Overnatting på Vardafjellet - Fjords And Mountains

My life in Norway unfortunately ended, but still I have some issues that keep me there. And this give me a reason to visit land of trolls time to time. Of course every visit must be connected with mountain trip. For this time I planned something new. I wanted to take a tent and sleeping bag with me. In addition I shared my idea with my oldest son and I heard from him, that he would like to join me on this trip.

We choose one weekend to go to Norway. I wanted to use sunny and warm weather which we could enjoy from May. In Norway forecast showed drought warning, because of lack of rain. Unusual situation in this country.

We landed in the Friday evening and found out that weather is going to its normal level (rain) on Sunday. That meant that we had to go on our trip on Saturday.

I don’t remember when I slept in tent last time and backpacking was really challenging task for me. I had to pack two sleeping bags, tent, some warm clothes, rain jackets, food and water into one backpack, because Tymek, my son was equipped with small backpack. I could give him to carry only sleeping mat and some clothes. Rest of equipment I had to take on my shoulders.

We started on Saturday afternoon from Vestvoll. Area was quite well known to me from previous trips. Once, about two years earlier, I went this route with Tymek. We went down after Brennestag summit. This time I wanted to set up the tent near Vardafjellet mountain, because there is water stream between Brennestag and Vardafjell, where we could fill up our two bottles. At least it should be a stream. Now, during the drought, I could only have a hope to encounter some water resources on our journey.

First stage of the route is average difficulty. Up to Friarene you will go by wide tractor road. Trail goes mostly close to trees, so there is hard to enjoy the views. From Friarane you can climb to Hovda where you can get in several minutes. My little troll didn’t wanted to go there and he went forward to our next point: Litle Kjort. Challenging part of this stage is almost vertical wall with ropes, that can help you a lot to get higher.

We didn’t stop for more than to take a few pictures. The reason for that was flying insects that were very irritating. We passed Litle Kjort summit, then Brennestag and in halfway to Vardafjell we reached water stream, where we could refill our bottles. When we came to Vardafjell, I decided to set up the tent. There was still plenty time to sunset and we could go further to Åksla, but I left this mountain to next day.

We prepared our place to sleep, eat something and enjoyed the surrounding area in the next hour. Then we had to go back to the stream to get some more water. After 9 pm there was still very light and sun didn’t want to hide behind the horizon. When we decided to go sleep, it was still a daylight.

*Traditional norwegian snack: sandwich with brown cheese.*

The morning was wet and cloudy. In fact we wake up into the clouds and visibility not exceed several meters. We had to change our plans regarding Åksla mountain. I wanted to avoid rain so we packed our camp and went back towards Brennesag, where is road down to Blikra. And from Blikra to Vestvoll, where I left my car is approx. 300 meters. Soon we were at home. According to weathercast rain started late afternoon.