Camping on the mountains
Last Sunday i packed my car and drove several hour north to the mountain-passage at Imingfjell. I had been looking at maps of this area for some time now. Finally i had some days off during Pentecost to go up and explore the area.
It’s a beautiful drive trough the small villages & farm-landscape at Tessungdalen. The river running in the valley is also a well known white water paddling destination, since it had been raining several days the water was high and there where a lot of paddlers around.
I found a nice sport to camp along the toll-road on the north side Sønstevatn. The start of the trail was about two kilometers further in at the ed of the road. It was great to be camping outside again, it had been a while since last time 🙂
The next day i crawled out of my sleeping-bag, brewed some coffee & i was on my way. The trail started with an nice ATV track that gently went up along the hillside for several km. I’m sort of a diesel, my legs usually preform better if they have warmed up a little on some leveled ground before the steep inclines. This was just perfect, my legs felt good.
Time to run
At the start it was so cold 6-7 degrees (Celsius) and 9 m/s winds. I was tucked inn with a thin isolated jacked, beanie & gloves! and my homemade soft-shell running thighs that where just perfect, so happy with those pants! i even had a fall about 12 km out on the trail on a jagged rock. It made a 6cm cut in my skin just below my knee but not a mark on my pants.. it is magic! Later that day the sun came out and the wind subsided, bye jacket, beanie & gloves 🙂
The plan was to run towards MÃ¥rbu and then a little north, trough ‘SmÃ¥gÃ¥dalen’, past ‘Vikstul’ and back to the car. The trail ran on open alpine plains with far views in all directions. It runs close to the border of Hardangervidda nation park, a large wide open mountain plateau. Especially close to ‘MÃ¥rbu’ the trail went over large open areas towards ‘Solheimstulen’ there where more rugged formations, mountains & valleys to run in between.
When i arrived at ‘SmÃ¥gÃ¥dalen’ (the crossing) i had such good legs and plenty of time to add a little. So i decided to add a little loop run north towards ‘Solheimstulen’. This trail went slightly uphill all the way. When the trail hit the ATV track coming up from ‘Solheimstulen’ my legs where pretty tired. Form here i took the shortest route (the ATV track). After a little break on the highest point of the trail i ran down to ‘Vikstul’ & back to my car.
Before driving home i made some dinner at the car park and gave my legs some rest. I don’t trust my legs to drive right after a long run. You never know when the muscle cramps hit! It had been a great day running over the mountain plains. to be repeated! 🙂
The trail report – more info about the trail and the route on a topographical map.
