Norway

we Drove into Norway from Sweden and after night at the beach in Saetre, and a dent in the van from a drop down barrier I didn’t notice dropping down we drove to Sokna where we had an unusual walk following a path that wasn’t a path, more like a 7 mile scramble through beautiful pristine woodland, but we did see our first Norwegian deer, and a large skull lost in the forest. Then we drove over to in Fla for the night to stay on a not so glamorous shopping centre car park, but it did have services (and the most expensive asparagus known to man!) We had decided on a slow drive over to Aurlandsvangen, apparently Norways Grand Canyon!

After a night in the woods we had another fine walk in the forest near Nesbyen and our first Norwegian mountain, Klevarudnatten, at 808m only a baby one. The walk was great, through broken woodland and forest with more deer, lakes and views. After Klevarudnatten we went on to Vestland to find the Norway you see in picture books, passing a small herd of reindeer along the way. We parked up next to Lærdalsfjorden to stay the night under mighty granite precipices surrounding us!

The following morning after leaving Lærdalsfjorden we drove from sea level straight up the Bjørgavegen mountain pass to nearly 5000ft and across the mountain tops, stopping of at Flotane for a short walk around the lake and waterfall and a play in the snow before continuing on to our main walk of the day, a 1700ft straight climb to the summit of Prest which gave us a spectacular view of the world heritage Aurlandsfjorden landscape and the mountains beyond. The weather here changes in minutes, worse than the UK. We had weather go from sunshine to cloudy and overcast, we had showers and at one point sideways hail, all in the space of a few hours. We even met some newly weds going for a hike, literally in their suit and wedding dress! Finally we settled for the night parked back up in the mountains on a small carpark at 4300ft!

That evening as we watched the sunset we didn't realise it, bit it was the last that would see of the sun for a while! The following day mainly chucked it down, however we did manage go to Stegastein viewpoint to look at the cloudy view through more rain, then we drove over to Vøringsfossen, a massive waterfall that again was hiding behind the rain and mist. We decided to stay the night on Vøringsfossen car park in the hope the view cleared up a little, and it certainly did, wow what an impressive waterfall in the morning, 600ft high and funky footbridge that tests your nerve at the top!

From Vestland and the Vøringsfossen waterfall we went to Rogaland and a very steep walk up from the village of Odda up through the Folgefonna National Park and to the Folgefonna glacier. A 1500ft climb involving chains, ropes, steps, rope bridges over fast flowing glacial meltwater and a little bit of luck! The views were stunning even though it was raining, but the rain gave us our own rainbow near the top. Great views of the glacier and massive melt waterfall. Lots of other massive waterfalls on route the to Hjelmeland ferry where hopped over to Josenfjorden ready for a short trip to pulpit rock in the morning!

So we ventured out to Pulpit Rock, but made the mistake of leaving a little late as the morning weather was still not great. Consequently Everyman and his dog that could carry a pair of walking poles or who had just vacated Greggs (British pie shop) was on the path. Inittially quite a steep route climbing around 1500ft with some spectacular views at the end of the trail with 2000ft sheer granite cliffs down to Lysefjorden! This walk would have been a great day out without the crowds! From Pulpit Rock we drove over the mountain tops to get nearer to the Kjerag walk so as not to make the same mistake again and found an area adjacent to the road where we parked up for the night ready for an early start in the morning, first and night last night in the whole of Norway so far without 4G at 3200ft!

This morning were up at 6:00am to relocate the van a little closer to the start of the Kjerag walk and we set off at 7:00am to make sure we avoided the midday rush and making the most of the better weather. This walk turned out to be an absolutely stunning walk up to the summit of Kjerag the highest peak around Lysefjorden and then on to the famous Kjeragbolten for the photo opportunity I’ve wanted for for many a year and the main reason for the drive up to Norway form the UK. The boulder is wedged in between two cliffs at around 3280ft high and there is no illusion, it really is wedged in with that drop straight down to the Fjord below! Arriving at the boulder for around 9:00am was brilliant, there was no queue for a photo just a friendly group of fellow walkers happy to take each others pictures or help each other on and off the rock. After lingering on the top plateau, we eventually took a slow walk back down the steep inclines assisted by chains where we got back to the van. On the way down we passed hoards of clickety stick carriers on their journey to the end of a what would have quickly become massive queue forming for the same photo we took effortlessly a few hours before! This was a brilliant day, with quite a challenging walk due to the steepness in sections, however it is only around six miles walk there and back. That evening we returned to the van and stayed where we were for the night

The following day we decided to give our legs a rest from the Kjerag's 30,000 step walk with over 2500ft height gain, we had eventually covered around 15 miles! We decided that a short walk over the mountain top off the high mountain pass (3200ft) would do. A strange rocky landscape where people had piled stone towers literally everywhere, we only walked a couple of miles, and then continued driving away from the high mountains and back towards Oslo and Sweden beyond, hopefully before we need to fill up with diesel again!

Finally our trip into Norway came to an end with another lovely picturesque walk, our last walk was in the hills around Dalen on the way back to Sweden. That evening we drove back into Sweden to see if we could find some sun!

Finally a small not to mention was that we couldn't quite believe how expensive Norway was to shop and didn't know how every Norwegian didn't suffer from either scurvy or malnutrition due to the limited range of fresh fruit and veg available in any of the shops or supermarkets we went into. There was practically nothing fresh to choose from in any of the supermarkets? and to give you an idea on prices the following are just an example: £14.70 for a six pack of beer! £3.98 for a 1 1/2ltr bottle of Sprite; £4.05 bag banana flavoured sweets; £1:75 litre milk; £2.00 4 clementines and £4.00 small bag oven chips