Silly Billies Return to Roam

Adventure Race Tasmania

2011-11-24T15:28:00.000-08:00

The annual World Adventure Race Champs - this time in Western Tasmania - had come around again and always seems to excite and frustrate those of us who follow these mad races. Because I am writing this well after the event it is impossible for the outcome not to flavour my post - those of you who followed the race online will understand.

We weren't really able to follow the race anyway, there was a strict "no spectators allowed" rule. So Viv, Karin and I decided to follow the general route of the course by car and enjoy some great camping and picnicking along the way, catching up with the race if and when possible.

I would have liked to post during the race, but this part of Tasmania is very sparsely populated and so there was virtually no internet access. The race started in Burnie at 9am, as the teams paddled out into the sparkling sea on inflatable kayaks and round the beautiful coastline to Penguin.

On Burnie beach minutes before the race start

We saw the racers paddling into the beach and transitioning to a trek at Penguin. From there we decided to take Karin to a nearby wildlife park where we were able to see Tasmanian devils and koalas, as well as close up kangaroos, potaroos and pademelons...all different kind of unusual roos which one might frequently encounter Tasmania.

Cute koalas sleep most of the day

Tasmanian devils

We spent the night back in Burnie. The following day we drove through to Tullah and met teams arriving in after 24 hours racing, looking very cold and tired having just completed a canyoning and kayaking section in cold waters. Seagate had a good lead, but had just been told the big blow that they had been given a massive 4 hour penalty for accidentally forgetting their spot GPS device on the second leg.

Arriving across the lake - this was the checkpoint where Seagate were told about their 4 hour penalty

I felt so bad for them, but they took it amazingly calmly and continued onto the bike section just as darkness fell. Aaron's team (Karin's Dad) Silva came in second place and headed away about 1 hour after Seagate.

We drove through the pouring rain feeling very sorry for the racers who would be biking through it to arrive in Strahan on the West coast of Tasmania late in the night. This was the place where teams had their compulsory 6 hour sleep. Seagate arrived in the early hours of the morning having had another disaster - Chris's derailleur had broken so he was having to ride single speed costing the team lots of time.

That day Karin and Viv had a great time on the old steam train which runs from Strahan to Queenstown. I took a walk through the beautiful forest near Strahan and enjoyed mucking about in the picturesque village.

The fern walkway

Fern fronds are so cool!

Strahan was actually one of the last points we could see the team until almost the finish of the race, so we would spend the next few days travelling back from west to east coast. We drove out to the Hentley Dunes and enjoyed the beautiful and wild beaches which abound on the west. We found a great campsite at Trial Harbour, toasting marshmallows on the fire and falling asleep to the sound of crashing waves.

Viv and Karin enjoying the beach (and sandcastles) near Strahan

Our beautiful campsite at Trial Harbour

The following day we followed the course of the race through to Corinna in the Tarkine Wilderness Area. There is a car ferry to cross the river and the forest closes in around you as you drive through - it had a distinctly NZ West Coast feel. We camped at Julius Creek with a little resident wallaby and kookaburra. Teams had to paddle the nearby Arthur River as far as Kanunah Bridge, from there they would cycle out to the coast again.

The windswept west coast of Tasmania

A little wallaby peeks through the undergrowth at Kanunah Bridge

By now they had been racing for nearly 6 days. Seagate still held over 2 hours lead, but with their 4 hour penalty the win was slipping away. Team Thule had raced well and overtaken Silva, so were almost certain to now win the race.

We drove to Rocky Point with its golden sand beaches and blue waters, and then around to Ships Harbour to find Seagate sitting out their 4 hour penalty and watching those hard fought minutes slip past as first Thule and then Silva raced past - it was awful. However, Chris was remarkably positive - especially when Nathan asked the small crowd which had gathered around if there was anyone willing to lend Chris a working bike for the final ride - and a local man offered his most excellent old school Avanti commuter bike complete with bell!

They took off at about 7 pm on the final leg, 20 minutes down on Silva. We raced to the finish, excited to see the finish of this saga of a race. Thule had already finished about an hour earlier, and as we entered the stadium we saw the lights of Team Silva coming in to the track for a final loop on the velodrome. Karin was very happy to see Dad after 6 days spent with me and Grandma - she really had been the most wonderfully natured little 4 year old to hang out with.

About 3 minutes later Seagate raced in after a incredibly fast ride averaging about 32 km an hour! It was lovely to have Chris back, but Team Seagate were pretty disappointed with the outcome of the race. They gave it everything, but it seemed like everything had been against them.

Seagate racing in to the finish

After nearly 6 days of hard racing they retired to the hotel for a very well earned sleep. The next day was spent cleaning and sorting tonnes of muddy wet gear.

The prize giving wasn't for a few more days, because there were still many teams fighting for positions and to finish the race within the 10 day cut off. We decided to escape Burnie for a night and headed up to Cradle Mountain National Park with Nathan, Jodie and Sophie.

Cradle mountain is a neat place - alpine tussocks and beach forest trick you into feeling like you are back in New Zealand - until a wallaby hops past. The mists were down low and it was could and windy as we pitched our tents in the campsite.

Chris looks pretty lively emerging from the tent!

Rain came down most of the night, so the following day I packed in plenty of warm clothes before meeting up with Jodie for a little mission up to Cradle Mountain. It was still very cold and windy as we set out from the empty car park and climbed the ridge up towards Cradle Mountain. Still, we were both loving getting out into the mountains!

We crossed a tussocky plateau and then climbed up amongst great pillars of rock, feeling like monkeys as we clambered up the big boulders. Mist swirled about the summit, adding to the atmosphere of being up there. A quick clamber then run back to the car made it a very satisfying round trip.

The next day back in Burnie we took a run around Rocky Cape and enjoyed a quick swim in the crystal clear waters. After the prizegiving that evening the rest of the team said their farewells and buzzed back to Nelson, while Chris and I had a few more days to potter around Tasmania before our return to New Zealand.

We spent our first night at beautiful Fortescue Bay in Tasman National Park

Curry for tea

Breakfast at Fortescue Bay

We came across these cool fossils on the coastline near Eaglehawk Neck

Cathedral Arch

Fortescue Bay

The highlight of our trip was a night spent out on the Freycinet Peninsula camping at Wineglass Bay. We walked over a little saddle in the late evening and then dropped down to the magnificent sweeping beach that is Wineglass Bay. We walked barefoot along the golden sand as the waves crashed onto the beach, this place could be treasure island!

The amazing evening view of Wineglass Bay

We reached the far end of the beach and the little campsite just as it got dark and millions of stars came out in the dark sky. Having expected this well known beach to be very busy we were pleasantly surprised to meet only two fellow trampers on our trip. I guess November is a good time to visit.

Treasure Island?

The next day was our final day in Tasmania and probably the best. We ate breakfast on the beautiful (and now very still) beach, before climbing up over Mt Graham and then Mt Freycinet. The views down to the bay were amazing and we wished we had another night to spend here!

Breakfast on the beach

This is a little advertisement for all my Norwegian friends to come visit this side of the world (-:

We had a picnic on top amongst the shade of some Eucalyptus, then wandered down through the ever changing forest to Cooks Beach. We were now on the opposite side of the peninsula from Wineglass Bay and we walked along windy Hazards Beach. The last section of track wound through the forest back to the carpark - a very nice 7 hour walk which is described on the sign as a 3 day tramp, hmm?

Casting a spell on the top of Mt Freycinet

Walking along Hazards Beach

Early the following morning we started our journey back to Christchurch, New Zealand and the many more adventures which no doubt await us in that amazing country.... But don't worry, I'll make sure the Silly Billies continue to post their silly stories here for you to read (-:

A silly billy in tree form?

Returning to Down Under

2011-11-07T19:45:00.000-08:00

We felt right at home flying into Tasmania, over green pastures and small sunny towns. After landing in Launceston airport we rented a hire car and made a beeline for the local bakery and a delicious vegie pie! Such a delicious pastry and so unattainable in the rest of the world (-:

We took our car into the Walls of Jerusalem National Park, which backs on to the well known Cradle Mountain NP. We had two days to fill in before the rest of Chris's adventure racing team arrived - so we decided to head into the bush for an overnight tramp. The fog was hanging very low and it felt like rain was on its way as we wound up through the bush, passing through Eucalyptus forest filled with amazing tree ferns!

Chris amongst the ferns

We made our way up to Chapter lake on a very small and forgotten track. The lake is beautiful, densely crowded by thick bush with delicate falls cascading off a small rock outcrop. We had a little feast to cook up - including some good old corn-on-the-cob.

A very atmospheric Chapter Lake

The following day was very rainy and little brown leeches wriggled at us on the forest floor. We were entirely unperturbed because we thought they were friendly little worms - even when Chris found one had wiggled all the way up his pants!

We drove to Burnie, spotting a beautiful echidna (or spiny ant eater) along the way. That evening the rest of team Seagate arrived - it was great to be hanging out with Kiwis again. We went to bed that night feeling excitement and anticipation for the race to come.

A friendly echidna

Adventures in China

2011-11-07T19:41:00.000-08:00

Arriving in China
We flew to Beijing Airport and then took a domestic flight with Air China to Kunming. On the flight we were served this very strange looking fruit – white with little black spots like a slice of dalmatian dog! We chuckled about the weird and wonderful things ahead of us (we later found out this peculiar and tasty thing was a dragon-fruit).

After a long taxi ride in rush hour traffic through Kunming we caught a rumpty bus to take us a further 4.5 hours to Dali where Matt and Lara live. Due to a series of unfortunate events they were currently at the hospital in Hong Kong, but we knew our friend Joe would be at their place.

Sunset from Dali

Communicating with drivers was pretty challenging, but we did finally find ourselves in Dali old town around midnight. Lugging our gear up the hill we located Matt and Lara's on the university campus with the help of Joe's detailed instructions and it was a great thing to yell out “Joe” and see a familiar face pop out of the third floor balcony.

On the streets of Dali the following day with Joe

The next day we mucked around in Dali old town, taking pictures of the lanterns and temples. We ate lunch at a little noodle place where the man actually made the noodles right in front of you by pulling and twisting some kind of pastry. The whole place felt a bit like a scene from Kung Fu Panda.

A trip into the Cangshang mountains

Backing right on to Matt and Lara's place are some great green mountains – the Cang Shang mountains, the highest of which is about 4100m! We packed lightly because we hoped to stay in guest houses along the way and Joe was sure we would be able to buy food as we went.

On the first day we climbed up a steep path, through a graveyard and then on up to the “Cloudpass Walkway”. This was a broad terraced and paved path winding around the steep mountainsides, with a clear view down to Dali and the Er Hai lake below.

A little shrine along the path

After a bit of exploration, locating some food and visiting a temple we climbed on up to the Higher Land Inn which Lara had recommended we stay in. We had a hilarious time with the innkeeper there, he spoke to us quickly in Chinese and then roared with friendly laughter when we stared blankly back at him.

A hairy critter I spotted along the way

Chris on the Cloudpass walkway

He cooked us a wonderful “Family Dinner” - curried eggplants, tofu, beans, rice, stir fried vegies. We enjoyed the evening talking to a couple of young French guys who were also staying over – while Chris went for a quick run all the way down to Dali and back again to get our tent (and for a bit of extra training).

Family dinner!

The following day we climbed up steeply following the path the innkeeper had directed us to. The trees became shorter and more stunted until we finally emerged into the sun to see blue sky above and clouds below.

Climbing up through the forest

We came to a huge construction site at the top of the (fortunately) incomplete gondola. Heaps of workers were building a big ugly plastic staircase up the mountainside. We wandered past them, wondering who could have seen this construction as a positive thing.

The crazy "plastic stairway"

By now the air was getting pretty thin and I was finding I got way more puffed than usual walking uphill. We reached the ridge, and then clambered along a fairly knife-edge but hand-hold-abundant ridge-line out to Mulong Peak (4100)! Cool! The wind had picked up now and was whipping up from one side of the ridge, and clouds and mists were constantly spilling over obscuring our view before suddenly revealing tantalizing glimpses down to the valley's below. It was an amazing ridge.

On our way to the first summit - Mulong Peak

Me on the summit of Mulong with the strange mirror ball that marked the summit. I am holding the cam which Joe managed to pull out from a rock.

We climbed back along the ridge, above the Horse Washing Pond where the gondola terminus is and then further along over a series of 4000m summits. We made good progress along a little well worn track even though the wind was now very strong.

Some amazing red flowers as we look back towards Mulong Peak

From Yuju Peak looking down to Horse Washing Pond and the plastic staircase again.

An amazing view from Yuju back to Mulong Peak

"Silver trees" in the valley below as sun rays shone through the clouds

After a very long day we were all tired as we neared our goal for the day – the Dragon Lakes. It became dark just before we reached them so I stopped to put my headlamp on. Unfortunately our group dynamics suffered a bit of a meltdown at this point – Chris wanting to go one way and Joe another. After some heated arguments and angry roaming around we finally had a tent site for the night – and we all sat and ate cold leftovers for dinner feeling cross with each other.

Descending into the mists just before it got dark and we tried to find a camp spot

After a chilly night (the wind was blowing hard through the first part of it) we woke to beautiful sun! We didn't have too much to eat for breakfast other than some dry bars, then we climbed back up through some rhododendron scrub onto the ridge. Now we didn't really have a track to follow so progress was much slower.

Joe caught the fire sunrise on his camera

Beautiful clear skies in the morning

The map Chris was using for this trip was an ancient Russian survey map from the war which Matt had somehow cunningly sourced. It was a pretty average map and Chris was having some trouble interpreting it. By lunchtime Chris thought we had reached the road which would lead us down to the Valley of Flowers – but then he realised we had to climb over another peak.

We climbed up that peak through some amazing thick patches of bamboo following a very narrow walking track. But once we reached another point where we could see out he saw that there was still more ridgeline to traverse until we might hit the road. The track we were now following dived off down into the main valley back to Dali – not the Flowers.

Bamboo bashing

Then the bamboo gets bigger!

We climbed the next peak to try and scout a route but swirling mists made it tricky to see. By this stage Joe had decided he was very keen to give up on the Flower Valley plan and just head down here. We were very short on food supplies by now, so we reluctantly (Chris especially) turned tail and started down the long descent to to the main road.

A little lone Chris tries to rectify the terrain with his poor Russian map

The steep and rough descent back to Dali

It was a very long way down and the track grew into a deeply rutted horse track as we neared the valley. The temperature also increased dramatically. Finally, just as it was dark yet again, we reached the streets of a little village bustling with life. People were unloading big bales of hay from wonky motorbikes and stacking bricks along the streets, there was a hubub of activity.

We wandered down to the motorway and managed to hitch a ride in the dark with a taxi guy back to Dali, dinner and a delicious hot shower.

Shuanglang Kayaking

I had a large blister on my little toe from so much walking and Chris needed to do some paddling, so Lara had suggested we take a trip to a little place called Shuanglang around the Er Hai lake. We caught a crammed minivan with the help of a lady who seemed to be running the show, then she put us on a little 4 person wagon attached to motorbike thing, then we took another minivan along a prettty bumpy section of road to Shuanglang.

Fortunately the taxi driver directed us to the start of a walk down some very narrow passageways to find the Sea and Sky Lodge. On the way there we saw huge cobwebs above us full of the biggest stripey spiders I have ever seen...

A donkey on the streets of Shuanglang

Yikes!

The Sea and Sky lodge is a cool place right on the lakefront with good food and nice people. We enjoyed the evening there, and in the morning took the old double fibreglass kayak out for a spin. The lake was a little smelly, but otherwise very nice for paddling. We watched lots of fishermen rowing boats out and hauling in big nets.

The lake shore from the Sea and Sky Lodge

Evening at the lodge

The man who hired the kayaks out to us told us to watch for "large sheep on island" - after puzzling over this for a bit we figured it out.

The calm (but rather smelly) lake

The waves and wind picked up in the afternoon following the trend of previous days, and we were pretty wet and chilly when we pulled back into the lodge. A quick shower and a nice “baked spaghetti” at the “western cafe” and we journeyed back home to Dali to meet back up with Joe and hopefully Matt and Lara.

Chinese food at the Sea and Sky lodge - tofu and tomato and spicy sliced potato, yum!

Tiger Leaping Gorge

Sadly, Matt and Lara still were in Hong Kong, and now it looked like we would hopefully see Lara in the weekend, but Matt would have to zoom off to guest lecture in another city and we would miss him. In the meantime we decided to travel to Lijang (a very touristy and famous city) and then on to the popular spot of Tiger Leaping Gorge.

A view during the bus ride to Lijang

Arriving in Lijang after a 5 hour bus ride from Dali was a pretty amazing thing – it was dark so the city was all lit up, glowing lanterns and trees, packed with people, and an aray of open shops and markets selling all kind of amazing things – fried grasshopppers, black goats feet, chicken feet, frogs...and those were the things we could identify!

An amazing sight greeted us in Lijang

We found Mama Naxi's – a nice cheap hostel full of foreigners and a friendly Mama who fed us bananas all the time. After a good sleep on a very hard bed we took an extremly bumpy minivan ride to the start of Tiger Leaping Gorge. We followed a spectacular track high up above the gorge. There were a couple of very pushy old saleswomen along the way who harrassed us a bit, and we learnt the best technique was to avoid taking any pictures or stopping at all anywhere near these women.

One of the many nice guest houses along the route, a great spot for a beer!

Looking up Tiger Leaping Gorge

The track sidles on one steep side of the valley looking directly at the steep face of the other

We climbed the “28 Bends” and then drank a nice cold beer at the Tea Horse Inn. We talked to a helpful guide there who told us we could climb up to the peaks above from the following lodge if we wanted to, so we decided that was a great plan for the following day.

I loved the Half Way Inn with it's magnificient view and bright red dried chillies hanging from the roof. From the dinning room big windows looked straight across at the sheer walls on the very close opposite side of the valley.

Chilly peppers hang to dry at the Half Way Inn

Chris felt he needed to get a good amount more height into his legs, so the next day we climbed above the lodge on the little trail the guide told us about. It lead to a series of quarry sites were workers were living under tarpaulines mining the river for tungsten. The river was completely silt filled and the place looked dirty and depressing.

Workers tents dotted down the stream which is being intensely sluiced

We climbed up so high on a smelly donkey track which had an extremely consistent steep gradient. After several hours climbing we finally reached a large plateau area where the trail flattened out. There were trucks and diggers and a massive quarry area. We were above 4000m and the hillside was a mess. Above us (but still in the mist) loomed the summit of Haba Snow mountain that we would have liked to climb had we had the time.

Mules carry up logs to the mine at the top

After a little snack we headed down a narrow and more interesting trail, but not before a train of mules and their guide who had been bringing up supplies to the mine.

Finally reaching the top of the mine works at about 4000m

We ran down the mountain as quick as we could for the fun of it and arrived back at the Half Way house for a late lunch. We all ordered the most humongous soups I have ever seen and left the Inn feeling extremely bloated - but happy.

Lots of soup and vegies for lunch

The final section of the track was very spectacular – we wound in and out of steep gullies until we descended back down into the gorge. Once there we paid a little extra to the locals so we could descend the steep ladder right down into the gorge and to the river. There we could see the point where the massive brown river is squeezed into a super narrow gap in a canyon with sides over 5000m high!

Joe climbs down the ladders into the gorge

The story is that a hunter once chased a tiger into the gorge, and to escape the hunter the tiger leapt right across the river. We had the place to ourselves because the last bus had already left for Lijang, but we saw no tigers. Joe and Chris did sneak across the forbidden bridge to get a good peak at the river from the Tiger Leaping Rock – naughty boys.

Tiger Leaping Gorge and Stone

We climbed back up the ladders to Jane's Guest House and felt pleased with our day's efforts – over 2000m climbed and descended. We managed to find a lift with some young Chinese guys and a rather over eager driver and we made it back to Lijang in a record 3 hours. I tried not look out the front window too much.

Back at Mama Naxi's we ate more bananas and found some good food. In the morning light the streets of Lijang looked a bit different and the crowds were much less so it was nice to poke our noses into some shops and explore a bit more.

On the evening we arrived back in Lijang Joe purchased three of these innocent looking baked apples - I don't think so! They were the most horrid play-do balls with a strange nut thing in the center - Joe and Chris managed to gag down all three much to my horror!

We had a long bus trip home – first accidently taking a taxi to the train station not the bus – then the rickety bus we were on broke down. Finally we reached Dali in the evening, and we were happy to finally get to hang out with Lara. We ate at “Superman Vegetarian” - what a great name (-:

Chris sits besides some entertained Chinese on the bus trip back to Dali

Back to the Higher Land Inn

We decided to walk back up to the Higher Land Inn with Lara for our last weekend in China. We had loved the old fellow's laugh so much from the first visit – and the family dinner was so good too! There was another man working with the older man this time and Lara conversed easily with him in Chinese.

Leaving the uni campus to walk up to the Inn, Chris performs the "lotus" position

He showed us heaps of great photos from his mountaineering trips in the Sichuan Province – up many 6000m plus peaks. We got all inspired for a future trip in that region of China to climb some bigger mountains!

The final day in Dali we spent in the old town and enjoyed learning that New Zealand had just managed to win the rugby world cup against France.

Some neat flowers we saw along the path

Joe headed on his way to the North – Europe – where we had just come from, while we continued on our journey home – now to Tasmania for the Adventure Racing World Champs which Chris will compete in with Team Seagate. On the way we spent a night in Bangkok and from the plane window I got some views of the massive floods spreading out across the lands.

Storsylan Traverse...to China!

2011-10-05T07:44:00.000-07:00

Two days before we were due to leave for Nepal a fairly large earthquake hit more or less precisely the Kanchenjunga area we were heading to meet up with Jamie and Penny. Our first thoughts were concern for their safety in that huge crumbling landscape - luckily they escaped and have lived to tell an amazing tale which you can read about on Jamie and Penny's blog.

For us it spelled the end of our original trip and a rethink given we were so disorganised trying to shift from this continent we have lived on for nearly 3 years back to the other side of the world. How have we accumulated so much stuff?

This has been a familiar site over the last two weeks - brown boxes!

For the time being we had to move from our flat and the opportunity to return to Tømmerholt - Wing's orienteering club house up in the forest - was very tempting. It was quite fitting two, given it is where we began our life in Norway some years ago, although there was a little more snow round then.

This time the trees are showing their autumn colours and the days have either been beautiful crisp and clear, or gray and raining. The hut is so cosy, with the added ability to simultaneously produce 6 waffles at a time!

During the extra two weeks we also did a bit of paddling - and kayaked out to the NTNU Gigaphone in Lademoen

We climbed Jervfjellet after biking around the Jonsvanet via a very alternative route!

Somehow between all the organising and reorganising we managed to squeeze in one more final final really final trip. It was Garmin Bear at his best - heading away from Tømmerholt at 5pm on a Saturday, beginning walking at 7 just at it got dark, without a map. We were in Sylan, a high treeless plateau near the Swedish border. It was a place our friend Bård had always told us was great, so we decided we really should visit it before we went.

The landscape was wide and pitch black. After about 1.5 hours walking Chris decided that based on the map in his head this one wasn't going the right way @#$%! So we took off across the countryside to his 'attack point' which was the side of this huge mountain that we could sort of 'feel' looming up beside us.

We found a fence which Chris thought he remembered, so we followed it up a gentle hill until finally our torch beams reflected a tiny hut sitting on the hill top. After dinner and putting on warm clothes we took this shot - it was 12.36 am!

Of course the result of all this lateness results in further lateness the following day. We had a lazy morning, justified equally by the low hanging mist as by our late night. Being mapless made me less than keen to set off up towards some mist clad summit.

The cute little hut by daylight

By midday the sun was starting to peak through, so we headed away from Fiskåhøgda blinking at the visual complexity of our surroundings compared to what we had missed in our blind journey in to the hut. Lemmings popped out squeeking at us everywhere - one lay belly side up squeeking tremendously before flipping back up and scuttling into the nearest hole leaving me chuckling at these most crazy animals.

Walking up the early slopes towards Storsylen

The mist swirled around but was slowly clearing

We could spot far away reindeer and the occasional ptarmigan complete with white fluffy winter coat. Eventually we reached the rocky ridge which leads to Storsylen (1762 m). The swirling mist made the ascent very atmospheric. We climbed over several false summits before reaching the top of Storsylen just as the mist completely cleared and we could see right down to a blue glacier on the Northern flank of the mountain.

The first false summit - I was busy writing our names in the 'summit book'

The last of the mist billows off Storsylen

Storsylen summit complete with pirate flag

We could finally see down

The day was drawing on as we continued down the ridge which had some fairly tricky spots to downclimb, the drop just off the summit involving me using a Garmin Bear-shoulder-foothold to aid my descent.

Big rock clambering on the way down (I know Amber will appreciate these (-: )

Just to make things a little more complicated I had a preorganised dinner with my great friend Laila that evening back in Trondheim. She was very amused and tolerant of my frequent texting with our progress off the mountain and ever lengthening eta.

Off the mountain finally, stripey poly-pro man marches along

The late afternoon sun threw golden shadows across the already red and yellow hillsides, and lake Nesjøen was still and dark in the cool air. It really is a beautiful and wild area not to be scorned at (Ally). We jogged down across the last marshes and arrived at our car by 6 - hooned home to a very quick shower and off to Laila's for a lovely evening meal by 9pm! Mission accomplished.

The sun sets on the horizon just before we reached the car

Now we are all packed and ready, boxes boxed and bags packed. We are going to China! First we have to visit Stockholm to sort out our visas (and maybe squeeze in a kayak trip in the archipelago) In China we will visit our friends Matt and Lara (and probably Joe the Nomad too) in the town of Dali for a couple of weeks before we go to Tasmania and then finally home.

So bye for now Trondheim! We will miss you so much.

One Sunny Day in Sunndalsøra

2011-09-29T04:10:00.000-07:00

This was supposed to be our last weekend in Norway, or so we thought. We had decided we better spend it somewhere cool with some cool people. Beautiful Sunndalsøra about 2 hours drive from Trondheim with our great trip buddies Helen and Ally seemed like a perfect plan.

Of course we were already in a mad scramble trying to organise ourselves to leave Norway over the previous month, since we have been back from France.

We also fitted in a crazy Friday night mountain bike adventure with Tim and Ally up Vassfjellet and some weekday orienteering. We flew down to Oslo for the Norwegian Orienteering Nationals, Helen did a nice write up of that on her blog.

I got a bit carried away with the delicious blue berries on the way up Dronningkrona

The day was amazing, one of the crispiest, clearest days I have ever had here. Helen and I make our way carefully up the loose and freshly snow covered boulders.

We found a nice little house on the way up with a sunny porch to sit and admire the view

Looking down the back side of Dronningkrona to the glacier below. The early autumn snow had fallen quite low on the hillsides, further down the trees were still golden and red.

We descended beside the glacier via the route which Chris (aka Garmin Bear) was sure would be better than our ascent route. Much to our sceptisim it actually was!

The boys striking a pose!

The descent was pretty long and steep (Dronningkrona is 1816) - although we didn't quite make the top because we were worried it would become dark before we got down! The evening sunset on the Sunndalsfjord was beautiful.

We drove around the fjord and installed ourselves in the local DNT hut Brandstadbu. The hut was a really nice one, in the forest and a perfect cosy size. We had a yummy dinner including polishing off some tasty port.

On Sunday Ally and Chris had to run back up to the little hut from the previous day -Ally accidentally left his fancy camera up there! Camera safely retrieved, we returned to Trondheim from our fun weekend trip to face the maelstrom of packing our flat and organising for our departure to New Zealand via Nepal.....

WOC 2011 Aix Les Bains

2011-08-24T10:22:00.000-07:00

So here we were again - back in the land of pâtisserie and pain au chocolat for the 2011 world orienteering champs in Aix Les Bains. We spent 3 days in our favorite town of Annecy to begin with - some of the team staying in a little hotel while we camped in a campground across the road.

We ran up on two of the WOC training maps - they were super technical. The forest was fairly dense and very rocky underfoot with great big holes hidden by leafy ground everywhere. It took me nearly two hours to do the first training, and I thought I did it ok!

Some of the Kiwi team in Annecy after a squeeze-through-the-crowd sprint training

Annecy was absolutly packed with summer holidaying Europeans and wasn't quite the utopia we remembered from 2005 when Chris raced here in the Raid Expedition race. On Friday the others drove through to Aix Les Bains, and I cycled via some back roads the 50km between the towns. There were some nice little French villages and farmland along the way.

We stayed at Hotel le Dauphinois, which was a funny old place, complete with rose garden and old ladies dressed to the nines sitting around drinking cups of tea. I think we looked a bit out of place, but it was a nice place to stay and in a very convenient location right in the center of Aix Les Bains.

Day 1: Michael punches the final control after a solid run in the long qualification

Tane and his brother Ryan and I found a prime location during both the long and middle qualification races to cheer on the Kiwis and get some good photos.

Penny storms in as the third Kiwi girl to make the middle final!

Day 2, the middle qualification day, was an exciting one - first Lizzie qualified well, then Amber came in really high up - easily qualifying for her heat, then Penny came in with a great time as well. Chris was his usual tinny self - placing 15th in both the long and middle distance qualification races (the last spot to qualify is 15th).

The three successful girls talk with Hanna about their races

Wearing our choice as Tiki t-shirts for the opening ceremony!

During the main WOC races Jamie, Hanna, Dieter and I were also running in the spectator events, which were usually held very early in the morning before the WOC events in the afternoons. This lead to some very long days for us, we would have to get up at 6, drive for about an hour to the event, run, sit round in the baking sun for 5 hours, then watch the WOC races for a few more to make it home by about 7, when Jamie and Dieter would have to rush off to the team officials meeting. Quite the busy schedule!

On the day of the Sprint Qualification and Final we had to leave our hotel at 7 am due to some stupid rule - Chris, Michael and I headed down to the waterfront for some chilled morning chat before having a yummy breakfast at a nearby cafe - not such a bad way to spend the morning.

Tane punches a control during the sprint qualification in the pretty town centre of Aix Les Bains

In the afternoon Penny and I took the bus to Chambery town centre, the location of the afternoon's WOC sprint final. Both Ross and Lizzie would be running, so it was set to be an exciting afternoon. The big screen had been erected in the town square, and you can see Lizzie nervously waiting for her start.

The course wound around the complex old town streets, including little hidden passageways and back ally's. Lizzie had an brilliant race and finished in an awesome 11th place - she went on to place 13th in the long and 18th in the middle - a truly impressive WOC performance. Ross also ran very well in the sprint, losing a little time towards the end but still finishing strongly in 25th position.

After the sprint final the event arena moved up to the ski arena at La Féclaz. This was over 1500m above sea level, but even despite that the day time temperature was around 30 degrees. There seemes to be something uncanny about WOC which means it is always the hottest week in the region, whatever that region may be. This year was no different.

Chris and Helen were both starting the men's and women's long final respectively in first position because of their 15th qaulifying spot. They both had the goal of keeping that lead until the end - and both managed it, providing us with great excitement as they entered the arena and got the media spotlight for some time until a faster finisher showed up.

Neither Helen nor Chris particularly like running in the blazing heat, and both felt this had affected their runs - But they still did well; Chris finished in 28th position and Helen in 23rd.

The two happy first finishers of the long final - Chris and Helen

Chris races in to the finish line of the middle final - he was the first finisher again! He ended up in 29th place overall.

The last day of WOC finally came around - it had been a very busy and exciting week, but I have to admit that by the last day I was a bit done with orienteering, I discovered I do have a threshold and I had gone over it. Never mind, the relay was exciting to watch and the banquet entertaining as always. We (along with several other nations) had chosen to dress 'stereotypical French', with some cool glasses, little skirts and french baguettes for accessories. The guys chose fluffy hello kitty earmuffs...not so sure about that....but there you go (-:

Hmmm...

Well done team Tiki - it was great to hang out with you (-:

The Cheesy Delights of Switzerland

2011-08-23T07:57:00.000-07:00

One-Pan (short for one Emily carrying one pannier on bike) riding in the Swiss Alps

After our great trip in Iceland we took a midnight flight across Europe to land in Stuttgart early on Monday morning. We were laden down with bikes and panniers, and 6 train changes later we wearily unloaded our gear onto the streets of Chur, Switzerland. Not long after this young Lovely Lovell-Smith appeared with two wonky panniers and a big grin.

The three of us set off up the road to try to find Jamie and Penny at Flims Camping ground. Unfortunately we had a few mishaps along the way - my brake pad finally called it quits- and we got a little lost and ended up down in a huge ravine cycling along a very narrow track beside the railway line.

After a big grind out of the ravine we were still looking for Penny and Jamie and their camp ground as the light faded and it became dark. Fireworks started going off around the valley - it turned out it was the Swiss national day. Finally we got hold of Dieter, the Swiss coach for the New Zealand WOC team this year and he showed us to his campsite and a place for us to pitch our tents! 'A great start to a typical Em and Chris trip' said Lovely as we crawled into bed.

Dieter, Lovely, Chris and me on the first of four chair lifts and gondolas

The next day we woke to breakfast (yoghurt, muesli, croissants and fresh bread) delivered to our tent door by Dieter. Then we were heading up on the Flims cable car to run Day 3 of Swiss O Week - at over 3000 meters!

Post race Lovely and I search on the glacial rocks for a control...

This necessitates some leaping on my behalf, and some gazing on Lovely's!

The following day we took a trip on the local via ferrata - along with Dieter, Jamie, Penny, Michael, Toby, Tane, and Lizzie- a fun Kiwi bunch, plus a whole pile of other keen via ferrata-ers out for the morning.

That night Dieter drove us to his place in Davos and we had Raclette!

Raclette is delicious, what a cheesy delight. I did manage a serious cheese nightmare that evening though - a vivid dream about Chris leaping boldly across a channel, falling in and being eaten by a killer whale! Yikes!

The next morning we (being three again) set off from Dieters place up the valley with a plan to bike over a pass to a little hut where we could spend the night.

Lovely cruises into a little town near the head of the valley.

After many hours carrying and pushing our bikes up the pass we found the descent most enjoyable. Unfortunately large parts of the descent were also not very rideable, but Lovely shows off his skills on this bit.

We reached the little hut just as the sun set and night fell - just in time for some good posing (-:

We slept a very comfy night on the hard stone floor of the hut. Well at least I did on my great new Thermarest NeoAir. I am not so sure about the boys. At about 9am, when we were still asleep, we were woken by voices. Thinking they had left Chris went out to relieve himself on a nearby rock, not realising the very amused bikers were sitting just nearby taking it all in!

We set out to bag a nearby peak called Chüealphorn (3078m). The clouds were fairly low, but Lovely was convinced we would have sun on top.

The sun appeared through that little patch of blue sky just as we reached the summit. I was studying the little 'peak book' and enjoying the feeling of being up high. The coloured prayer flags sent shivers down my spine thinking of our up and coming adventure to Nepal.

Not long after we started our descent from Chüealphorn all sign of sun and blue sky was gone and it looked as if rain and thunder was on its way. We climbed down a steep gully to avoid crossing the slippery glacier we had crossed on the way up. Once we got back down to the hut we were back on the bikes - carrying them up another pass and then continueing carrying them back down the other side. This was not great mountain biking country!

In a few places we could ride for a few meters, here I am showing off some great 'quadpod' technique. Shortly after we had started carrying our bikes down the hill the rain decided to let loose, and we were rapidly soaked as we negotiated our way through a pile of angry mooing cows. Lovely was left behind to fend off the maddest ones (we are still great friends).

Feeling wet, tired and a little sorry for ourselves we came to a fairly raging river, which required the skills of Chris the expert river crosser to help ferry Lovely, me and our bikes across.

Finally we made it to the end of the valley and 50m of rideable track.

From there we carried our bikes up a very steep hillside and plonked them down onto the road which leads up to Flüela Pass. We cycled up to the pass, then put on all the clothing we possibly could for the wet, freezing but rather exhilarating descent into Davos. We stocked up with lots of yummy food from the supermarket, then rode back up the hill to Dieters wonderful warm home, a warm shower, a big warm feast and a warm bed, mmmm.

The next day we drove in Dieter's car no. 2 back to Flims to meet up with the other New Zealanders and Dieter himself again. Chris competed in Day 6 of Swiss O week, while Lovely and I did a big cycle (95 km and over 2500m climb) to meet them all near the top of Furka Pass (2436m) - via Oberalp pass (2046m). We stayed in a youth hostel which sits almost at the top of the pass, and ate a big cheese fondue for dinner.

In the morning it was time to say goodbye to Lovely who was due back at work in Freiburg the following day. It was raining as he set off on the last part of the climb, then he had another climb and then a big descent into Interlaken where he would take the train. The rest of us piled into two cars and headed away on the long drive to Annecy in France where we would stay for one week's training before the world orienteering champs in Aix Les Bains. Here we are enjoying lunch at a cafe along the way.

Iceland Part 4: The Journey's End

2011-08-23T07:55:00.000-07:00

The ride from the end of the F88 along the ring road to Mývatn was a long and hard one, because we were already tired, a bit hungry, and for the first time in many days we had a head wind - a strong head wind. I drafted Chris as much as I could, but it was hard with the traffic roaring past us and it reinforced in our minds why we didn't cycle on the ring road.

After what felt like an eternity of unchanging landscape we finally rounded a corner and could see steam rising in the distance, and hundreds of tiny people wandering over a brightly coloured clay area. Soon we reached the pull-off and parked up our bikes for a good look at some bubbling mud and strange steaming knoll things.

Mud pots

The bubbling mud was good, but not quite up to Taupo standard in my opinion. We climbed back on our bikes and rode over the last small hill into Mývatn, headed straight for the supermarket. The supermarket seemed amazing and we bought all sorts of things we had been craving - yogurt, nectarines, a sweet sticky bun, a bottle of coke and some crisps!

Skubba, a local at Mývatn

Next plan was to find a campground and miraculously there one appeared right across the road on the lake shore. With our camping pass we got cheaper rates on the local version of the Blue Lagoon hot springs - the Jarðböðin Nature Baths.

We pitched our tent on the nice rolly green lawn, cooked up a feast and then cycled up the road to Jarðböðin for a swim. That was a great end to the day and we soaked in the warm water until midnight, then cycled back in the dark - we could notice the night's getting much darker now than when we arrived.

The rolly lawn at Mývatn

Enjoying the Jarðböðin Nature Baths

Cycling back in the dark - using our right lights for the first time on the whole trip

We planned to spend our last real day in Iceland (the following day we would be on the Express Bus back to Reykjavik) doing a bit of hot spring exploration. We knew there were supposed to be a couple of very good ones in the area - one which is in an underground cavern. After a bit of inquiry we set off on foot, it was wonderful to be off the saddles for a bit!

After about an hour we found the first one, it's called Grjótagjá and it's a very hot pool in an opening in the lava flow. There are some precariously hanging boulders on the roof which put people off a bit, but we weren't too concerned.

The entrance to Grjótagjá

For me however the pool was far too hot (Chris estimated about 45 degrees!) so I couldn't go in. Chris did and came out looking a bit like a red lobster - but we did manage to get some nice photos of him in the pool.

Chris in the amazing Grjótagjá pool

After wards Chris is a red lobster

We talked to a friendly group of Icelanders out for a run (I think they were impressed that Chris actually went in that cauldron) and they told us of some other nice pools not so far away. So we walked back to find the pools called Storagja. Here you have to climb down a ladder into a canyon and in amongst the strewn boulders we found a small rope which you could use to lower yourself into a pool.

Chris lowers himself into the pool

In the beautiful Storagja pool

Storagja was beautiful, but the pool itself wasn't quite warm enough - now we felt a bit like Goldilocks. We headed back to the campground for lunch, then readied ourselves for our final ride to Akureyri.

It was 100km to Akureyri but mostly on seal, so we hoped we could do it pretty quickly. As we left Mývatn we talked to a fellow on a bamboo bike who was incredulous we would attempt 100km at 4 o'clock in the afternoon. Fortunately we had a strong tail wind, and our average speed for the first 60 km was 32 km per hour.

On the long cycle to Akureyri

We arrived at the Goðafoss falls as the afternoon sun was just setting. The falls were very spectacular, a curtain of white water cascading down amongst green mossy pillars. We sat eating and enjoying the falls for a bit before continuing on our ride. The area seemed very green after the past days, but there were still no trees.

Greener lands than the previous days

Goðafoss (Chris is the little blue figure)

After 80km we turned off the main road and climbed up 600m on a shingle road which lead to a radio tower. From there we could drop down into the valley in which the town of Akureyri sits.

The view from the saddle down to the fjord of Akureyri

We could hear throbbing rock music coming from the town - apparently there was a big rock concert going on and the town would be very loud all night. So after a bit of time spent hunting around we found a spot in the bushes to pitch our tent and spend the night. We could look across the fjord to town and enjoy the music as we cooked dinner.

The ride only took 4.5 hours, so we laughed a bit about bamboo bike man who thought it must take at least 7. We slept very well after our busy day and it seemed like no time before our alarms went off. We had to hop up, depitch and head into Akureyri to catch the bus at 8 am. It all worked out nicely and we were soon sitting on the comfy bus which would take us all the way back to Reykjavik with a few stops along the way.

Our bus, with our bikes strapped to the front

The bus would drive through the inland route F35 called Kjölur which we would have liked to cycle if we had had more time. Still, it was nice to see the route anyway, and we had already sussed out that it would stop at the Hvervellir hot spring for 45 minutes - enough time for a soak!

We leaped off the bus when it stopped and undressed along with a couple of other keen bean travelers and enjoyed the prefect temperature of the pool. It was deliciously hot and we could take in the wide landscape with the humongous glaciers in the distance.

Mmmm, the perfect temperature at last!

We had a few more stops along the way including an extremely crowded Gullfoss - I don't think I have ever seen so many tourists at one waterfall and of course the famous Geysir. Geysir itself doesn't actually erupt any more, but another geysir called Strokkur proved to be much more spectacular than we imagined and we got some good video footage of it along with the hundreds of other tourists.

Chris enjoys Gullfoss (yogurt snack in hand)

The Emerald Pool - I had been looking forward to seeing this one

Strokkur erupts (but you can't see its top! - x this picture by about 3)

We reflected that it had been nice to see some of the main tourist attractions of Iceland, but our adventure on the bikes exploring and discovering under our own steam had been so much more rewarding.

Finally we arrived in Reykjavik at 8pm after 12 hours on the bus. We had time for a quick wander through the capital and time to buy a delicious take away pizza to eat in the park, before getting on another bus to Kelfavik camping area. There we picked up the gear we had left behind and cycled down to the airport.

The main pedestrian street in Reykjavik

Chris cycles along the cycle path in Reykjavik

We did a quick bike pack outside the main entrance to the airport with a little audience laughing at all our smelly gears strewn every where and then packed away again into two bike bags. At midnight we flew out of Iceland bound for Germany. It had been an amazing two weeks we will never forget and I can't believe it took me four blog posts to get it all down! Hope you enjoyed it too (-:

Mmmm, a yummy pizza in a park before we fly away!

Iceland Part 3: Crossing the Sprengisandur and the Ódáðahraun desert

2011-08-23T07:53:00.002-07:00

After a very rainy and slightly dismal morning in Landmannalaugar fixing up my broken brake we decided to continue inland, into the desert of the Sprengisandur. This was definitely to be the most cold and miserable day we had in Iceland - if we'd known this at the time it might have been better!

We had bought some extra food supplies at the Landmannalaugar 'store' which consists of a bus full of extremely expensive basic food items. We calculated we may not come across a shop for another 6 days, so we it was worth the expense!

We had a strong tail wind pushing us away from the warm hot springs of Landmannalaugar, and we were quickly flying along the flat, quite good shingle road which leads to the F19. The sands were black and there wasn't much to see as the rain came down and mist hung low on the flat landscape. Some motor cyclists hooned past us, but we were making pretty good progress.

The landscape was pretty bleak in this area and very windy!

Soon we reached the small climb and then a fairly rough road (large loose metal) which was made rougher because of the insanely strong side wind which made it impossible to keep the front wheel on the ground. Soon we were off walking, some ugly power plants with big lines to my right added to the generally unappealing feel of the area.

Eventually we reached the small section of sealed F19. Here we had to decide if we wanted to head South for 10km to fill up our fuel bottle - we decided to risk not refilling it and managing with what we had. We found a drain beside the road where was sat and tried to eat some grit sandwiches in the rain, but soon we were so freezing we had to keep going.

Rainy and cold in the desert

Another strong side wind section and we were off pushing the bikes - we still had 60km to ride and I was feeling pretty low! Fortunately we changed direction a little and were able to ride again, and after a few more hours the wind eased entirely and we were making good progress again.

The landscape in this area is bleak - rolling rocky desert in all directions. We past a few tents beside the road with bikes outside - other cyclists who had given up for the day. Finally we reached the closed hut we had been aiming for - we decided to cycle 10 km more up the road to a ford where there was potential camping.

After a very tiring day, over 90km of rough riding we were very happy to climb into our warm little tent. Chris cooked up a feast out in the vestibule, and we went to sleep very quickly to the sound of pattering rain on the tent roof - that was quite a mission of a day.

Finally time to jump into the tent

In the morning there was a new kind of pattering on the tent roof, this time it was millions of mosquitoes! They must have loved the rains of the previous day and now they were out on force! Just as well we had our mosquito face masks, we were able to pack up and eat a hasty breakfast without too much wild flapping.

Map studying time

It was a further 30km to Nýidalur, a wardened hut and common stopping place in the middle of the Sprengisandur. After a couple of hours cycling with not much to see but more seas of rocks the sight of a green hillside looming ahead was wonderful. There was a sign saying we were entering the National Park, we were both very happy to have made it this far.

The green hills of Nýidalur were a very rewarding sight after the bleakness of the last days.

A strange sight greeted us as we neared Nýidalur - fluorescent vest clad workers were raking stones over old tire marks which hard scarred the stony surface of the hillside. We found out later that these tire tracks take years to disappear and leave ugly scars for all to see - off road driving in the National Parks is therefore strictly prohibited. Unfortunately not everyone obeys this rule.

We parked up at the little cluster of buildings that is Nýidalur and were greeted by the very friendly hut warden. For a small fee we were allowed to go inside the warm hut and cook up some yummy lunch on the gas stoves provided. There were several other groups there - most of them traveling by jeep or motorbike, and we shared some good stories with them over lunch.

Chris shows off his rain booties off at Nýidalur

We also managed to find out from the warden that the route we hoped to cycle to Askja should be quite ride-able. The road was officially still closed, but she told us a couple of cyclists had already made it through a few days ago and the rivers were now cross-able - great news!

So feeling much renewed by the warmth, food and company we headed off on the much less frequented F910. We crossed a lot of rivers and eventually made it to the final and largest river. Fortunately Chris was strong enough to carry the bikes across one at a time and then come back and get me. We made it to the bridge crossing of the Skjálfandafljót river, from there we would take an even smaller road than the F910, the Gæsavatnaleið road which skirts the Vatnajökull glacier.

Cycling away from Nýidalur

It had been raining for several hours now and we were completely soaked. We knew that not far from here was a little hot spring, so we decided to ride a bit further to try and find it and camp beside it. We rode for some distance before deciding that the turnoff must have been unsignposted, so we rode back again and found a very indistinct road leading in the right direction.

In the dimming light of late evening in the drizzle we came upon the most extraordinary little hot pool. In the middle of the barren land, on a little green grassy outcrop was a beautiful little pool, scooped out with a seat. We plopped our tent right outside the pool (the temperature of the pool was only about 34, so we decided a quick exit from the pool and entry into tent would be optimal).

Our amazing camp spot by a hot spring

We couldn't imagine anyone would turn up here in the middle of nowhere at this time of night. Just as we were putting in the last pegs I heard the roar of vehicles and looked up to see 3 sets of bright headlight on the horizon! Soon they pulled up in the car park and jumped out, highly amused to see us there.

They were German tourists, also on the hunt for hot pools. We stood there - them in their nice warm clothes and us in our freezing soaking ones shivering away- having a good chat, until they decided it was too cold for them and went back into their jeeps and drove away. So much for that! We got in the pool, and slowly our frozen feet and hands warmed up and we could enjoy this most unusual camp spot.

Chris cooked dinner on the side of the pool, and then we hurriedly jumped into the tent and snuggled into our warm sleeping bags.

There were more mosquito and 'no seeums' about in the morning, so we packed quickly and headed back to the junction by the bridge from the day before. The weather was still overcast, but still and dry, so this was a big improvement.

We reached the Gæsavotn lakes by lunch time - another beautiful grassy spot with an absolutely crystal clear stream and several small lakes. There was a closed winter sports lodge there. After lounging on the grass eating lunch and doing a little bike maintenance we headed up the climb to the tongue of the Vatnajökull glacier. The road was very rough here, but still ride-able.

The space toilet at the Gæsavotn lakes

We met two friendly hikers who were amazed to see us biking. Soon we reached the foot of the enormous glacier and found some funky lava formations which actually made for some great riding. We cycled across the glacial silt out-washes, a strange kind of very flat sand with little turbid streams running everywhere. These proved damp enough to be quite ride-able, and we made great progress through the moon like terrain.

Riding up towards the glacier

Rock cairns

Chris riding on the smooth lava with the Vatnajökull glacier in the background

One of the very flat out-wash zones

By late afternoon we arrived at Kistufell hut - an Icelandic mountain hut which is open to the public for a small honesty fee. It was great to be in a hut after so many days in our tent and we hung our clothes and things out to dry. We cooked up some dinner and enjoyed the solitude of the cosy hut in the middle of nowhere.

Kistufell hut in the setting sun

Cosy to be inside a hut!

At about 8.45 we heard the terrible sound of vehicles - and looked out the window to see two monster trucks reeving up towards the hut, oh no! Soon an Icelandic Guide had told us to move our stuff out the way for the guided Dutch family who would be staying in the hut with us. Grudgingly we moved our stuff and tried to remain polite.

The Dutch family were actually very friendly and soon we were chatting away with them and the guides left with the monster trucks. The family had so much food it was unbelievable, and kindly gave us lots of nice things to eat - and a cold beer!

We had a really good sleep and in the morning we were able to have fresh bananas and yogurt for breakfast! The wind had been gradually picking up all morning and now we could hear it howling around the hut, we had the feeling that the day ahead might be another challenging one. We knew the road ahead became even rougher with many river crossings followed by 'the sands' which could take hours of walking through unrideable sand....maybe in a sandstorm?

Monster truck vs. Chris and hut...

The friendly Dutch family roared off in their monster trucks looking at us dubiously, obviously thinking we would never make it. We set off down the hill towards the Urðarháls shield volcano. It was extremely windy and very bumpy, so the going was pretty slow, but on our full suspension bikes we rode along quite well.

We reached the large crater in an area which really could be the moon, and sheltered out of the wind. We consumed an entire packet of biscuits (also a monster truck family donation) and then continued down onto the river plains.

The crater of Urðarháls shield volcano

Dropping down onto the out-wash plains

The rivers were amazing - totally flat glacial out-wash plains, with small shallow channels spreading across them. On either side were the rocky lava fields and far in the distance the twinkling ice of the glaciers. We followed regularly spaced yellow road markers across this surreal landscape, riding fast because the sand was firm and the tail wind amazingly strong.

Chris enjoying the riding

Riding on the plains

This was a fantastic section of riding and we covered the distance at a really good speed, so in no time we were off the plains and into 'the sands'. Actually, because of our fat tires and the recent rain we were even able to slowly ride the sands too, so in only 5 hours (compared to the guidebooks estimate of 8) we were nearly at Dreki hut.

Suddenly Chris's smile dropped away... he had just noticed that the tent was no longer on the back of his bike! Hmmm, this was not very good. We got out the camera and scanned through our recent photos, back and back..... to a photo of Chris shortly after leaving the hut... no tent!

So the tent must have fallen off near the start of the ride! There was no chance of going back,so we just kept on riding to Dreki to see what they could suggest. Dreki is a dry and amazingly sculpted valley - it is from here that you can visit the Öskjuvatn and Viti explosion crater from a huge eruption of the Askja volcano in 1875.

Dreki huts and camping area

We talked to the rangers at Dreki, and they very helpfully sent out several messages to huts in the area in case any driver turned up with our tent - in the mean time she offered us a place in the nice warm hut for the price of camping - lucky us! After a big feed up in the hut kitchen along with many other tourists we decided to do the 2 hour walk to Viti.

Leaving Dreki and heading onto the ridge which leads to Askja

From the hut you climb up a ridge, and then to a saddle where you drop into the Öskjuvatn lake and then sidle around to Viti. It was very windy, but the low light was beautiful and the barren mountain sides very spectacular. Chris said it reminded him of Abu Dabi.

A quick descent to the lake

Öskjuvatn

We reached the Viti crater after a quick descent down some snow. There were some people already swimming in the aqua blue water, so of course we had to have a dip too. The lake is supposed to be warm - but it was only about 25 degrees and with the very cold wind this wasn't quite warm enough to be pleasant. Chris found some mud on the west side of the lake that you could burrow into and it was quite warm.

Viti (the little dots are swimming people)

Hopping out was freezing and we hurried back up and out of the crater and along the 3 km trail to the car park where some kind French family let us squeeze into their car and we drove back to Dreki for a noisy evening in the hut sharing stories with many other travelers. We smelled so strongly of sulfur from swimming in Viti!

Chris looks pretty warm after getting out of the 'hot spring' right?

Looking into the Dreki gorge (Dreki apparently means 'dragon' and you it's not so hard to imagine dragons around here)

Good news in the morning - our tent had been found and taken to Nýidalur by a jeep driver! So hopefully they would be able to get it down to us in a day. We cycled out of Dreki and 40 km along the road to Herðubreiðarlindir. With another strong wind it didn't take us long and we soon reached the grassy fields and babbling stream of Herðubreiðarlindir, a cloud capped Mt
Herðubreið in the distance.

Dreki in the morning

An enormous muddy river on the way out- luckily we didn't have to cross this one!

Wide landscapes and a very strong tail wind!

Here we found yet another helpful warden who knew all about us and our missing tent and was happy to have us stay in the hut again, and she thought our tent should arrive in the morning. We had a chilled afternoon exploring the little lake and surrounding cold springs and washing some clothes in the hut. Our food supplies were getting pretty limited by now - dinner consisted of plain pasta and mashed potatoes.

The oasis of Herðubreiðarlindir

Cloud capped Mt Herðubreið in the late evening

Cool evening clouds

We had a very comfy nights sleep and in the morning our tent had arrived! So that all worked out very nicely thanks to the helpful wardens. We had 90 km to cycle to get to Mývatn that day, and fortunately we had another tail/side wind. We made good progress along the loose metal road and enjoyed the deep river crossings because it was a relatively warm day.

Looking back towards Mt Herðubreið

Another of many river crossings

After 60 km of rough road we finally hit the main road - the ring road - which runs around Iceland. After 11 days crossing the interior of Iceland we had finally made it out to the North coast and we knew that only 30 km down the sealed road we would find Mývatn and a supermarket!!!

To be continued...

Iceland Part 2: þórsmörk to Landmannalaugar

2011-08-23T07:53:00.001-07:00

The lava at Landmannalauger

In Selfoss we were caught by the big black rain cloud that had chased us all morning. We had decided that we would take a bus for the next stage of our journey, as it consisted of a long flat main road that is reported to be extremely busy. So we enjoyed the luxury of the bus (especially given the rain spots).

The 'jeep bus' on the way to þórsmörk

When we reached Hvolsvollur we were all piled on to a more 'jeep like' bus because the road into þórsmörk (þ is pronounced as a 'th' sound) is rough and has several deep river crossings. We stopped at a beautiful waterfall called Storidalur.

The Storidalur cascades off a mossy cliff

þórsmörk is an amazing place, the gateway to another world. After crossing wide glacial outwash plains and barren mountain sides we reached the leafy green campspot, with it's own little hot pool (which unfortunately wasn't quite hot enough) and hut. We camped there for the night along with a lot of other hikers who were starting the famous Landmannalaugar hike the following day.

The scenery on the way up to þórsmörk is so unique

The first of many hot springs at the campground at þórsmörk

We realised that we hadn't actually come to quite the right place we had intended, and because of the huge uncrossable rivers which blocked our way, the only way to progress on our journey would be to bike (or carry) the first day of the Landmannalauger hiking trail until we made it to the 4WD road we were supposed to be traveling on.

In the morning we wound our way out of the scrubby gully leading away from þórsmörk and on to the first river crossing. We got some strange looks along the way from the walkers, but we found we were able to ride quite a lot of the route. After a nice lunch stop we could see the track climbing very steeply out of a gully through deep sand, so Chris ran ahead and did two shuttle runs carrying our extremely heavy pannier laden bikes up -just as well - I couldn't even lift mine!

Winding (and pushing our way) out from þórsmörk

Some single track riding with heavy panniers

One of the spectacular gorges we had to get across

Chris thought it was the best day ever! Finally, after about 6 hours riding/ carrying we made it to the first hut on the route, and we were able to join to the 4WD road we had planned to ride on originally. We rode across a rocky moonscape in the late afternoon sun, eventually descending to a pleasant grassy ford where we made camp for the night.

Strewn boulders

A rocky descent, in the background you can see a tiny speck of the glacier

The gorge bridge

Nearly on to a road

Wide views everywhere

Happy riding again

A very turbid river (this one luckily had a bridge)

A cool river crossing

Finally our happy camp spot

In the morning some gray clouds had gathered and it was cooler than the day before. We enjoyed riding on the quite compact road, across lava fields and rocky areas. We cycled past the beautiful Álftavatn and then up some very steep climbs (most of which Chris proudly managed to ride) to a junction. From there we decided to cycle up to Hrafntinnusker Hut back on the Landmannalauger trekking route.

Junction point

Álftavatn

Cycling through the lava after leaving Álftavatn

The hut is at 1027 m, so we had to push up through quite a bit of snow near the top. The wind was freezing, and the hut is perched on a rocky windy spot with little rock walls dotted here and there for you to shelter your tent behind. There were several exciting steaming fumaroles nearby.

Steam pots!

The dragon's lair

We snuck into toasty warm hut and dried out some of our wet gear and sheltered a bit from the wind. Outside even with my super warm down jacket it was cold. Luckily the young hut warden was a friendly student and he kindly pretended not to notice our sneaking in. Hundreds of people must be walking this popular route at a time in the summer, so there were plenty of other bright little tent spots dotted amongst the rocks.

On the deck of the hut trying to get some sun...

Rock shelter

After a windy night in the tent we put on lots of clothes, including our very useful neoprene over-boots for our cycle shoes. We biked down the big snow slope, across some glassy black basalt rocks and back to the junction point from the day before.

Pushing through snow shortly after leaving the hut

There we now turned South and climbed steeply to a pass of around 900 metres. The wind was freezing and after several deep ice cold river crossings Iceland was beginning to live up to its reputation. Warmly clad in jackets, longs and gloves we speed down the rocky pass and onto some wide plains. There was a bit more traffic here as it is very popular to drive into
Landmannalauger.

Some funky green moss

Finally nearing the top of the pass

Back down on the flatlands

We passed several cars having difficulty negotiating the deep fords. After a windy lunch stop the road climbed onto a dusty lava flow, from where we could look across to the large lake of , and see dust storms blowing across the road in the distance.

Approaching the dust storms

Soon we were in the dust storms, and were blackened from head to toe. The worst thing was when the grit got in your eyes. Fortunatly it was only a few kilometers before we were sheltered by a mountainside. We climbed over a little pass and drifted down into the Landmannalauger valley, with its beautiful contrasty coloured hills and dramatic spikey lava formations.

Its a very strange place - there were many large buses, hundreds of brightly coloured tents and so many people! Just as I was hauling my bike up onto the footbridge which crosses the deep river just before Landmannalauger I heard a crack. I couldn't work out what it was, but when I reached Chris on the other side of the bridge he pointed out that my entire brake lever had broken from the handlebars...not good!

Landmannalauger

Feeling a bit tired and concerned we made our way into the camp and found a relatively sheltered spot (the wind was strong but not howling) and we pitched tent, got out of our wet things and headed for the hot pool!

There was a nice big toilet/cooking area, and from there you walk across a series of mossy board walks to a pretty stream - which is beautifully hot! There is also a larger pool with some very hot water running into it and mixing with a cold spring. It was a wonderful place to spend several hours soaking - getting out into the freezing wind and quickly changing was the only hard part.

The hot spring (not the best picture - we were too busy enjoying it to take many photos)

We met an amusing Polish cycle tourist and a couple of German dentists in the cooking area and spent a fun but chilly evening cooking dinner on our stoves and comparing notes on our Icelandic adventures so far.

In the morning it was pouring with rain and pretty cold and miserable. The idea of biking anywhere was pretty unappealing and I was really regretting my decision to only bring my light weight over-trousers to Iceland. While I was moping around Chris was busy attempting a repair on my broken brake. To my amazement he appeared clutching a power drill and some copper wire. Soon he had come up with an ingenious and very secure way of reattaching my brake!

With full storm force clothing on (most of what we had) we left the amazing landscape of Landmannalauger and headed further inland into the desert lands of the Sprengisandur......

Iceland Part 1: Cycling the Reykjanes Peninsula (includes Puffins!)

2011-08-23T07:52:00.001-07:00

Chris and I have dreamed about bike touring in Iceland since about 2008, when
some friends at a BBQ in Christchurch enthusiastically told us about an adventure they had had there. The idea of remoteness, rough roads and challenging river crossings, plus occasional amazing hotpools definitely appealed to us.

So finally we decided that this year, in late July, we would go there. We only had two weeks because after that Chris needed to get to France to get in some last minute training before WOC, but we decided this was enough time for a good adventure.

I did a bit of reading and soon discovered that a circumnavigation of the Island via the busy and very touristy ring road was probably not for us. The interior of Iceland however, with its challenging roads and remoteness sounded more like it.

We flew into Keflavik on July 17 with most of our gear sorted, but a few last minute things needed sorting – such as a new spoke on Chris’s rear wheel and a brake ‘bleed’ for my bike. We had decided to take our full suspension mountain bikes and had bought some expensive ‘Old Man Mountain’ carriers especially for the full suspension bikes which we hoped would do the trick.

The landscape of Iceland is entirely unique and as I gazed out the plane window I saw a barren rocky lava field, no trees in sight, but patches of brilliant green grasses dotted here and there. We camped the night at a campground only 2 km from the airport – after arriving in the evening light at 3 am.

A morning spent fiddling on the bikes and buying a few bits in the fairly bleak and windy town of Keflavik and we decided our first destination was the touristy but very nice sounding Blue Lagoon commercial hotsprings. On the way there we befriended a Swedish man who had just spent one month cycle touring on the island, he gave us lots of helpful advice, and gave us a mosquito face net – we would later find this invaluable!

On the way to the blue lagoon we came across this 'hole in the lava'

The pools were wonderful, an amazing shade of silvery blue with this strange silicon mud you could spread on your face for beautifying oneself – not sure about that – but we soaked in the pools until we were prunes, then we cycled a bit further down the road to a rare patch of pine trees which bordered the lumpy lava flow.

Chris enjoys the silicon mud in the Blue Lagoon

The pools of the Blue Lagoon with the thermal power plant in the background

There we found a grassy spot for our tent, and cooked up a feast. A group of Icelanders with a big dog wandered past – noticeable by there very distinctive knitted sweaters that we were coming to realise all Icelanders wear, big or small.

The evening sun was beautiful as we cycled away from the pools looking for a camp spot

The slightly surreal view of the power plant on the lava field from our grassy meadow

Cooking dinner on the meadow

We were really excited about exploring this unique land and being self sufficient on bikes seemed like such a great way to do this. We had bought numerous maps, along with the ‘Hot pools of Iceland’ book, so we had already formulated some rough plans of where we wanted to ride. We discovered it was good we had come over so late because many of the roads we planned to ride did not open until late July because of snow melt and high rivers.

Our plan for the first day was to ride most of the way around the Reykjanes peninsula towards Selfoss visiting some sea cliffs along the way where there was a very small chance of seeing puffins. The roads became unsealed and rougher as we made our way round the peninsula and occasionally we could see ‘steam pots’ in the distance.

Cool woolly sheep - we should have some more colourful varieties like this in NZ!

It was sunny, but also very cool and windy, and it became progressively windier as we made our way out to the bird colonies on the sea cliffs. We saw some amazing woolly sheep along the way.
We were sitting on the cliff edge eating sandwiches and watching thousands of seabirds – mostly some kind of seagull thing – swooping and diving, when suddenly Chris jumped up and nearly dropped his sandwich off the cliff, he was certain he had seen a puffin!

The sea cliffs (I am calmly eating lunch prior to puffin sighting no. 1)

The next hour was spent scanning the cliffs catching better and better glimpses of puffins, their distinctive little red beaks and feet shining up as us. After some detailed observing we noticed three puffins landing on a ledge that we could possibly peer down to, so we ran over to the edge and peered and there, sure enough, were 3 little puffins all in a row about 10 metres below us.

Three little puffins all in a row

Look at them!!!

An amazing airborne puffin (a little zoomed on our camera)

We were so lucky to see them so close up, about two minutes later they flew off again.
After our excitement at the bird colony we continued along the coast until we started to get a bit tired, and we happened upon a sign which read ‘Free Camping’; we turned down to the beach and found a nice mowed lawn with little tables and a clean toilet area, what a great find!

We saw some beautiful wild flowers growing in the most harsh environment

It was still cold and windy, so we put on our down jackets and went for a stroll to an old church.
There were some beautiful wild horses and strangely coloured sheep in the paddock alongside our free camping.

Strandkirkja

We also discovered a basket of fresh duck eggs for sale in the toilet, so we bought a couple of those for breakfast, before heading away from the lonely beach of Strandkirkja and continuing the long paved ride into Selfoss where we wanted to catch a bus in to þórsmörk and start our journey into the interior of Iceland.

To be continued…

Meråker Extreme Race

2011-07-15T09:12:00.000-07:00

Dad crosses the bog lands on the way up Blåberge to meet Chris

On Friday night we drove with an extremely heavily loaded car to Meråker and then on to Teveltunnet for the much anticipated Meråker Extreme Challenge. Chris was to compete against race organiser and competitor Hallgeir Martin Lundamo, who held the race record of 39 hours to complete the crazy 170 km long run, which includes climbing all 26 peaks in the Meråker commune - a total of 11, 000m climb!

80 competitors were also due to start the shorter challenge, which took them as far as Teveltunnet, about 70km from the start, over 9 of the 26 tops. The organisers had sorted us out a neat wee cabin to stay in at Teveltunnet at a place called Fjell Vukku. Unfortunately we had a really rough night and we were all worried about how Chris would go in the morning.

A little Rock Ptarmigan at Teveltunnet, Dad and I were followed by a pair of these on our walk - this one has it's 'winter plumage' on.

He got to begin the race in style - flown to the start in a helicopter! Dad and I organised ourselves to go up Blåberge, the fifth peak, so Chris would get there at about 1 pm after starting at 8am and we would restock him with food and drink.

We had an interesting walk across boglands and then up a very rock spur onto the windy summit. We had on our great Offtrack (Chris's sponsor) suits which were super wind proof, so we felt pretty cool as we sat near the summit behind a boulder to shelter from the wind eating mackerel sandwiches waiting for Chris to arrive.

Dad and I wandered across this curiously scalloped snow

The next thing I heard a distant "ho ho" on the summit and quickly decided no Norwegian would say that, so we ran up to the top and found Chris there. He had a quick transition and then was off again with Bård's brother Ola Christian. It was nice to see he had someone to run with. They had about a 25 minute lead over Hallgeir Martin at this stage.

Chris and Ola Christian head off from the summit of Blåberge

As I returned to the rock with my mackerel sandwich on it I spotted a lemming scampering away, so Dad got a lemming siting - then I wondered if perhaps it had been nibbling on my sandwich?

Lemmings or no lemmings, Dad and I didn't have much time to lose - we headed back down to the car and drove through to Teveltunnet. It was only just in time - Chris had taken his predicted 4 hours from Blåberge and he reached Teveltunnet in around 9 hours 30. He was finding it a bit tougher in the warm weather and having a few problems with his eating, but generally was all good.

Team Offtrack assists Chris during his transition at Teveltunnet

After a short stop he was off again, with club mates Jostein and Mads following this time. Dad and I mucked around at our cabin eating up some of Chris's race left overs before bed.

Early the following morning I had a call from amazing Chris - it was 7.30 and he only had three hours left and he would reach the final peak! I raced out of bed, ate a quick breakfast and Dad dropped me at the bottom of Fonnfjellet - the final peak. I ran up as fast as I could and got to the top by 10.30, I was the only one there!

So I became official time keeper, photographer, communications officer and most importantly welcoming committee! It was great seeing Chris and Tomas pop over the top and realise the race finish, we were all very happy. Then Chris remembered he still had to go down to Meråker on his own two feet, he wasn't quite so happy about that.

Chris upon reaching the final summit Fonnfjellet - the official finish line

Nevertheless we all trotted down quite merrily, and after a short 'photo session' at the bottom we were driven back to a warm welcome at Teveltunnet. Everyone was amazed at Chris's new record - 26hours 48 minutes - over 11 hours faster than the previous record, and he got a lot of interviews and photographs, it was quite exciting!

Chris and Tomas making there way down towards Meråker

Heading down on some snow

Mum and Dad arrived and we had a fun afternoon hanging out by the lake and eating strawberries. Chris had a very good long sleep that night.

At Fjell Vukku there was a beautiful lake, it was also quite warm for swimming!

The next day was taken up with packing up, eating food and generally mucking around. Chris also met the major of Meråker and popped a bottle of champagne. My phone was buzzing with messages all day from friends who spotted Chris is in various Norwegian papers!

Hallgeir Martin, Chris, Mum and Dad discuss the race

The mayor of Meråker, Chris and Hallgeir Martin

Chris shakes hands with the race organiser

Mum and I trying to deal with a rather full car!

Late on Monday afternoon we finally left Meråker and drove Northwards. Quite late on Monday night we found a nice roadside cabin to overnight in, not far from Grong. Our original plan was to drive up to the Islands of Vega, where there is a large archipelago perfect for sea kayaking.

The gray fjords on the way to Vega

Ferry antics

Our very nice camp spot on Vega - the rain cleared for about 1 hour in the evening

The fishing village at Nes, nearby to the Eider duck colony where they harvest original Eiderdown from.

Maybe some Eiderdowns?

Atmospheric stony beaches with strange constructions at Vega

A wondrous sculpture, very wind proof

We got into some blueberries

Unfortunately the weather thwarted this plan with lots of rain and wind, so instead we enjoyed the trip to the Island and went for some nice exploratory walks - including visiting the hole in the mountain at Brønnysund.

The hole. This cavern is about 150 meters high and 100 metres across, it really is quite spectacular to walk through - you can see little islands of the archipelago down below.

Mum and I heading through the hole

On the drive back to Trondheim we came across a very spectacular waterfall! I guess all that rain had helped.

Mum, Dad and I enjoy a nice picnic spot on the way back to Trondheim

We arrived back to brilliant sunshine in Trondheim - typical! So we enjoyed our last day here with Mum and Dad swimming in the lake and starting to think already about our next trip! Mum has headed back to NZ now, Dad is working in Sweden for two weeks more before also going back home.

We are departing today for Iceland where we are spending two weeks cycle touring, hopefully bathing in hot pools and spotting geysers too! After that we fly to Switzerland, still with our bikes, and will make our way towards Aix Les Bains in France where the world orienteering champs will be held this year. So, the adventures continue and hopefully I will get some opportunity to update the blog during all that silliness (-:

South with Mum and Dad

2011-07-15T08:41:00.000-07:00

Mum and Dad arrived in Trondheim on June 25th, and Chris and I picked them up from the airport after Chris had completed his last training run for the Meråker Extreme Challenge. He had set out from Bjørneggen at 6.30 am and run for 8 hours over the Southern part of the course including Fongen. I met him at a wee cabin in the mist most of the way through the run and we finished the last three peaks together.

Running up Vålåkleppen in the amongst the clouds

It was great to see Mum and Dad and we drove excitedly home to our place in Trondheim. We spent the first few days mucking around here, visiting the town and exploring in the forest as well as some swimming of course! Then Mum, Dad and I headed away on a trip through Jotunheimen, Geiranger and finishing with a tramping trip near Åndalsnes. We had a great trip despite the mixed weather. I have put a lot of photos up on my picassa album and there are captions which tell a little story of our adventure. I had so many pictures I decided this was a nicer way of telling this trip.

Anyway, enough puff, this should be a captioned slideshow:

If you click on the slideshow I think it will also link through to the album.

After we came back from this trip we were very busy organsing to head up to Meråker for the Extreme Race, so we didn't have long to wash and dry our gear before we piled in the car and headed on to Meråker for the next adventure.

Tafjordfjella

2011-06-09T07:18:00.000-07:00

Spring melt water makes for impressive whitewater

Disclaimer: If you have had enough of the words snow, mountains, lemmings, skiing etc then read no further! (-:

Yes, it was to be another snowy weekend in the mountains. We had three days because of 'Himmelfarts' day so we took off on Thursday evening heading South through Oppdal and then along the road which leads to the Troll Wall. Before we reached that however, we hung a left into the Tafjordfjella mountains.

The spring rivers were running very high and there was some spectacular whitewater on the drive in. We found a grassy spot by the river to put up our Quechua 'ten second tent' and had a nice sleep with some little baa-ing sheep for company.

Sheep on the road into Tafjordfjella

The following morning we put all our ski equipment on our packs and headed up the hillside. Clouds were hanging fairly low in the valley. After no more than one hours walking and one convenient snow bridge crossing we were already at the point were we could ski! I was quite disappointed given I haven't tramped in over 7 months!

Our lucky snow bridge - no wet feet this time

Chris is ready to roll - polypros and all!

Guess what's in the hole?

This one quite liked Ski Trab skis (-:

We skied up 'Benkehøa' (1943) and then down into a white valley and across a frozen lake. My ski boots were causing me a bit of pain and our packs were both feeling pretty heavy, so when we came to see a gentle snow slope heading down to the hut after about 7 hours of skiing we were very happy!

Descending from Benkehøa

A little grass skiing before reaching Veltdalshytta

The hut was really flash and new - and quite deserted. I guess the Norwegians still know how snowy it is in there! We cooked outside as more clouds rolled in from the seaward direction.

Cosy times in Veltdalshytta

During the night the wind really picked up and there was some fresh snowfall. We happily delayed our start by laying in bed until ridiculously late. Finally the weather began clearing up and some sun rays peaked through the mist. We skied across to a reconstructed bivvy from the war called Fieldfarehytta. From what I can gather three Norwegian soldiers constructed it and lived in it for several months during the war from mid February!

Fieldfare is a neat wee bivvy perched on the edge of a deep lake beneath a cliff.

The surreal lake beside Fieldfarehytta

After a late lunch we skied up Karitinden (1982) which was more exciting than the previous day's peak because it was a pointier steeper ridge. We reached the top with clouds blowing over occasionally, and then had to kick step our way carefully down some steep rocks until we could put our skis on and ski down a gently sloping glacier.

On the way up Karitinden - right in between the good weather and the bad

The clouds came in just after we reached the top of Karitinden

The initial drop off was nice a nice gradient

Descending to the lake - very nice snow at the bottom

We reached an amazing basin at the end of the glacier and the snow conditions improved too. After a little 'refuel' on a rock overlooking the valley we skied steeply down to Sødre Botnvatnet (lake) and then down towards Pyttbua (hut). The bridge for crossing the river that was on the map was gone so we had an interesting crossing - water which has just come from snow is very cold when you stand in it for a few minutes!

Skiing down the river looking for a safe spot to cross

We had a nice evening Pyttbua, once again we had the whole huge hut to ourselves and choose to use the smaller 'overflow' hut instead so as not to feel so small in such a big space.

Morning at Pyttbua

We had rather too much fun with 'hot lips' half way up the mountain

In the morning the sky was totally blue and the sun was out - so it was a nice day to ski one more peak before we headed out down the valley. We skied up various interconnecting snow patches that steepened before the summit of Høgtunga (1912). From here we had a great view of the surrounding peaks - including the ones we had climbed the previous two days.

Chris on the summit of Høgtunga

Skis on backpacks again we down climbed a surprisingly icy and rocky ridge onto gentler slopes which enabled us to ski all the way down to Ulvådalsvatnet (858) giving us over 1000m continuous vertical descent, very nice!

Looking back towards the summit of Høgtunga. You can see our tracks starting from the bottom of the steep rocks.

Super descent down to the lake

We ate lunch of salsa mackerel and polar breads in the sun amongst the seemingly lush green grass (compared to the snow of the last two days). We then made our way through the marshes and scratchy birch around the lake shore. Sometimes it got so scratchy it was easier just to walk in the cold lake!

Walking in the lake

We made it back to the car around 6 pm and started the fairly long drive (3.5 hours) back to Trondheim along with many others obviously heading back from their long weekend trips. Yet another successful and memorable mountain trip for the Silly Billies (-:

Chris does a mega run

2011-05-30T07:32:00.000-07:00

In preparation for this crazy race: http://www.merakertiltopps.com/26-Peaks-Extremity-Race.html which Chris has been persuaded to compete in July he thought he had better do some running. 100km sounded like a gentle ease in, don't you think?

Problem was I had a bad cold on Friday, and wasn't up to much on Saturday morning, so we lounged around, organising stuff and generally mucking about. Then it was 4 pm and we decided we had better get going.

So, we drove to Oppdal and he ran while I cycled about 20km and 700m climb into Orkdalshytte on a high plateau beside the Orkdalsjøen (lake). We arrived at the hut at about 10pm, and were eating dinner round midnight.....the em and chris timetable in its full glory!

Chris on the run in to the hut

Cycling across the plateau with a heavy pack

Arriving at the hut in the evening mist

We slept in late. Of course! We were tired from being up so late the night before. A sprinkling of new snow on the tops with the sun peaking through rolling clouds was very tempting. Chris was tempted, he still wanted to attempt his massive run. Hmmmmm.

We stashed our overnight gear at the hut and headed out by 12.30. It was a long way, a very long way. We were on a gravel track till we reached a lake where we had a little stop, then we both had to walk for about an hour along the lake shore. I met a lady and had an entertaining conversation using my bad Norwegian, she thought we were totally mad and told us not to go on.

In the early stages of the run

It snowed for a while, then hailed

We went on. It snowed for about an hour, then it was brilliantly sunny, then it hailed. It was absolutely beautiful scenery, little colorful farmsteads dotted amongst snowy peaks, glistening lakes and yellow open hillsides.

Morning with sun and new snow on the hills

Chris pops out of the hut after breakfast

Chris runs beside a lake

One of the pretty farms along the way

Chris started to get a bit tired and our pace slowed. Time crept on and we were feeling pressured to make it back to the hut to pick up our stuff. Eventually we were close, so I decided to ride ahead and pick up our gear. Chris caught me up, we got our gear and slowly started on our way down to Oppdal.

Chris was feeling very sore and tired now, so I gave him the big pack and hooned ahead on my mountain bike. I got back down to the car finally at 10 pm, zoomed back up the hill to pick up one very sore but still jogging Chris and we drove home to Trondheim for midnight sandwiches and work early the next morning. Now I can definitely say we deserve the title of this blog!

Two sillies

The Lemming-a-lanche!

2011-05-16T10:37:00.000-07:00

This weekend we took off on Friday night for an overnight trip with our mad keen ski friend Bård - the aim was to try and find some more snow before it all goes. We drove out to Stjørdal and met Bård there, then onwards towards Meråker. After that we crossed the Swedish border and headed into the Snasahøgarna mountains.

The weather was a bit average - cloudy with patchy rain. We were able to ski up a river that was still full of meters deep snow - even though the surrounding land was completely snow free - it was some kind of lee valley where all wind blown snow must accumulate. There were great cracks like crevasses where the thick snow was slowly falling into the river.

Bård pokes the snow crevasse - it looks more dodgy than it was

The craziest thing of all on the way up however was the lemmings! The little furry creatures were scuttling everywhere, and there was also a multitude of dead ones sprinkled about on the snow. Bård told us they carry a disease and you shouldn't touch them or drink from water the may have contacted. There seems to be a great swarm of them this year!

Chris had to try chasing one - you would expect said lemming to run away, instead it stayed to fight ie. jumping, squeaking and ferociously eyeballing Chris's ski boot.

Lemming....

Cross lemming!

We found the wee emergency shelter we planned to stay in, it was quite cosy and seeing it was 9.30 and raining it was time for dinner and some within sleeping bag banter.

Our house for the night

It was quite windy and rainy through the night and in the morning it wasn't much better. We decided after a lazy morning in our little shelter that we should still try to ski some peaks. So we first headed up Getryggen (1382) in the complete fog. We skied down a cool narrow colouir and into a nice valley. It was at this point Chris realised he had dropped the camera somewhere on the way up!

After some deliberation of proceeding course of action we skied up Tvaraklumparna (1409) while some rain turned into a little snow. Bård had picked out a particularly challenging (for me) steep line off the top into the mist. Fortunately the line did have a good run out, but my heart was beating a bit as I made the first few turns off the ridge.

We set off a series of slush avalanches which you had to take care to avoid skiing through because they can knock you off balance. Halfway down we noticed all these little blobs in the avalanche and realised it was hundreds of lemmings being swept down in the snow!

After that it was 'camera retrieval' time - Chris climbed Getryggen 1382 from a slightly different angle to us and we met at the top - and he had located the camera by retracing our earlier steps - phew!

Great summit views of the mist once we finally got the camera back

We skied back to the shelter to pick up our things and then enjoyed a very gentle slide back down to the car.

On Sunday we ran in the Freidig Relay not far from our house, Chris won the first leg of the relay and set some new fashion trends after the race.

Chris looking very stylish in pink

Nice springtime orienteering in Bymarke

I did some research on the lemmings after-wards because I was very curious about them, so here are a few facts I learned:

- The population seems to fluctuate between years and there is speculation this may be a peaking year
- They get very angry when you try to go near them, but they don't explode (rumour). They may die due to shock however.
-It is a myth that they all run off cliffs in mass suicide
-They do carry some disease, especially tulameria (also known as “rabbit fever”)
- One Norwegian skier has already reported getting one stuck to there ski this year, but managed to get it off without the lemming hurting itself (-:
Source:
http://www.newsinenglish.no/2011/05/05/predicted-lemming-year-arrives/

Fish, saunas, skis and seas - Lyngen continued

2011-04-27T08:27:00.000-07:00

Our fantastic 'Rorbu' in Koppangen

We still had 5 days in Lyngen to explore and enjoy the fantastic peaks. The days flew past, each day we had a different adventure and before we could really stop to reflect again we were winding our way back along the rainy highway into Tromsø to catch our flight back to Trondheim on Easter Monday - bound for the realities of work the following day.

Since then the weeks have flown by, spring has truly sprung in Trondheim and the snowy summits of Tromsø seem far away. But I will always remember that magic place and our amazing Rorbu in Koppangen and the days skiing from snowy tops right down to the lapping shores of the fjords.

Below I have written a little story about each of the peaks we climbed. We calculated that by the end of the week we had climbed (and skied down) over 9000m!

The fish (~ 35 cm)

This looks a lot like the one I am talking about

Well, this wasn't actually a mountain. Rather an incident. I went out onto the jetty to watch Ally and various other folks fishing one evening. Ally suggested maybe I would like to hold the rod for a bit and reel it in - why not? I took it and began reeling in carefully, when it occurred to me I really would rather not catch a fish. I began a little mantra as I reeled "please don't catch a fish, please don't catch a fish, please don't.... uh oh...there's a fish pulling!" A large cod had not heeded my warning, much to Ally's delight, everyone else's amazement and my horror! We ate him/her the next day )-:

Tomes Renne
On Friday we had ummed and ahhed this one through. I wasn't sure about it - Tomes renne is a 30+ degree couloir that leads up to a glacier. It is a cool access route into the Lakselvtinden area, but the weather was dubious, we were all a bit tired and motivation levels were low.

Nevertheless we headed up some crappy wet snow slopes in thin birch forest onto an open basin. Big evidence of earlier avalanches also made the scene off putting and cloud was swirling continually around the tops. Lovely, Tim and I enjoyed a nice view from a house-sized boulder while the others continued a bit higher.

Rock lounging

Little grass huts back down at the bottom

Eventually they also decided today wasn't the day for it, so we all skied down again and messed around on some little grass roofed cabins.

Sunset in the evening back in Koppangen

Langdalstindane (1580)

We decided on a longer trip, feeling reinvigorated after our not so successful attempt on the couloir the day before. Clouds were drifting about the tops as we drove through Lyngsæter and the enormous santa which dominates the town shoreline. We had to drive 1.5 hours to get to the start of the mountain.

Strange and enormous Santa on the shores of Lyngsaeter

We skinned up the pretty valley which was mostly pine forest for a change, but as we climbed it turned to birch and then we came out above the tree line and sat on some moss for lunch. Spirits were a bit low because claggy stubborn looking clouds hung to the mountain sides a couple of hundred meters above us and they didn't look about to move any time soon.

The pretty valley we skied up (this photo is taken on the way out)

Hallvard was sure it would clear, the rest of us were not so sure. We continued up into an increasing white out, until we came into the 'miniamfi' described in the guidebook - at least that is where we were pretty sure we were, you couldn't see a thing. Hallvard proposed, as he had every day so far, why don't we just chill, build a kicker and have some fun....maybe the cloud will clear in a while.

Kicker building in the cloud

Unlikely, we all thought. Still, we found a wind scoop and got some great footage of Halvard, Ally and Chris on the kicker. Suddenly, after 1.5 hours waiting in the fog the clouds suddenly lifted and we could see our route to the summit up the glacier shining in the afternoon sun! Kicker instantly forgotten we took off up the glacier.

Suddenly the clouds cleared and we were off up the glacier

Chris, Lovely and I decided to experiment with some ropeing up for the glacier travel, providing some interesting lessons. Eventually after a few mishaps we reached the top where Tim, Hallvard and Ally were and took in the awesome views all around.

Beautiful views opened up around us

We skied down the big descent one at a time to be on the safe side, and it was a massive amount of turns to get back down to the mini-amphitheater again. The final part of the descent had turned into beautiful summer slush and made for some very nice skiing. Finally we made it out to the car after a rather long but very satisfying day on the mountain.

Enjoying the sunshine on the summit

Chris on the summit

Storgalten (1210)

Sunday was a hot day by easter Lyngen standards - about 11 degrees! We decided on the easy summit of Storgalten, with the hopes of some summit to sea skiing experiences. Climbing up was really warm and stripey polypros, shorts and t-shirts were visable all round. We met Lovely on top - he had set out earlier with a Swiss group who he was catching a ride back into Tromsø with that day.

We farewelled him on the summit of Storgalten. The snow conditions had deteriorated over the last few days and nice powder had turned into wind blown crust. Ally, Tim and Halvard headed down a gully off the summit while Chris and I skied down the standard descent. Halfway down Hallvard, and then Chris with no persuasion at all, decided it was so hot that all clothes had to be removed, the only exception being essential safety item the avalanche transceiver.

Nice ride down Storgalten

Right down to the beach

I skied right down to the seaside and walked back to the car along the beach. We sat out on the grass and laughed about our adventures. The smell of barbecue wafted in the air and we realised we were all quite starving, so we drove back to our Rorbu in Koppangen for our final dinner and evening.

Back at the car, the trip had a feeling of closure as the spring felt more and more close with the melting snow and warm weather

Easter Monday morning came and it was time to clean, pack up and squeeze ourselves and lots of gear in our hire car. It was raining and gray, so our more ambitious mountain plan was scraped in favour of an easy peak on the way back in to Tromsø. Chris had fun trying out Tim's telemark skis while Ally had fun trying out Chris's racing randonnee equipment. We skiied off the mountain in slushy snow and rain and made it back to the car wet and a little cold and ready to leave Tromsø and head back to the warmer more springlike climes of Trondelag.

Ally is pretty excited about the final mountain of our trip

Journey to Lyngen Alps

2011-04-27T08:24:00.002-07:00

Climbing up towards Tafeltinden - Day 4

Friday afternoon and school was out! We were off to Tromso, then further north to spend 10 days in the Lyngen Alps. We flew from Trondheim in nice spring weather, to arrive very bumpily into Tromso airport in 4 degrees and driving rain. We were questioning our decision to come north.

We located our 7 seater hire car and dropped Tim and Ally off at their comfy hotel, before heading back to the airport to collect Cris and find some bushes to camp in. By the time we found somewhere suitably grovelly to camp the rain had turned to snow, and we put up our tent and the three of us crammed in. It was a rather damp night - but it was free.

We met Tim and Ally in the morning (they were pretty happy because they had found a great techno party the night before) and we hung out in their hotel as the snow came down thick and fast. After that we decided to drive north, take the ferry across to the Lyngen peninsula . Shortly after the ferry crossing we parked the car and skied the few kilometers into Jaegervasshytte and found it cosy with 3 friendly Americans who had been doing loads of skiing in the area.

Serious route sussing on board the ferry between Tim and Ally

We made a big salmon dinner and enjoyed the evening in the hut. The following day the weather was still crap, snowing heavily and very wet. Cris, Chris and I decided to embark on a 'valley ski' straight through to the other side of the Lyngen range directly to the place we had booked in Kappangen, while Tim and Ally would drive around and pick up Hallvard on the way.

Cooking dinner in the cosy hut

We skied across the frozen lake and then on up the valley into the clouds. The wind was howling down the valley and the steep mountains towered up on either side of us. We had to cross a very low saddle (about 300m) before dropping slowly down the other side right back down to the sea. We couldn't see a thing on the initial descent, but fortunately it was very gentle.

Dropping down into Koppangen

We arrived at the sea and located three little red houses right on a jetty with a fish rack right beside them and a great view out towards the sea and some dramatic snowy cliffs plunging straight into the sea. It turned out we were staying in one of these wee red houses!

We found Tim inside cooking us up some delicious dinner, things were looking good. The snow kept falling and began piling up all over the jetty outside our house. Night came slowly, but eventually it got dark around 10.30. In the morning it was still clagged in and snowing, and we saw a powder avalanche come down from the cliffs above straight into the sea.

Cold and snowy out to sea - the view from our front window shortly after we arrived.

Things were not looking so good for heading high into the hills, so instead we drove on the windy roads through to Tamokdalen. There we were able to ski in some powder amongst the trees and stay beneath the cloud line. On the way back it was still 'puking' (an Ally-ism) and it was hard to see the road. Once we got home Hallvard cooked up a storm with a yummy fresh cod soup and some home made foccacia bread.

Throwing pebbles on the drive to Tamokdalen

Tuesday morning and the sky was a bluebird! We could see all the snow clad peaks around our place and the sun was out. After some deliberation we settled on a mountain - Daltinden (1533m). We skied up a nice valley alongside a brook amongst the birch forest. We crossed one massive avalanche debris, then started the climb up through the trees and out into the open. Once we got a bit higher we had our first great views over the fjord and the whole Lyngen Massif. The climb steepened and then finally we approached the flat summit cairn.

There were some big ice avalanches dropping off the surrounding peaks

Emily slowly climbing up towards the summit

A little picnic on top before we all got too cold and it was time to slash some powder!

It was nippy on top - around -10 with quite a breeze so we didn't muck around. With headcam on we started down the 30 degree descent and it was absolutely delicious! Fresh fluffy powder that made it feel as if you were floating. All too soon we were back down at the tree line, and then skinning back out down the valley to make it back down to the supermarket to buy some beer to enjoy out in the sun on our jetty.

SkiTrab-race-man crossing the bridge on the way out of the valley

Tuesday's meal was curry a la Chris, Cris was general dog's body. The forecast wasn't quite so good for Wednesday, so we decided on a smaller peak called Rørnestinden (1041 m). We met a friendly Australian called Richard who was living next door to us and he joined us on our trip. We skinned up a broad hillside along with several other skiing groups who were heading for another peak nearby.

The 'gang' on the way up

After lunch in a little windscoop which Chris dug out we climbed the gentle snowcap to the top. On the way up Chris and Richard took a high speed ascent of a nice looking slope out to the side of our mountain, then raced up to join us on the sunny and absolutely still summit. We enjoyed an awesome 300m descent down to the ridge in really nice snow, then decided it was worth a second run.

Heading up to the top for a second run

Chris on top with a great view down into the fjord

From the ridge we dropped down into a shady valley and snow conditions rapidly deteriorated to crusty ice. There was ice hard avalanche debris, and as we entered the trees we started crashing all over the place. Twenty minutes later we made it down to the valley after battling our way down amongst the trees and Chris ran back up the road to pick up the car.

In the evening we decided to try out the sauna, so after heating ourselves up to some warm temperatures we ran out onto the jetty and jumped into the freezing cold sea. It was kind of horrible, but felt amazing afterwards and there is something cool about jumping into the sea this far north. Hallvard made some delicious almond buns for dessert after all of that!

About to leave our front door - on skis!

Thursday morning (this morning) the weather was great again and we wanted to ski Tafeltinden (1395) which we could climb right from our house without any drive. There were several other groups heading up there, including some guided groups. We had to climb up a narrow gorge, then up a fairly narrow valley until we reached the Kopangen Breen (glacier). We climbed the gentle glacier for quite some time and ate lunch on our way up.

Heading up the majestic glacier

Crispin was enjoying himself a little too much on the way up!

We climbed into the upper part of the glacier with an amazing veiw out to the sea and also to the toothy peaks around the neve. We turned right and skinned up a steeper snow slope onto a great summit. Skins off, ski boots buckled down (or in Ally's case split board stuck together) and we skied down the long and gentle descent all the way back down to the gully and then right out to the sea!

Chris and me on top

Nice lines right off the summit

I really enjoyed the ski right back down to the seashore!

We hung out on the wharf until a few rain clouds popped up, then we retreated inside to create dinner. This time it was Ally's turn as head chef, and he made us real fish and chips. So we have four days left in Lyngen to enjoy more yummy dinners, good skiing and general sillyness, and of course eat plenty of Easter eggs along the way!

The Galdhøpiggrennet

2011-04-27T08:24:00.001-07:00

When: Weekend April 9 and 10, 2011

What: Galdhøpiggrennet - a race up and down Galdhøpiggen (highest mount in Norway) on skis or for most people entered a telemark race straight down, no up part.

Where: We stayed in our little tent in strong winds at Spiterstulen - a big, historic DNT hut is also there where you can stay for some $$$. We chose just to hang out there after the race and take the cheaper option of camping on the other side of the river with all the other poor/cheap people.

Not so great points: The weather was crappy so we could only do a short course, about 500m up to a random point on the mountain side, then back down again as fast as you can on randonnee skis, then repeat.
By the time I finished the race my legs felt quite jellofied.
Chris was late starting his race due to poor organisation resulting in a little bit unsatisfying result.

Chris spies things from the top

Great points: There was only me doing the girl's randonne race so I won an awesome pink Goretex jacket! We met lots of fun people, watched the amazing telemark down hill competition and joined in the great party afterwards. The next day we climbed all the way up Galdhøpiggen and then skied the entire way back down from the summit cairn, fun fun!

Ski organisation at the top of Galdhøpiggen

Lessons Learned: Don't undo you bindings half way up the hill without being sure you have your ski secured, it runs away down the hill very quickly if you don't watch out!
Pitching tents in nice little wind scoops works well, ours stayed up when many came down.
When hosting a prize giving include alcohol, music, great atmosphere and a good presenter and you get a very memorable prizegiving/ party.

A warm gray day up on the ridge to Galdhøpiggen on Sunday

Sum up: What an awesome weekend - thoroughly recommended

Ski WOC - Day 5 & 6

2011-03-29T13:25:00.000-07:00

Mass start of the long distance (I am near the back on the left)

The Long Distance

Much of the course was on the tiny scooter trails which you can't really skate on so you end up getting a massive arm workout.

On Friday we had had a nice rest day, eating lots of Swedish food, waxing skis and hanging out at Hotel Tanndalen. We also went out for a nice cruisey ski on the trails right outside our cabin with our friendly Canadian room mates Nick and Robbie.

Myself, Nick, Robbie and Chris in front of our very nice home for the week

The weather was still pretty bad with snow and wind as we drove up to the hotel in the morning. We had all sorted out various systems for attaching energy gels onto our ski suits for some extra fuel out on the course. It was a mass start race, so we set off in a big pack of girls all racing hard - I was quickly out the back but there was still a little bunch around me - Japanese, British and Spanish skiers mostly.

Crossing the bridge near the end of the long course into the final loop

The course started with a huge climb, then a huge descent followed by another climb then down to the map change...and repeat all over again! After 2.07 hours out there I came in - I made a few mistakes on the last loop because I was pretty tired, but I finished up in 37th place which was my best for the whole competition and got me some real world ranking points! (-:

Coming into a control carefully in the forest

Chris had a good race too, but found it pretty tough to concentrate the whole way through as well. He finished in place 43 in 2.18, but was only 1/3 slower than the winner which is impressive!

We were all a bit pooped after the race, so we blobbed around at the hotel and got the nice buffet dinner. It was fun to hang out with our Wing club mates Marte, Lars and Helen as well as lots of the other competitors. Marte had won the bronze medal in the long race that day!

The Relay

We were unable to have a proper relay team because we needed 3 skiers, but we were allowed to enter the first leg of the relay anyway, so I raced the first leg of the womens relay and Chris the first leg of the mens. Robbie from Canada was also in the same boat so he and Chris having their own little one man relay race. Robbie had beaten Chris by a couple of minutes each day, so Chris was keen to put the youngster in his place (-:

It was another mass start, and the course took us out for a loop over the flat area before crossing the ski bridge and climbing up the hill we had raced on in the long. We then torpedoed down a rather terrifying downhill into the finish. I made a mistake on this last part and lost my Japanese competition, but it was a really fun race anyway. I enjoyed the course length and the relative technicality compared to the grunt of the long the previous day.

Japan susses out the strange Kiwi

Chris did a really good time and managed to beat Robbie by a minute into the finish, he was excited. Helen did an awesome job on the second leg for the British team, and they ended up finishing in 11th place.

Helen, Marte and me all smiles at the end of Ski Woc

Sadly after all that excitement it was time to pack our things and head home. We missed the post race banquet on Sunday night, because work commitments in Trondheim were calling us home, but we had our own kind of banquet round at Helen's thanks to Tim and Ally who cooked us a yummy curry on our return.

Trondheim had also been having lots of snowfall while we were away, so we came back to a new meter high pile outside our front door. Lots of people at work are sad because they thought spring was on its way - we are pretty excited because the skiing is on again! Powder lines to be had everywhere, winter's not quite over, but the days are getting really long again, so it's a really nice time.

I hope you have enjoyed reading about our experiences at Ski WOC 2011, we are quite excited to instill some ski o enthusiasm into New Zealand orienteering when we return.

Team Kiwi in our flash ski suits

Ski WOC - Day 3

2011-03-25T10:15:00.000-07:00

Chris emerges from the bushes in the sprint relay

The sprint relay was heaps of fun. Chris and I raced together, each completing 3 loops. It was still a blizzard and this made things extra challenging. We were both happy with our 18th place and it was really cool to be the New Zealand team together.Team NZ happy to finish the sprint relay

Today is a rest day, then the long distance is tomorrow - Saturday.

Right now we are about to zip home and make dinner, I am starving! So I have kept this post short and sweet - more will follow tomorrow.

In response to the comments regarding sexy pants: we will try to get some better photos in the next two days - it is challenging to be competing and taking pictures and so far the race organisers have failed miserably to do the sexy suits justice, it just doesn't seem to be their priority for some reason?

Ski WOC Day 2

2011-03-23T07:17:00.001-07:00

Chris races in through the driving snow in the middle distance today

Driving home last night we encountered extreme wind and whirling snow - it was representative of the day to come! In the morning it was still snowing heavily and we put on extra layers under our ski suits so we didn't freeze in the blasting winds.Chris just after he finished

Chris says about his race: "Good, it was great fun and I was pleased not to make any big mistakes. The snowy conditions made it very hard to see causing me to crash several times, but it increased the navigational challenges which possibly benefited me. Now I am looking forward to the team sprint with sexy pants tomorrow." Chris ended up in 47th place.

I had a bit of a frustrating time in the forest, I find ski orienteering challenging enough without throwing in snow blasting in your face so you can't see and all the tracks disappear. I got quite lost on my way to control 3, I was standing in a field and I couldn't see a thing! I found a road and relocated, but then went to control 9 instead of 6, so that got me really confused! Never mind, eventually I finished in 42nd spot.In the 'warm room' after the race

Tomorrow is the mixed relay so that will be fun, we just hope the weather might improve, at the moment it is still a blasting blizzard outside.

Ski WOC - Day 1

2011-03-22T09:22:00.000-07:00

On our way to the opening ceremony

Hello! We are now in Tanndalen, Sweden, for the ski orienteering world championships. We arrived on Saturday and settled into a nice cabin that we are sharing with the two men from Canada - Robbie and Nick. We tried out the model map on Monday and found it pretty steep and a bit scary on the downhills.

Our Trondheim clubmates from Wing - representing three countries at ski-WOC!

On Monday evening all the countries gathered for the opening ceremony in chilly windy conditions. Tuesday morning came and it was time for event 1 - the sprint race. We had to be in a 'quarantine zone' by 10 am, so we couldn't see where competitors ahead of us were going. I started at 10.22 and made my way very carefully around the course - I decided this was the best tactic for me to avoid making any huge mistakes.

I got pretty confused coming into the arena, there were distracting people, bridges and extra little map box thingees. Eventually I sorted out my brain and found the final 3 controls into the finish - and I was well off last in the results! Just as I was finishing the weather changed from nice and sunny to a snow storm.

Chris came in about 30 minutes later (the men started after the women) in a respectable time, but he made a 4 minute mistake going to the wrong control during the snow storm. Typical Chris, he was super excited by the race and also really annoyed by his mistake, so now he is totally excited about the next race.

There is supposed to be deteriorating weather tommorrow for the middle distance so that could make things interesting. Now everyone is in the waxing room trying to get the fastest glide in the fresh powder (-: Yesterday Chris managed to charm the Norwegian smør-chefs into waxing our skis, maybe he will work his magic again today. I will keep you posted with the outcome of tomorrow's event, so stay tuned!

Fun and games in the waxing room - some countries waxing areas look more like ski shops to me!

Chamonix

2011-03-14T10:46:00.000-07:00

I am well overdue for a new post - so its finally here! The problem is I have been so busy the last few weeks I haven't spent much time sitting in front of the computer. Most of the reason for this is skiing. Skiing seems to take up a fair bit of my time right now - skiing in various different forms, partly in preparation for our upcoming 'big event' - the world ski orienteering in Sweden in two weeks time.

But it hasn't all been serious training (-: We spent the winter holidays in France, in the very over tourist populated but none-the-less beautiful town of Chamonix. On the Wednesday of our trip we got some horrible news - Christchurch (our home town in New Zealand) had been hit by another big earthquake, large parts of the city had fallen down and many people had lost their lives.

It was awful to be stuck on the other side of the world not able to help out - and I felt bad about us continuing to have such a great time in France. Fortunately no one we know was hurt, but both our families homes were badly damaged. I wondered if I should publish this post - but I had some requests from people in Christchurch who want to read about something fun to take their minds of aftershocks, cracked walls and broken crockery - so here we go.

Chris's Mum's kitchen isn't looking quite as organised as last time I saw it!

We flew to Geneve on Saturday with Tim and took a minivan Chamonix - about a 1.5 hour drive, but it took even longer because there was so much traffic - this was the first warning sign. We made it to our little rented apartment in central Chamonix, then headed out for our first French dinner, yum yum! I had a delicious thing called a 'croute savoyard' and red wine followed by lemon crepe, mmmmm.

We discovered we even had our very own little 'telepherique' in our apartment!

The next day we set out on our first 'orientation' of the ski areas. With the 'Mt Blanc' unlimited ski pass we had access to 4 areas around Chamonix plus the Courmeyer ski area in Italy through the Mt Blanc tunnel. The buses were totally packed as we got our first taste of the Chamonix sardine feeling, then we queued for our lift passes, then queued for the telepherique, and 'sardined' our way up to 2 700m! We could notice the altitude on our descent from the gondola on Grand Montet. Unfortunately it was very cloudy and visibility was really bad.

'Sardine-ing' in up on the Telepherique on our way up to Grand Montet

We still had a fun day getting used to huge descents and yummy cheesy lunch at a wee restaurant on the slopes. The piste was pretty icy, but off piste you couldn't see a thing, so it was best to compromise by going between the two.

Tim looking suspiciously snowy...

That night Helen and Ally arrived from their friend's wedding in Switzerland. We cooked dinner together and shared stories as well as planing our strategic 'attack' of the ski areas over the coming week. We wanted to get the best value possible out of our pricey ski passes. Snow conditions for the week were not looking so good - there had been a small amount of snow fall the day before, but that was the first in weeks and there was no more predicted. So much for powder in the alps!

Forest skiing at Le Tour when visibility was bad - also hunting for some elusive fresh powder lines in the off piste

The following day we spent the morning playing in the trees at Le Tour, before giving up in average snow there and sardining our way up to the very top of Grand Montet. At about 3300m the view from the top out over the alps is amazing, and it had finally cleared so we had sun. We carefully skied down the glacial part, past some great yawning crevasses, then on down the massive descent all the way to the valley floor,the whole run took us two ours and it was great!

The clouds finally cleared on Monday and we got to see this!

Tim shows his telemark style in nice powder - finally

We had a disappointing meal at a English pub that night and decided to stick to the Frenchy places from then on. It was in the morning that we learned the sad news about the Christchurch earthquake, so we ended up setting out later for our skiing than planned, and the day passed with a slightly surreal feeling.

Skiing at Brevent

We skied at the Brevent and Le Flegere, which would have massive potential if it wasn't for the total lack of snow. There were little rocks and stones everywhere, and patches of ice. We skied all about the place, desperately searching the off piste for any hint of fresh powder. We had the odd good bit - although Chris seemed to be constantly finding 'sweet lines' according to him? I think he is just generally easy to please (-:

Helen headed over to Spain and Portugal for her orienteering training camp in nice warm temperatures while we kept on skiing. The weather for the following day was supposed to be really good, so we decided to take on the Aguile du Midi and ski down the famous Vallee Blanche. Fortunately we certainly weren't the only ones, so we could follow in the safer tracks of the many big guided groups in front of us (thus hopefully reducing likelihood of falling in a crevasse).

Snake trails descend carefully from the Aiguille du Midi station

Ally eyes the route down the Valle Blanche

Nice powder and hundreds of meters of descent

It was awesome being up so high (3800m) I think, and we carefully descended our was from the top of the telepherique and onto the glacier. From there we followed across the gentle slopes, before dropping more steeply down to the hut halfway down the glacier. Chris and I actually walked down the glacier a few years earlier after one of Chris's adventure races - but then it was summer and the glacier was even more broken up than now.

Chris and Ally most of the way down the glacier

The surrounding peaks sparkled, revealing their icy slopes in the afternoon sun. We sped down the last part of the glacier, Ally getting some assisted towing by Chris on his snow board which doesn't slide on the flat as much as skis and you don't have any poles! Feeling sweaty, but pleased with ourselves, we took the cog railway back down into Chamonix.

Ally carves down the glacier 'track'

In the afternoon we managed to squeeze in time for another trip to the very top of Grand Montet- that was just two ski runs in one day! We repeated a nice dose of yummy apple cake consumed at the very summit of Grand Montet which we had discovered the day before.

On Thursday we awoke to a sprinkling of fresh snow on our skylight, and after some deliberation the night before we had decided to attempt a trip over to Courmeyer in Italy through the Mt Blanc tunnel. The problem was we had tried call the bus company to book a spot the night before, but we were told the bus was full and there was no chance of a ride - even though this bus trip was supposed to be part of our 'all mountain' ski pass.

We arrived at the bus stop and Chris managed to charm the lady into getting us spots on the second bus, so after a nice cafe au lait in the little cafe nearby we were off to Italy.

Courmeyer was great, it was still cloudy, but the slopes were much quieter and the fresh powder made it really nice! We took a cable car up high on the mountain and did a big and quite steep descent way back down the the valley. The temperature down in the valley was really nice and the sun had just emerged, so we had a little picnic in there, before skating back out along a road and up a chairlift onto the ski area again.

We found really nice powder in Courmeyer and this was a huge descent all the way into the valley

The rest of the day was spent skiing in the powder amongst the trees. At 4 we headed to a little after-ski halfway up the ski field and tried what all the Italians were drinking - some strange pink 'spritze' drinks, which made the long descent back down into Courmeyer a little more entertaining.

Chris and Ally spent some time messing around on this little jump in the forest

In Courmeyer we ate very average pizza, then bused back into Chamonix after a great day skiing in Italy. It was so good in fact we decided it was the best pick for the next day as well. We repeated our technique with the buses successfully, and soon we were squiged onto the telepherique and heading up to the highest point on the field, the Cresta D'Arp (2755m). We had a wonderful view from the top, and we studied in detail the famous Helbronner descent on the other side of the valley.

The only descents from D'Arp are quite exposed and all off piste, so we took our time and carefully descended above some cliffs, then enjoyed some powdery turns till we were back in the steep gully we descended the day before into the valley.

Ally checking out the routes down from Cresta D'Arp

We skiied out from there and plonked ourselves at a outside restaurant in the sun to try our luck with Italian pizza again. This time we did better, particularly with the 'petit Mt Blanc' pizza which consisted of pear and blue cheese! We spent the afternoon doing some more tree bashing, then took a slightly earlier bus back to Chamonix than the previous day.

Waiting for the bus in Courmeyer

We had the best meal of the week at the Omletterier (-: (Ally had been reluctant to try it earlier - but I knew it would be good). After that we agreed to visit the after ski Chambre Neu which Ally had been hankering after all week - it was a nice place to hang out.

Pizza at Petit Mt Blanc

Saturday was our last day, and we decided to try Les Houches, seeing as it was the one area we hadn't been to all week. It is lower than the other areas, and the snow was very patchy turning to grass in lots of places. So it was pretty average skiing, but it was entertaining nonetheless. Ally got to try a few rail slides in the snow park.

Not-so-amazing Les Houches

Chris, Tim and I took the bus back to Geneve so we could fly out from there on Sunday, while Ally took the overnight train to Paris, so he could try out some crazy caving in the underground tunnels of Paris with his friend! We arrived back in Trondheim on Sunday night after a great week in the alps - maybe not the best snow ever - but we still enjoyed ourselves.

The gang and Italian 'Spritze's' in the sun!

Winter Time!

2011-03-14T10:28:00.000-07:00

The last few winter months have been really busy and lots of fun for Chris and I. Knowing this is our last winter here has made us appreciate how cool it is even more, and we have got out exploring Bymarke and surrounding Trondelag as much as we possibly can. I have posted some photos from various weekends and a couple of weekday excursions into the mountains.

At the end of January Ally celebrated his birthday in Oppdal with us and we made use of a deal that was running there where you got a hotel for 1kr per night if you had a ticket for the ski area there. So we stayed two nights and had two days skiing with Helen, Ally, Tim, and the Czechs Tomas and Paja.

The weather was a bit average, but we got lots of nice powder on the Saturday, even if we couldn't really see anything. On Sunday the weather was a bit clearer, but the wind was unbelievable. We took a tow up to this little 'warm hut' to eat our lunch - no one else was up there and the lift closed straight after we arrived - we were not surprised given we were almost blown off the mountain on the way up, clinging desperately onto the swinging T bar!

The peisestua and the blizzard - wind doesn't really come out in pictures unfortunately

Inside the nice warm hut and out of the wind at last

A rare sun ray shines down on Oppdal

Interesting visibility on the descents!

In the first week of February I got the flu )-: But then we headed down to Sjusjoen for the next weekend to get some fresh air and it seemed to get rid of the bug I had been battling all week. We decided to be budget, so spent both nights camping. It got to about -8 both nights, so it was good to have my trusty Fairydown Scorpion sleeping bag.

Camping in the park in Lillehammer

On the second night we discovered a lovely day shelter with a fresh supply of firewood on the ski field up at Sjusjon, perfect for us to hang out in and also to pitch our tent!

A good warm place for a tent!

The skiing itself didn't go so well for me as I was still a bit sick, but Chris enjoyed himself and triumphed over some real Norwegians (!) to come third in the Men's recreational class.

My fast paced ski O action. I missed any photos of Chris because I was still out on my course!

Since then many of our weekends and week nights have been spent in the Bymarke forest above our house, we are always discovering new trails, and the snow conditions have generally been great. It's really cool to have this on your back doorstep!

Wonderful winter trails and snow on the trees

Refueling on our 5 hour 'classic bash' with Ally

I thought I should also add a picture of the porridge I got on Valentines day - it was so cute (-:

Kårvatn - Norges Cup Randonnee Race

2011-01-17T13:56:00.000-08:00

Chris is the red person furthest away in the third row - you can just see a little of him

Just a quick post to update you on last weekends activities - a trip to Kårvatn for the first in te Norwegian Cup Randonnee Race Series. There were races on both days which Chris planned to compete in. I was planning a more relaxed version skiing in the 'recreational' category on Saturday with Line, and going for a fun excursion up the hillside on Sunday with Ally, Paja, Tomas and Line.

Chris just before he races up the hill

Chris loved the race on Saturday - 2 times 1000m ascent and descent back to back. The fastest guy took a crazy 49 minutes up and 6 minutes down! Then he repeated a similar time the second loop around. Chris's times were pretty respectable and he managed to beat and scare quite a few Nowegians. He was up in 57 minutes and down in 10! Not bad for an old one (-:

Line and I finally make it to the top of the climb

We went out for a really funky dinner on a farm on Saturday night. The restaurant was this kind of renovated wooden barn thing - all the meat eaters got to eat a special kind of local cow, while I got a yummy fish dish - it was a really nice evening.

Dinner at a cool wooden farm house

The terrible real seal skins - Chris is never allowed to have these ones

On Sunday there was a 'two person teams race, Chris raced with a speedy Norwegian who kept him on his toes. In the meantime our little group skied up valley and explored a spectacular frozen waterfall. We then skied higher up the hillside and found an amazing old hut where they apparently used to store the hay during winter and would come up on horses to retrieve it when supplies got low down in the valley.

Chris sets off on day two with Olav

The frozen waterfall

The little hay hut we discovered

From the hut we enjoyed some nice powder descent back down to the farmstead. Then it was time to pack up and hit the very ice road back to Trondheim - the temperatures had risen a lot and it was raining, creating dangerous ice every where, yuck! Luckily we made it home safely.

There are a few more photos on my picasa web album:

Kårvatn Norges Cup Randonnee Race

Skiwis New Year in the hills

2011-01-07T07:53:00.000-08:00

Just a few pair of skis each for our trip away, not excessive at all (-:

Running late as usual we drove out of Trondheim on Dec 28 headed for Oppdal to meet Tomas, Paja and Anders in our little, silver, string-of-unusual-noise-mobile. We meet the others (who were waiting patiently in the Rema 1000, and then followed them up the Storlidalen to Anders' wonderful cosy cabin in Storlia up the head of the valley.

Looking up valley you can see the steep rock faces of the Trollheimen mountains. His family's cabin is very modern and so snug and comfy, complete with a little sauna. We ate a quick lunch then drove back down valley to go up Okla on our randonnee skis. Anders and Tomas were braving fjellskis instead.

Starting up the hill

We climbed steeply and very slowly up - the snow was super light and deep and impossible to go upwards through, there was no base underneath though so one's ski got tangled up amongst the rocks and trees on the ground.

After 1.5 hours up we had climbed barely 400m! Then Chris fell on a rock and snapped his pole in two. After that we decided Okla was off, so Chris and I gingerly skied down trying to avoid scraping our skis too badly on any more rocks.

Finally back down on the flat land

When we reached the bottom we saw the others making their way down too, so like Anders' suggested we started construction of a little ski hopp (jump). For me it was spooky going over the little jump, especially when Tomas put it upon himself to give the jump an enormous kick so you were thrown up straight in the air!

We had great fun - Anders' showing the real style by doing the jump well on the fjellskis! Finally when we were chilled to the bone (at least Paja and I were!) we headed back to the cabin and spent the evening eating, suana'ing and playing Settlers.

The next day we decided to tackle Storbekkhøa (1504m) all on fjellski this time. It was a long trip up - about 4.5 hours till we reached the summit just as the sun was dropping beneath the horizon ( it was about 3.30 in the afternoon), we enjoyed the final rays then set off down.

Climbing slowly up Storbekkhøa

The peak above me is the top

Snowy valley
¨

Nearly at the top, by that stage I had given up on my skis and found it was easier to walk

Enjoying the final rays on the top

Sinking sun

I was hopelessly slow, the others nearly froze waiting for me, and I was thinking "why didn't I bring my good skis?" But Chris assured me this was much better training and would make it seem so much easier next time I was on the other skis, hmmm.

Heading down as it got slowly darker

We crashed down through the forest, and it was completely dark when we eventually made it back. That descent is one which was much more fun retrospectively, once I was warm and fed again it didn't seem so bad.

Relaxing inside Anders' great cabin

On Wednesday it was time for Paja and Tomas to head back to Trondheim and Chris and I to head on to meet up with Theresa and Matthias at Høvringen - the little ski town we visited last year with Stu and Fi.

We went out for a beautiful classic ski on the valley trails before we left and got some nice photos of the white land and the blue skies.

Chris enjoying some nice classic trails and nice scenery

After driving for about 3 hours (and doing some grocery shopping in Oppdal on the way) we met up with Theresa and Matthias in their small wooden cabin. We ate dinner and played the card game Romme in the evening.

Chris, Theresa and Matthias in the wee cabin

The following day we skied together out to a little place known as Puttensetter and found a warm spot inside a hotel lobby where some friendly Germans were happy for us to eat some food. Theresa was having fun on her new skis, it was her third day on cross country skis. Having said that Chris and I seemed to do our fair share of crashing too.

3 Reindeer skiing to Puttensetter

We had a super hot sauna in the evening, then ran on the frozen lake making snow angels before running back into the hot sauna. We then amused some Norwegian who were just arriving in the blizzard by running back to our cabin in the nud.

After our sauna we tried some strange Swedish 'fruit soup' - it was actually pretty good!

In the morning we farewelled Matthias and Theresa and hit the road again on our way to Grovellsjøen in Sweden to stay with Aaron, Sara and their two small daughters Greta and Karin. Russell (Aaron's Dad) was also going to be there - visiting from NZ.

We arrived just in time for Sara's delicious spinach lasagna and some nice Kiwi trifle for desert courtesy of Aaron. Later in the evening we walked down with the masses with their burning sticks to the little hotel where there is a countdown to the new year, a bonfire and fireworks. We did the same walk two years earlier when we stayed in Grøvelsjoen with Aaron and Sara at New Year.

Some people lit some cool paper hot air balloons which wafted off into the cold night. During the day it had been snowing, so there was fluffy white snow everywhere.

Flaming sticks along the way to the bonfire and fireworks

Fireworks!

New Year's day was clear and sunny, so we took off on the skate skis. Chris, Aaron and Swedish Jens headed out for a speedy ski round the 5 km, while Russell and I took a more leisurely pace following them. The snow was so soft that skating was extremely hard work and I decided that it was definitely better conditions for a classic ski in the afternoon with Sara.

After lunch Sara, Chris and I headed out onto a different loop. It was a fun challenge skiing with Sara, I could just keep up with her if I pushed myself, so we raced around the 8 km, and it was so much fun we decided to do it one more time.

By the time we got back to the house I was feeling a bit pooped. A hot sauna followed by Em's veggie lasagna helped though, and in the evening we had a great game of Settlers. Chris loves that game! Sara and I schemed a bit and came up with a plan for a good long classic ski the following day out to an old farm on a hill following some small trails.

Russell, Sara and myself out on the classics for our little mission

Russell and Chris came along too. The trail climbed gently up to the old farm where we stopped for some food and hot rosehip soup. Chris and Russell then skied to Norway (the border was about 300m from the farm). The trail then wound gently back down through the trees, you could double pole along and it felt like being on a roller coaster, it was great!

Russell was really tired and had taken to running on his skis, while the rest of us were all getting a bit tired too. It was a solid 3 hour ski, just a small one for Sara though who is planning to compete in the 90km Vassaloppet again this year.

Sadly it was time to say Goodbye to the cute girls, Aaron, Sara and Russell and head back to Trondheim because we had work the next day. Chris did the driving - it took about 5 hours on the very snowy roads. When we reached Trondheim we found that even more snow had fallen. There was so much snow at our house and we had great trouble driving up the steep street to our house.

The snow now comes half way up our window - so as you can imagine we are pretty happy with the snow conditions right now. Thanks for reading my long post - I hope you had a really great Christmas and New Year too. Believe it or not we are actually quite excited about a sunny warm NZ Christmas next year - so we plan to make the most of the snowy months ahead of us! Happy New Year,
Em (-:

Skiwis Christmas

2011-01-07T07:34:00.000-08:00

Rather a lot of snow!

The Christmas holidays started only 2 days before Christmas this year, so we decided to stay in Trondheim until the day after boxing day, after which we had several ideas for trips up our sleeves. This year (unlike last year) the best ski and snow conditions by far was actually in Trondheim itself, the rest of Norway didn't have much snow. So we canceled our plan to visit Sjusjoen again near Lillehammer, and decided to head somewhere more local instead.

The week before we had a wonderful early Christmas dinner with Helen and Ally - we had a really fun evening, with some little presents, some delicious food and wine, some whiskey and most of all some great company.

The days leading up to Christmas were really cold, around -19 on Thursday and -15 on Friday. Nevertheless we got out for a really nice ski both days, the trails around Bymarka were in great condition and we could track (and chase) the groomer using the GPS tracker on the brilliant Skisporet.no website.

After our night ski on Christmas eve Chris had some beautiful eyelashes!

Once Chris was looking at our laptop and saw on the screen the groomer was out on the trail just below our house, and then looking out the window we saw the lights of the groomer heading across the Kyvannet bridge, cool! We put our skis on and raced out the door after the huge machine.

On Christmas day we opened some nice wee parcels in the morning, skyped home and then headed out for a ski with our new Czech friends Paja and Tomas and their friend Anders. We were all skating and it was a fast paced ski for me, I spent all the time way out the back. Never mind, it was really fun, we skied out to Elgsethytta, down to Grønlia via Storheia and back through Lian to our place - a solid 2.5 hours skiing and a good way to get a really good appetite for Christmas dinner.

Tomas, Chris and me from the flagpole at Lian, Christmas day

Tomas, Anders, me and Paja just after a quick stop at Elgsethytta

The evening was pretty low key with yummy roast veggies and fish. The next day we went out to Klaebu and round the Jonsvannet to ski in a new spot with Paja and Tomas. It was nice rolling terrain, a lot less demanding than the usual Bymarka hills.

Unfortunately the wee cafe shown on the map was not open so we all ate muesli bars and jumped around trying to keep warm. After that it was home for a hot shower and pack for a week away in the hills!

Vindølbu Hut Weekend

2010-12-22T12:07:00.000-08:00

Last weekend Ally Chris and I finally got round to our planned mission into Vindølbu hut in the Trollheimen National Park. We wanted a very easy randonee ski trip with lots of time to lounge about in the nice warm hut. We left Trondheim quite late after curry round at ours, and didn't finally arrive at the carpark until 11.30pm. But given that it had been pitch dark since 3 this didn't seem to matter so much.

It was quite magical skiing in the moonlite alongside a frozen river. There was lots of snow and it was super fluffy, so at one stage when I fell over I couldn't stand up again. Finally we made it to the hut for a midnight feast and off to bed under the ice duvets - it was about -8 inside the hut.

Nevertheless we had a very cosy night and woke late. The sun was shining on the other side of the hill so we chased it, but never quite got it. We skinned up a gentle hill side, unfortunately the fluffy snow of the night before had been damaged by wind, so it was a bit crusty. We had a fun but chilly descent, although for Ally on the split board getting up enough speed was a bit of a problem on the gentle slopes.

The little blob above Ally's head is the moon

Sunset at about 3!

Rather frozen we arrived back at the hut just it was getting dark and spent the next hours eating, knitting, chatting, playing chess and eating some more. The hut got up to an amazing 21 and it was about -15 outside!

The cosy Vindølbu

After another cosy night under the ice duvets we decided to take on the steeper and more treed slopes above the hut. IT was great skinning up through the forest and before long we had some precious rays of sun. We had a short but sweet descent, then spent some time videoing Chris and Ally throwing themselves off a small cliff (I will attempt to upload the video to this post).

Up we go - Ally in the front on his new split board

Skinning up into the sun

That rare and majestic thing - a sunray

We tidied the hut and skied out in the dropping temperatures, arriving back to Trondheim to a charming -17 feeling a little chilled - our hut weekend was a pretty cool way to spend the darkest time of year in Norway though. The temperatures have continued to decrease since, today was -20 all day! But on the positive side school holidays have just begun so I have 1.5 weeks off as of today. So I am sure there will be some more chilly adventures shortly to be posted on this blog (-:

Hello to the world

2010-12-22T12:05:00.000-08:00

Trondheims Christmas lights, plus me in my trusty down jacket that has been my constant companion the last two months.

Hello to all readers of Emily and Chris's blog! I am sorry there has been such a lapse in posts, I'm not really sure how this occurred...but fortunately for you the drought is over and you about to be swamped with an amazing barrage of exciting posts! Well, maybe not a barrage but there will be many (0:

Chris spent 3 weeks back in NZ catching up with his friends and family and successfully reclaiming his World Rogaining Title with Marcel Hagner in the Championships that were held in Canterbury.

Chris and Marcel at the prize giving

Ian was also competing in the Rogaine World Champs and came 3rd in the Veteran category with Bruce Meder.

Chris brought a nice new camera back from NZ with him, so as soon as he got back he headed out and took some atmospheric 'dark' shots.

Dark and snowy is our land.

This was about 8.30 am.

The road to work is a snowy one!

I spent my time here busy with school, and a bit of climbing and cross country skiing - plus lots of social stuff - so the time went pretty fast. When Chris came back we went to his work 'Julebord' (christmas party) which was lots of fun and involved Chris wearing a tie! Then we drove to a ski orienteering competition in Vennebu (about 4 hours South).

The view from our window including our snowy wee car - poor thing he looks so frosty!

Chris ran from my school one morning down to his work place at Piren - it was just becoming light. You can see the fjord in the distance.

Helen and Ally came round for a Christmas feast before they headed home for Christmas.

We had 'secret santa' which wasn't very secret and roast lamb (-:

We competed in the long event on the Sunday. Unfortunately even though it was pouring with snow in Trondheim that weekend, Vennebu had an all time snow low, so there were a lot of rocks on the course. We stayed in Marthe's cabin with 7 others, so we had a great time anyway. Chris even managed to beat 1 Norwegian skier in the race on Sunday.

Ski conditions in Bymarke have been really good, so we have been skiing quite a bit - only now it is so cold that skiing isn't so good. Hopefully it warms up a bit soon! So now for the first new post - a weekend trip to Vindølbu. Happy reading!

Skiing through the forest one night we came upon this amazing Christmas tree!

Pumpkin man gets snowy!

2010-11-06T08:03:00.000-07:00

This morning I woke up to find poor pumpkin man looking rather white and chilly! We had planned to go away this weekend and do some mountain biking and last minute long run training for Chris before the rogaine world champs in 2 weeks time.

This plan went out the window as soon as we looked out of ours, so instead Chris is currently charging around Bymarke through the snow. I ran up the hill some way with him, we were just running up through the forest when we came across a whole moose family! They nonchalantly ambled off into the snowy trees. Chris is then running on to Ally's place - Ally will do the last part of the run with him.

Before he went out for his run we spent some time clearing the piles of snow off our car and putting on our spikey winter tires. I was enjoying jacking the car up and down. Chris got to do the fun part when it started snowing again:

Tomorrow we think it will definitely be time to head out on the fjell skis - it is supposed to keep snowing tonight, so conditions should be perfect (-:

Halloween

2010-11-02T10:29:00.000-07:00

I have never carved a pumpkin before, so both Chris and I were very excited about this one which I made at school. On Friday night Kristof and Maria came over for dinner, so I welcomed them with the pumpkin man!

In the doorway behind the pumpkin is Ally and me.

Halloween makes a lot more sense here, it is getting very dark now and all the leaves have gone from the trees. The clocks went back on Saturday night, so it getting dark by 4.30 now. We went for a nice run in the forest on Saturday - Helen had organised a 'handicap' orienteering training (and just for the record, I won out of me, Chris and Ally (-: )

Chris and I did a good mountain bike ride on Sunday, around the back of Bymarke on a mixture of 4WD road and single track. The ice spikers work pretty well in the mud.

Happy Halloween! Em.

Garmin Bear leads the way...

2010-10-25T13:06:00.000-07:00

The first snow came on Tuesday, so Chris had to get the skis and go for a blast in the park. He was sure he would be the first, but I spotted several other ski tracks!

The weekend came around and the forecast was awful. We were a bit bored. Helen and Ally were also a bit bored. We put our heads together and decided what we needed was a good splurge in the mountains to cheer us up - a cosy hut, some fun times and a little adventure.

So while most of Trondheim was huddled inside on a very snowy and rainy Saturday morning Helen and Ally swung by our place in their little silver car and we loaded on skis and backpacks and headed away into the storm.

We drove through Orkanger and on along the E39. We were heading into the mountains of Nordmore to Hardbakhytte (800m). We turned into a very muddy slippery farm road and boganed around for a while before we found the right road and a little snowy spot to pull off the road.

Helen had snow shoes on, while the rest of us had fjellskis. We originally assumed it would be slower on the snow shoes than on the former - however by the end of the trip this was a debatable thing given our respective rates of progress. Anyway, we skied (or snowshoed) up the road past Gammelsaetra, then up onto the snowy hillside.

We followed some pylons up a gully and into the deep mist. Every now and then we were hit by snow flurries or sleet flurries, and progress was quite slow in the crappy snow. Finally we reached the broad ridge which the hut was somewhere on. The wind was increasing and darkness was approaching. Through all our minds (except perhaps Garmin Bear's) was the trickling thought..."was this a great idea? what will we do if we don't find the hut? we'll have to dig a snow cave....brr that will be %$%# cold!"

We wound our way round icey outcrops and it felt as if we were going around in circles! Suddenly I saw a little chimney and we had walked right onto the hut perfectly! Garmin Bear received congratulations all round (although thoughts of purchasing a real GPS Garmin (just in case) have been creeping into my mind!)

The inviting entrance out of the blizzard

The hut was super cosy, we lit the fire and the paraffin lamps, we even had radio reception as we cooked up a feast for dinner. We slept late in the warm hut, and made pancakes for breakfast, before we finally farewelled Hardbakhytte at 2pm.

My crazy new 'hoof' gloves - which actually work pretty well!

Chris enjoying a pancake....I think?

Helen and her little red crocs

We took a slightly different route back down from the hut, over a little indestinct summit called Hardbakfjellet. The weather was still awful, snowing and windy. After celebrating the summit with a photo we had a rather entertaining time crashing our way back down into the 'happy land' below the whiteout/blasting wind and snow zone.

The summit of Hardbakfjellet, or so we think

Helen is the first to happy land

Helen neatly snow shoed her way off the mountain in a quicker time than it took us fjellskiers, even though we were sliding! I guess crashing takes up a bit of time. Eventually the skiable snow ran out and we plodded back down the farm track feeling a bit tired but very happy to be back in happy land. Just before we reached the car the sky opened up for a final deluge of slushy snowflakes.

The boys...both looking a little odd...

The girls looking beautiful of course

We arrived back in Trondheim around 8 pm - it had obviously been raining all weekend in Trondheim too. We were all very content that our bad weather outing had been much more fun than sitting around moping in cold rainy Trondheim and the Hardbakhytte mission was a complete success (-:

Norsk Mesterskap Orientering

2010-09-20T13:23:00.000-07:00

Last weekend the Norwegian National Orienteering Champs took place in Beiterstolen - 5 hours South of Trondheim, not far from the Jotunheimen National Park. We headed away from Trondheim at about 5pm on Friday night, after I had arrived home from work and beavered away to make a pizza and some cookies for us to munch on during the long drive.

At Oppdal we met up with Bård and Ola, and they joined us in our car to make our trip a little more environmentally friendly. We arrived at a cosy cabin at about 11pm and went straight to sleep. Chris and I were both feeling tired after a long week at work, and in the morning we had quite early starts to deal with.

A plush grass roofed 'cabin' at Beiterstolen - the one we were staying in was rather more modest than this little mansion.

The arena at Beiterstolen - they even had a big screen with GPS tracking following the competition, pretty impressive technology for following orienteering.

I really wasn't in the mood for orienteering the next morning, but I was entered so I didn't have much choice but to turn up. It was a middle distance at least, so not too long. I headed off to the start, aware that it was supposed to be a 2km run to the start. However, after running 2 km I got to the start and no one was there! I quickly realised I had somehow taken the wrong way and I was now at the start of the final for the afternoon, not the morning qualification start!

So I had to run 2 km back, then 2 km to the real start! By that stage I had missed my start by almost one hour, and the time from my real start is the one that was recorded in the results! Opps! I actually enjoyed my run after all that, it was tricky and very flat, which was great given I was very tired after already running 6 km!

Chris finished just after me - he had a disaster of a run and missed out on qualifying for the final. Oh well, we enjoyed blobbing around for the afternoon and went for a walk to take in the amazing autumn colours in the mountains.

Emily is thinking "Autumn in Norway is really pretty"

Red and yellow trees, getting ready for snow again!

The next day was the relay and Chris ran the first leg in the first Wing team, while I ran in the 5th men's team. The women's Wing team came 5th overall - there are about 50 teams entered, so it is a tough race. Chris wasn't particularly pleased with his run, but the other two in his team ran well, so they finished in a respectable 6th place.

The men ready to start the relay race on Sunday

It really was ridiculous how fast the men started - not a lot of map reading going on at this stage. Chris sneaks in from the outside here to get near the front of the bunch.

On the drive back home we took this photo looking toward the famous Beseggen ridge. The photo doesn't really do justice to the beautiful autumn colours.

Imarbu Sea Kayak

2010-09-20T13:14:00.000-07:00

In preparation for the World Adventure Race Champs which Chris will compete in a few weeks time in Spain we decided on a kayak mission for the weekend. On the Thursday week night before we left it was very mild so both Chris and I took a dip in the Kyvannet - I'm pretty sure that will be our last swim in the lake this year (-:

Evening and autumnal feeling swim in the Kyvannet

On Friday afternoon after work I met Chris at the boat sheds in Ila in our wee Toyota Corola. I had already been in town purchasing some lengths of rope for attaching the kayaks to the little set of roof racks which came with our car. We headed out of town in heavy traffic and through to Orkanger. From there we drove the E39, a road we have previously biked along - until we made it to Valsøa where we loaded the kayaks and set out across the fjord in the gathering dusk.

The fjord in the fading light - it was about 8 when we finally set out

Chris organising the kayaks

Nearly ready to go

We paddled for over three hours - it was about 16km across the fjord then up another channel to the DNT hut Imarbu. It was beautiful and calm, but unfortunately we were too busy paddling to take any photos and it was dark too, so they might not have come out so well.

By ten o'clock Chris thought we should be close and sure enough a light appeared in front of us and we heard voices on the beach. There was a 'working bee' happening on the hut, so there was a big group of friendly Norwegians staying there, as well as a tramping group from the Uni. One man we met had just been studying in Dunedin for a year, so we had lots to talk about with him!

Imarbu hut the next morning

Before we set out for our long paddle on Saturday, I was considering ditching the kayaks and taking that inflatable white speed boat thingee in the background.

The sky was gray, but the scenery was still very cool

We paddled for about 4 hours before we stopped for lunch on a rock outcrop. We saw a wee otter swimming amongst the rocks, and I was enjoying listening to my iPod as we paddled. We had also rigged up an ingenious tow system the night before so my kayak slip streamed Chris's.... and if I felt like a little break he would never even notice....

At about 7 o'clock we finally rounded the headland and floated back into the bay where we had parked the car. We were both really tired after a long paddle, but happy to be back at the car and it was Saturday night, so the best thing was to be able to drive home and have a nice long sleep in the next morning (-:

WOC in Trondheim!

2010-08-17T09:46:00.000-07:00

I had been looking forward to this week since we first learned the World Orienteering Championships (WOC) were going to be held in Trondheim in 2010 - that was over a year and a half ago - I knew it would be very exciting and it certainly lived up to my expectations.

Ian and Anne (Chris's parents) arrived in at Pirabadet terminal from Kristiansund on Saturday evening - just after I had said farewell to Al and Amber and watched them disappear on the train back to Oslo. The Forne's had been traveling around Southern Norway for the week before making their way to Trondheim.

Chris was feeling apprehensive before the start of WOC, he had put in a lot of preparation over the past year and a bit we had been living in Trondheim - and on top of that he had just been asked if he could deliver the 'Oath of Fair Play' on behalf of all the competitors at the opening ceremony.

Sunday morning was warm and clear, as Ian, Anne and I walked down to Sverresborg Folk Museum where the sprint qualification would take place. Lara Prince and Rite Holmes were the two girl's representing NZ who would compete in the 3 different disciplines (sprint, long and middle) while Tane Cambridge, James Bradshaw, Ross Morrison, and Tom Reynolds, as well as Chris, would represent the men.

The afternoon sprint final in town saw Chris and Ross racing the world's best around the old streets of Trondheim, starting in the square and heading across Gamle Bybro up to Kristiansten Festning, then back down to the square. It was a very exciting race - the square was packed and big screens showed the athletes every move. The Swiss dominated winning gold and silver in the mens and gold in the womens.

Chris finishing in the sprint in the center of Trondheim Torg

Chris delivered his oath amid a very bizarre opening ceremony, then we headed home and crashed after a busy day.

Next up was the qualification for the middle event, then on Tuesday the qualification for the long. The Kiwis all raced hard, but making it into the finals is extremely tough. Only the top 15 from each heat of 45 makes it into the final....for most New Zealanders this means you must have a perfect run to have any chance of getting in.

Ian, Anne and I headed out to the event and ran our own course through the forest as part of the WOC Tour. Ian enjoyed getting some tuition from Emily the swamp expert (-: Ross and Chris both qualified in good positions for the middle distance, and Chris and Lara both qualified for the long....so we had some more excitement ahead of us. It was also great to see my local friend Helen, who runs for the British team, have a fantastic run and easily qualify for the final.

Rita finishing her long qualification race

Chris and Lara - stoked after both qualifying for the long final - go Southerly Storm!

Wednesday was a rest day, so while Chris lazed around saving up energy Ian and I headed out on the bikes to explore the Bymarke single tracks. The weather was continuing to put on a great show for all the Trondheim visitors.

Ian and I head out on the bikes

Anne and I on Gamle Bybro

Kristiansten Festning - the sprint final climbed up to here from town then back down again

The long awaited long final took place in the Granåsen Ski Arena, about 15 minutes bike ride from our place. It was exciting to finally go there after the area had been embargoed for all the time we have lived in Trondheim.

There was a big crowd turn out to watch the race, and the exciting commentary and big screens with live tracking made it very exciting to watch the competition. Chris raced very well, but said afterward he was feeling a bit flat and tired throughout the race. However it didn't appear this way when he out sprinted Daniel Hubmann into the finish who he had been clinging on to for the last part of the course. Lara completed her first long final in a great time too.

Chris verses Daniel Hubmann!

On Saturday WOC continued with the middle final, also at Granåsen. Ross had a few big mistakes in his race which left him feeling pretty demoralized and meant Chris caught him up, but I have to say it was super cool to see Chris and Ross run through the stadium together in their flashy black tops. The commentator liked it too!

Chris and Ross run through the stadium together during the middle final

Chris had a blistering run and his finish sprint was tremendous. I will never forget that finish, it was so exciting! He finished in an excellent 21 place and is now the NZ record holder in the men for all 3 WOC disciplines. I know I shouldn't brag, but I am very proud of him!

The whole NZ team, plus Ian, Anne, me, Mat Scot, Viv and Aaron Prince all squeezed into our living room for a communal dinner

So, WOC had nearly come to a close except the relay....and the party of course! Tom, Ross and Chris were running in the men's relay team - in that order. Lizzie Ingham had arrived in Trondheim by this stage, she was supposed to be competing in all the WOC events, but had to withdraw due to a bad injury in her ankle. This left Rita and Lara without a third runner for their relay team.

After much persuasion I was convinced to run for them so that they could still be a complete team and get a finishing result. This proved retrospectively to be a very controversial decision within the New Zealand Orienteering Federation - however at the time I didn't know this because the people making the decision within the IOF decided it was OK; it meant we still got to have a New Zealand team and there was a record number of international teams entered into the World Champs relay.

I was really nervous before I ran - I had had a couple of reasonable runs with the WOC tour leading up to Sunday, but I was thinking the whole thing was pretty crazy. My running is always hampered by my completely bunged up ankle and I still felt that I had not quite mastered the art of the Norwegian marsh.

But I ran the best race I could - I was knackered towards the finish and made some dumb mistakes in the last loop - but it was a total buzz to finish and the other girls were stoked too. Lara had a fantastic run on the first leg coming in before the Australians! The boys were also quite satisfied with their race - although Chris was so tired from all the other races he didn't have so much left in the tank.

The proud supporter!

Ian and Anne enjoying the summer sun on our porch - and a nice vino

We finished the WOC week with the infamous party, the boys in pink shirts with cool shades and the girls in stylish black and white dresses. Of course there was a beer O included in the party antics....need I say more (-:

Lofoten Return

2010-08-17T09:11:00.000-07:00

Reine - a classic Lofoten view

I visited Lofoten last July with Mum and Dad - it is an amazing place in north Norway, and we decided that it was worth the expense for Al and Amber to see it too - I was certainly excited to go back there again. So Al, Amber and I took the plane up to Bodø from Trondheim on Sunday evening. The 10 hour drive takes a mere 60 minutes by plane. We were hoping for some exciting views from the plane but unfortunately it was pretty cloudy.

Chris had had to stay behind in Trondheim because this was his last week of preparation for the World Orienteering Championships (WOC) which would start in Trondheim the following week.

We arrived in Bodø at 8pm and trudged down to the same campground that Mum, Dad, Chris and I had stayed at last year. We had to muck around sorting out a hire car in the morning, but eventually got one sorted and drove up toward the ferry crossing from Tyssfjorden to Lødingen. It was cloudy, but we still enjoyed the craggy scenery and raw rock mountain sides.

Heading up to Lødingen in our wee hire car

Tunnel from a cliff

Colourful boats

On the car ferry to Lødingen. It takes about 1.5 hours to get there.

We found a little cabin to stay in just outside of Lødingen. In the morning clouds continued to hang low about the mountain tops, but we were not deterred from our adventure from Svolvær into the Trollfjord - a very spectacular and narrow fjord with no road access at all.

The Svolvær church with the goats horns in the background which you can jump between if you are a bit crazy.

We requested the boat driver to drop us at the end of the fjord - and surprised the other tourists on the boat by clambering onto the jetty and waving farewell. We just had to hope they would remember to pick us up the following day!

Heading into the Trollfjord

From Svolvær into Trollfjord by boat

In the Trollfjord

There is a little DNT hut called Trollfjordhytte about 1.5 hours rough walk from the end of the Trollfjord. We made our way along a big pipeline which Al and I tottered along (it was scary!) and Amber strolled along as if it was a massive footpath.

Making our way along the scary pipeline

Arctic scrubbiness

View from Trollfjordhytte window

Of course we had to have another chilly swim at the lake beside the hut, then we lazed about in the hut enjoying the company of 4 friendly Norwegian 'locals' who all came from Halvstad and were perhaps a little surprised by these three Kiwis who had somehow found out about this cozy little hut.

Trollfjordhytte

Wednesday dawned clear and sunny - finally we had our perfect Lofoten day. We descended back down to the fjord in 45 minutes, then got to watch to wonderful old sailing boats anchor at the little jetty. By the time our boat arrived to pick us up we had to clamber over two ships to get onto our one!

Two beautiful old ships in Trollfjord, we had to climb over both to get to our boat

Looking back at the anchored boats in Trollfjord

The 1.5 hour boat trip back to Svolvær was beautiful, and we even got swooped on by a huge sea eagle that knew this boat had a fish to throw out for it.

Our sea eagle siting

Once back to the car we continued along the amazing road past Henningsvær, and the colourful fishing village of Reine. Amber was stoked and took some great pictures. In the evening sun we climbed up to Munkebu near Å at the tip of the Lofoten and pitched our tents with a great view of the lakes and sea.

Golden sand and such clear water

Fish racks near Henningsvær

Evening light made in Reine

Enormous raspberries!

After a chilly night I awoke and discovered a strange cloud had descended on all the hills, but the tops of the peaks still poked through the clouds.

My tent is the wee orange blob

On our way up to the peak with low clouds hanging about the tops

Munkebu

On top of Hermanndalstinden

Eerie morning cloud

We set out for a climb of Hermanndalstinden, which rises quite steeply from the Krokvatnet. We climbed up through deep cloud to suddenly emerge above the sea of cloud. It was just like being in an airplane, other peaks could be seen poking out of the cloud in every direction.

After enjoying the summit for a while we dropped back in the cloud and back down the steep track to Munkebu. By the time we made it out back to Å it was 6pm, and we were all feeling a bit tired and smelly, so we found a little cabin by the sea and bought dinner from the supermarket.

Friday had arrived all too soon, we had to fly out from Bodø at 10pm that evening, so we cued quite early for the 3 hour ferry trip back to the mainland. It was sunny again, but still chilly in the cool breeze as we sat out on the deck to enjoy the trip. Sadly another great trip to the Lofoten was over - that is such an amazing place.

Leaving Lofoten - looking back to the town of Å, with the distant island of Værøy in the background

We had time for a quick visit to look at the Oceans of Rock peak which we climbed with Mum and Dad last time we were in Bodø. Interestingly about 10 days after this picture was taken Chris was back here with Ian and Anne and they climbed it again!

Al and Amber come to stay

2010-08-17T08:41:00.000-07:00

We arrived in Lillehammer on July 25th to meet Al and Amber outside the train station laden with big packs and bikes. They were at the beginning of their 3 month holiday in Europe - some if which will involve cycle touring. They were amused by our wonky little new car and its strange noises - nevertheless we crammed everything in and took off towards Lom via the scenic route 51.

After many hours driving and lots of excited catching up we arrived in Lom, ate some terrible Lom burgers and found a spot to put our tents. In the morning we continued through to Geiranger Fjord along the tourist route - then over the amazing Trollstigen road and down into Åndalsnes. We stopped every two minutes to jump out of the car and take photos of the amazing view.

Breakfast on the jetty

We liked this first aid vehicle

Above the Trollstigen

Rock perch

From Åndalsnes we headed up the valley and parked our car at Rabben. We spent a while reorganizing gear, before heading off on foot into Svartvassbu. It was an enoyable walk in, the sky was overcast but it was warm - so warm that when we arrived at the hut we impressed the Norwegians staying there by jumping straight into the iceberg filled lake.

Maps for trip planning in Geiranger Fjord

Heading up to Svartvassbu

The semi frozen lake we jumped into

Fresh salmon and pasta with veggies was on the evening menu courtesy of top chefs Emily and Chris.

Morning sun on the hut

In the morning Chris's "little climb before lunch" turned out to be a 6 hour mission up Sjøvdøla. We crossed an enourmous rock garden before climbing up around a lake and crossing a little snout of glacier onto a flat plateau with great waterfalls tumbling off the side. It was cool, but some food along the way would have been nice!

Past a beautiful lake on our way up the mountain

On the summit

Cool views down to the lake

We got back starving at 4, stuffed ourselves with fried polarbread and cheese, then started out on the 4 hour walk to Vasstindbu. We arrived there around 9, quickly cleaned ourselves in a freezing cold stream, then cooked up a 10 oclock feast....Al and Amber were not sure about this new routine they were being introduced to!

On our way to hut number 2: Vasstindbu

Arriving at the hut - finally!

The last day of our trip arrived and we wandered out across more great boulder fields and down to the valley. Chris ran to get the car while we admired the cute Norwegian sheep with bells.

Past yet another pretty lake on our last day

Al + reflective lake

Sheeps with bells

A long but pretty drive through Trondelag farmland took us back to Trondheim and another late dinner. The next few days Chris worked (and orienteered) while I showed Al and Amber the sites of Trondheim. The weather was pretty good now, so we managed a swim in the lake. We visited the busy festival that was taking place in town and I ate my first toffee apple in years!

Trondheim cathederal - Nidaros - and big crowds

Out cycling on Fosen - watch out for elk!

Bymarka trails

Taking the car ferry across to Fosen with our bikes - which means its free!

Nice weather in rolling Trondelag farmland

We also had time to take Al and Amber for a spin on the nice trails through the forest of Bymarke, and on Saturday we caught the car ferry (for free!) out to Fosen and completed a nice ride round there. After humming and haaaing about what to do the following week we discovered some cheap flights up to the Lofoten Islands and decided that sounded like fun.

Snøhetta and a rather grey Week

2010-08-17T08:33:00.000-07:00

I was itching to jump on my bike again and hoon through the forest testing out some new skills after all that riding in Italy, but the rain just kept pouring down!

In Trondheim it was about 12 degrees, Chris had work to do and I was wondering why I wasn't still in Italy? Fortunately I managed to occupy myself by catching up with some friends, reading 'The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo', and completing another painting for our wall.

On Friday we started to look into hiring a car for the weekend because we were heading down to Lillehammer to pick up my brother Alastair and his girlfriend Amber who were flying in from New Zealand. The cars were all so expensive to hire and we hadn't been looking long when Chris said "why don't we just buy one instead?" 5 hours later we bought a second hand Toyota Corolla from a couple living round the road from us. It seems ok, so here's hoping! At least it was pretty cheap.

The next day Ally proposed a walking trip up Snohetta, the biggest mountain on the Dovre Plateau, several hours drive southeast of Trondheim. I decided this sounded like fun, so I agreed to join him. The road into Snohetta is only open for a few months a year - otherwise it is a long ski or bike ride in to the base of the mountain.

Receding glacier on the way up the mountain

On top of Snohetta

Great views along the ridge

We had a nice day roaming up the big rock covered hillside to the top of the barren mountain, along with lots of other people who obviously thought this was a good plan too. The real highlight of the trip was spotting a whole family of these crazy musk ox things that I had never even heard of before on the way out! They look little woolly mammoths with funny horns which come from their squashed heads - very cool.

The musk oxes! From a safe distance

We got back late on Saturday night, then on Sunday morning Chris and I headed away from grey Trondheim to go down to Lillehammer and meet up with Al and Amber.

Lago di Garda

2010-07-23T07:08:00.000-07:00

After my stay at Cris's place in Oberstdorf, (the little bit of Germany with sticks out into the alps surrounded entirely by Austria) we loaded up Frauke's wee car to it's absolute max and departed south - headed for Lago di Garda for a 10 day bike/climbing adventure.

We drove past the church in the lake on the way to Gardersee

We were staying in a campground in Tobleno at the Northern end of the lake. The lake is over 60 km long, the southern end is very flat and hot, while the northern end tucks into the foothills of the Dolomites, it is surrounded by steep peaks around 2000 m high which plunge into the lake.

The campground was totally filled with German holiday makers enjoying Italy's warm weather. Many people flock to Lago di Garda for its sailing - the lake gets regular and predictable winds. The first thing that greeted us in the campground reception was a miniature of the NZ Americas cup boat Black Magic proudly displayed on the wall.

One of the first things that struck me in total contrast to the peace and quiet I have become accustomed to in Norway was the amount of people and the general buzz! We nearly got run over by a speeding motorcycle on the street, cues of traffic honked and pedestrians veered across the street clutching dripping ice-creams. A totally different world - but great fun.

Pasta pasta pasta! Emily heaven in Riva del Garda

The lake by night - this is two minutes walk from our campsite

The lake - and the sun bathers

We spent the first few days doing some mountain biking, lots of swimming and ice cream eating. I found the heat pretty hard to handle - it was often above 35 and riding up big hills in that heat was hard work. Fortunately there were heaps of springs, as well as the odd river and lake that you could put your head under or plunge into - delicious.

Out on the bikes in the hot sun

Riding through the Biotope

Cyprus trees round the lakeshore

On our third day at the Lago we decided to try a via ferrata which climbed Cima SAT - you could see the spire through the haze from our campsite. The haze was getting more and more noticeable with the days, Frauke said we needed a good thunderstorm to clear the air again. After we had walked 1 hour up to the base of the via ferrata we realized we really needed some more water. I looked on the map and discovered a little spring marked very nearby.

Some ruins on the way up the hill

We headed towards that spot on the map only to find a barred path - until I spotted 'Aqua' spray painted in blue to a rock above and raced up to the cliff to find a strange tank with a lever. Cris came up after me and was also scratching his head in dismay...until it dawned on us that by lifting the lever water poured out of a tap! We were so excited by our discovery we danced for joy and soaked ourselves in the cool water.

After that we were ready for the via ferrata - which turned out to be a straight forward but rather terrifyingly exposed ascent of ladders. Hundreds of meters of rusty ladders, some almost overhanging, and below our feet we could see down to the tiny boats sailing on the lake.

We were ready to head up the via ferrata

Beginning up the ladders

Half way up the ladders

Frauke on the rock

Nice views from Cima SAT

Phew, now I need a lift home! Cris collapses hopefully on the helicopter pad at the top

It was lots of fun, but we were quite happy when we reached the top and were able to take off our harnesses and descend lots of switchbacks on an easy walking track back down to the lake.

We spent the next few days on the bikes again, completing several of the rides listed in Frauke's guidebook. One took us over the Biotope Marocche which is a strange rocky landscape created by huge landslides thousands of years ago. The temperature remained around 35 - 40 degrees, but I seemed to be getting a bit more used to it.

Another delicious cook up after a good day out

Cris is just full of beans

Downhill challenges....

The pink tire levers come in handy!

Nice downhill through the forest

We really couldn't eat these ice creams fast enough - it was 42 degrees and we were hungry!

Windy roads the next day

Steep drops down the lake

The trail wound through some amazing old railway tunnels

After 5 days at Lago Di Garda Chris arrived from Trondheim. We had 5 more days to hang out in Italy before it was time for both of us to head back to Norway.

Watching the final of the world cup along with all the Dutch crowd

In Peschare (the very Southern end of the lake) waiting for Chris to arrive by train

Silly girls...

After a couple of days easier riding and swimming it was time to plan a big mission. We decided on a fairly mega bike ride climbing Mt Stivo (2058) then descending 2000 meters of rough single track. Frauke and Cris (being a little more organised than us!) set off at 7am from our campsite. We followed them at 8am, climbing rapidly up to the town of Nago.

On the bikes out of the campground. There were some nice cycle paths to follow.

Chris actually got into the fountain it was so hot! Much to the amusement of passersby. I followed his example (-:

Cool narrow streets

After that was a very steep section of sealed footpath through some forest. This turned out to be one of the most testing climbs I have ever done - we were swarmed and attacked by killer flies with demon fangs (otherwise known as horseflies). They bit us all over and the only way to escape was ride like crazy....not surprisingly we did that part of the climb in record time, only stopping at the very end of the fly zone because I got a flat tire.

Steep climbing (we were out of the flies now so I was smiling again)

It turned out Frauke and Cris had also been attacked there. After that the climb was much more pleasant but got progressively steeper and more technical. We caught up with the others and shared fly stories (very thankful that that part of the ride was over). After some food we pushed and carried our bikes up through the alpine meadows to the summit.

Some Italians were very amused and impressed to see 4 bikes arrive on the summit of Monte Stivo.

Carrying the bikes the last bit to the top

Nice downhill trails

The descent was amazing, we descended some single track then traversed the ridge before flying down more single track to a saddle point. The others all outstripped me with their downhill prowess, but I was having a great time anyway.

Tricky bits

After a couple of hours descent we were all getting pretty tired and sore - we had finally had enough rough downhill - so we rode the last bit along the road and arrived back at our campground after 12 hours out!

The next day was our second to last, so we had to make it a good one. We rode up valley to the base of a very large cliff face - the sheer rock side of Monte Casale. We planned to do the Via Ferrata Che Guevara which climbs the 1300 m face. The sun was beating down and there wasn't much shade, but we had come prepared with at least 4 litres of water each so we hoped it would be ok.

Setting off up the fixed wires, the ground was rapidly falling away

Hot midday sun and a big rockface

The first part of the climb seemed quite tricky and we wished for rock shoes instead of scuffed running shoes (I had my falling apart icebugs with spikes on!) Within the first few minutes Chris, Frauke and I all had blisters on our hands from holding onto the wire and we stopped and taped up our hands. Cris was the only one showing he had been doing some climbing - his hands were tougher than ours.

The climbing got easier and we were soon over halfway up the face. The view down to the town of Daino and out to the Lago di garda was amazing.

Into the bush

We sweated our way upwards, enjoying the easy rock climbing but trying to conserve our rapidly diminishing water supplies. After a couple of hours on the face we entered the bush on a steep track which lead us the final few hundred meters up to the summit.

Nearly up and we left the face behind

Cris and Frauke about to reach the top

It was really weird to pop out on a flat grassy lawn with people picnicking and sunbathing! We still had on all our climbing gear and we immediately felt a little out of place. After admiring the tremendous view from the summit we headed back down a rather steep descent track into the valley.

The grassy paddock on top

Safely clipped onto the summit cross

After a couple more hot sticky hours we made it to the bikes, then cycled down valley for a very necessary plunge into the cool river, followed by a huge ice cream in Arco. That evening we decided to eat out - and being in Italy it wasn't too hard to decide what to eat - pizza pizza pizza, mmmm!

Ice cream time

Mmmm...

Finally the time had come to part ways with Frauke and Cris - they drove back to Germany on the Sunday while Chris and I took the train to Milan and flew back to Trondheim the following day. Trondheim was gray and rainy when we landed and I had some depressing thoughts that maybe summer was over....

Ravioli, sun, truffles and the beautiful Schreksee

2010-07-07T07:54:00.000-07:00

One hot stuffy Ryan Air flight and I arrive in Memmingen. From there I took a very long train trip to Freiburg to stay with Julian and Jana for a couple of days, before making my way down South to stay with Crispin in Oberstdorf. I managed to reassemble my dismembered bike in the sweltering heat at the railway station and cycle round to their place.

Jana had cooked some yummy nutty pasta for tea - then Julian and I headed out for a quick ride in the Schwarzwald before it got dark and it was time for bed. The next day Jana and I had a nice time hanging out and begun by eating breakfast at a nearby cafe. We constructed a vege strudel for dinner, much to Julian's delight.

On Wedsnesday Jana and I had the plan to head to Switzerland (about 1.5 hours drive) to spend the day rock climbing. We bhad bought the guidebook the day before and spotted a suitably shady crag which would hopefully stay out of the sun for most of the day. We had the crag and its multiple routes to ourselves all day, and slowly worked our way through some fun climbs.

In the evening we meet Julian and his workmates at a beer garden (they had just finished a mountain bike ride) for some delicious German radlers. Jana had to go back to work on Thursday so I mucked around getting things sorted for leaving on Friday, before Julian and Jana got back from work and we decided to go and sit in the Dreisam (the river which flows through Frieburg) and read our books! It was very refreshing and is apparently a very popular thing to do!

Friday came around all too quickly and it was time to hop back on the train - back through Memmingen and onward to Obertsdorf. I arrived in Oberstdorf late in the afternoon. It is a small town in a broad valley surrounded by tall peaks. It reminded me very much of Austria - not much of Germany anymore. As soon as I arrived in Cris's little attic apartment he proposed a swim in the Frieburg See - I was keen after a long hot train trip getting there.

We rode up into the forest for some time before reaching the deep green lake. After cunningly avoiding the 'pay to swim in lake area' we found a spot to dive in - the water was clear and surprisingly warm.

Cris had to work the following day and it was another stinking hot one - so I decided to slog up a steep road on my mountain bike. I climbed right up to the Seealp, then on up an amazingly steep sealed path. I bravely rode through a gigantic herd of mooing cows, then the path got even steeper till my legs gave up!

At that point I looked at my map and saw the track was described as an 'extreme downhill' and maybe you were supposed to take that big gondola drifting overhead? Nevermind, I jumped on my bike and whizzed back down the many switch backs through about 800m of descent.

That night we stayed at Frauke's place (Cris's girlfriend) in order to get organised for a two day tramping trip we had planned for Sunday and Monday. Frauke had another friend staying with her - Bini - and she was coming on our trip too.

In the morning Frauke's Mum drove us to Vilsalpsee and we started our walk up into the mountains. We reached the ridge after a long climb up through pretty alpine meadows and a farmhouse with very friendly ponies and goats. After lunch we continued along the ridge, then dropped down to the beautiful (but badly named) Schreksee. We pitched our tents, then dived into the lake and swum out to a little island.

Friendly goats

and ponies....

Amazing Funghi

Cris and Frauke on the ridgetop

At about that time some spots of rain began to fall, and by the time we were attemoting to BBQ our dinner it was pouring! Needless to say we went to bed early that night.

In the morning it was still cloudy and a bit drizzly, but we decided to head up anyway; over a saddle, along a ridge top, then a steep descent into the valley which lead to Hinterstein where we would be picked up again by Frauke's Mum.

Schreksee in the morning light

We dumped our packs on the ridge and went up to another of the many peaks along the way which are topped by big crosses. Cris and I decided it was a fun game to have a race to the top - resulting in us collapsing on the summit. We ate lunch, then continued along the ridge to where we needed to descend - and it started raining again.

Stormy cross on top

Phew! That was too tough!

With our jackets on we descended down a slippery track that was covered in cold little lizards that had obviously been caught out in the downpour - there were so many it was an effort to avoid standing on them! We were looking for a track to our right that we planned to take down the valley, but when it never appeared Cris and I lead the way bush bashing downwards to find it.

The girl's quickly decided this wasn't such a good idea (probably sensibly) and convinced us to head back to the main track where we made a slightly longer but more straight forward descent down to the valley. We mooched about in Hinterstein playing in the little fountain before Frauke's Mum arrived and drove us back to her place for some drying out of gear, hot showers and yummy dinner.

Yesterday Cris and I cycled back to Oberstdorf (about 2 hours ride) through some pretty German countryside. It was still a bit rainy, so we spent the afternoon mucking about at his flat and buying copious quantities of food for our ten day trip to Lago De Garda on Thursday.

Today Cris headed off to work and I went for a neat run up to the Schattenkreuz, up a very steep hill near Obertsdorf. The weather had turned sunny again and we are almost ready for our trip to Lago De Garda tomorrow. We have 3 bikes with us and climbing gear and huge amounts of food - so we are all set for some good times. In 4 days Chris F will fly over from Norway and join us for the last 6 days of my stay.

So, better hurry away because I am supposed to be packing and so this post was a bit rushed!

Finland - Sweden - Norway

2010-07-07T07:31:00.000-07:00

After our exciting time in Finland we headed to Stockholm and stayed in the newly built 'castle' in the forest belinging to Alistair and Juliette. Todd and Lizzie were also going to compete in the World Cup sprint race in the old town of Stockholm.

We had a fun day out in the sun enjoying spectating the orienteering - unfortunatly all the Kiwis missed out in qualifying - Lizzie by only a matter of seconds. The next day we parted ways and Chris and I headed off to spend several relaxing days in Gothenberg at Aaron and Sara's house. Sadly they were not there though - they had already headed away on their summer holiday.

We enjoyed exploring the forest with some orienteering maps and swimming and kayaking in the lakes in their racing kayaks - thanks guys! Then we headed to Gjorvik back in Norway for the O Festivalen and the last round of the world cup.

We arrived at an old house in Gjorvik filled with the friendly Irish team and Lizzie and Todd. On Saturday a middle distance race concluded the World Cup - I ran an open course in the morning as part of the O Festivalen, then watched the middle afterwards. It was a super warm day to spend out in the sun. On Sunday Chris and I both ran in the relay - he ran for the Wing men's team and me for the Wing men's 50+ team, hmmm? (we were not official).

On Sunday night Henning and Susha drove us back to Oslo, their parents provided us with a delicious dinner and then we slept over at Susha and Hennings nice place near Oslo - more nice people (-: In the morning we went into Oslo central and Chris caught the train back to Trondheim while I headed off on the next part of my summer adventure - off to Austria!