probably a couple of days ago, and it was now mainly icy. Even so, I avoided the big open area in the centre. I did a lot of hop turns on the ice!

If only it had been good snow, I would have spent the whole day doing short lines - but then I wouldn't have skied the line that I did, as it would for sure have been too loaded.

Now I wait for the darkness, and the 5.30pm train to Oslo in this lonely, wild, windy, mountain cabin of a station. It was great to break the journey like this in the mountains, and it was really refreshing to be on the top of a mountain in the wind.

I feel like I've been away from Chamonix for months, but its only just over a week. I fly back to the alps tomorrow, so will write one more post when I am back in Chamonix on Friday.

...so, i guess its not too early to ski in Norway...

A nice line to descend below the clouds

Nice colours around here

One of the back-sides of the ski hill:
Such inviting freeride terrain, but not today!

A white picket fence - Norway is full of these.

Dawn-ish this morning

Well, it didn't dump overnight, or clear up, so there was no fresh snow and no further view of the Aurora Borealis, but I was up for some exploring for my last morning, to see if I could get to the summit and see over the other side of the mountain.

I didn't get to look down the more steep skiable face the other side, though, as I didn't get high enough.

It was pretty similar cloud conditions as yesterday, so not so good for photographs. I had hoped to get some stunning clear images from high up, but the clouds were quite moody instead.

Ullr, Norse god of snow lives in these clouds...

Idris, Welsh dragon, snow slayer is here today.

Local industry hard at work

The intended descent

Top lift disappearing into the fog

I stopped climbing up just short of the top of the chairlift, as the cloud was still sticking to the summit ridge, but I did get some fresh air, a nice uphill walk, and a view of the fjord behind, and it was a challenge picking my way down through the variable snow, avoiding obvious pockets of windslab.


I didn't see anyone else around today, but there were some old skin tracks from a few days ago. I guess the locals are waiting for it to snow again.

It turned out that there was a small band of reasonably good snow in the trees  half way down the mountain, maybe for about 150 vertical metres. The top half was pretty icy from being windswept (but low avalanche risk on the pitches where I skied), and the bottom half was icy from the rain crust. It was good, though, and its not always about riding the knee-deep fresh!

 Continuation time: I boarded a bus after dark, and now I'm speeding South on the night train heading for Chamonix, 3500km due South. I have made plans for a daylight mountain stop on the way to Oslo tomorrow for my final day in Norway.

The Chamonix valley looks white above 2000m, so I may get some turns when I get back there on Friday. I'm looking forward to getting back there.

Heading Southwards again