What happened in
part 1: Frank and Anne came with their Skoda Roomster to meet Micha, me, and Roomster's "brother" Yeti in Oslo. Together, we continued north with the goal of having holidays on the beautiful Lofoten Islands. We met musk oxen and geese along the way, visited Trondheim, bouldered in Harbak, climbed Torghatten, and finally reached the ferry that brought us from Bodø to our first Lofoten island: Værøy.
Map of the Lofoten-tour (Adobe Flash required)
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Værøy is a small island of only about 20 square km located at the southern end of the Lofoten archipelago. It is famous for its tall mountain cliffs, on which in summer numerous seabirds like the cute Atlantic puffin, Kittiwake, Shags, Razor bills, Guillemots and Petrels breed. Visiting the island in August, we were just a couple of weeks too late for the breeding season and all the Puffins had shown their Pufflings the way to sea already. However, we saw a couple of enormous White-tailed eagles, a Golden eagle, a Peregin falcon and Skuas.
In the past, the inhabitants of Værøy have entirely lived of the island's bird richness. Puffin eggs were a delicacy and Puffins themselves were eaten fresh, salted in brine or smoked and dried as protein source for winter times. They even had their own breed of dog, called the Måstad dog (after their town Måstad), or Lundehund (Lunde meaning Puffin in Norwegian) for hunting the birds in the cliffs. The islanders also trapped White-tailed eagles by hiding in small cavities in the slopes of the mountain and grabbing the bird bare-handed when it came to feed on a laid out bait. In the 1950s the last bird-hunters left Måstad to move to the bigger town on the other side of the island where life was easier. Since then Måstad was a ghost town and old buildings have just recently started to be renovated as holiday homes. Still, no road is connecting Måstad with Sørland, the main town on the island. Only the old remains of an earlier (unsuccessful) attempt to build a street are left and can be used for a beautiful day-hike to visit Måstad.
That's what we did on a supposedly super rare beautiful sunny day. It was even warm enough to quickly hop into the refreshing turquoise water. From Måstad, we climbed up to Måstadfjellet, the mountain on which side the birds breed in summer. No nesting birds anymore as I said, but a nest of mul- and blue berries. Mmhmh.
On our way back I collected as much plastic rubbish from the beaches as I could carry. Quite literally still only a drop in the ocean. It makes me so sad to see all this beautiful unspoiled nature suffer from our human consumerism and throw-away society. Quite half of the rubbish at the Lofoten beaches is plastic bottles - the other half consists of torn-away buoys, fisheries plastic boxes, rubber boots, and fishing nets. Everything that swims on the surface - I am glad I can't see what is on the bottom of the ocean… .
Well, anyways, after this nearly perfect day out, we took the evening ferry to continue our way to the next Lofoten island: Moskenesøya.
Moskenesøya is the southernmost island of the main archipelago, and it is also the most spectacular. Steep granite mountains surrounded by green slopes shape the island, whose west coast permits access only by foot or boat. The main Lofoten highway, the E10, ends in a small town called Å, and from here onwards only hiking trails exist.
We arrived by ferry in Moskenes at midnight, and only drove a few kilometers further north to spend the night at a parking that offered a very romantic view of Reine. Reine is an old fishing village, which is popular with tourists mainly for the picturesque look it has from top of the mountain Reinebringen at its back. Frank and Anne climbed Reinebringen the next day to enjoy the view, but I was not feeling well and decided to recover to be able to join the big hike that we had planned for the following day.
Hermannsdalstinden is with a bit over 1000 m the highest mountain on the island of Moskenesøya. The trail to reach its peak starts in Sørvågen, and most people split the hike in two or three days, spending one or two nights in a tent somewhere close to the foot of the mountain or at the DNT hut “Munkebu”. As the weather forecast wasn’t particularly good, we decided for a night at the cosy Munkebu hut, and for climbing the peak on the second day. The hike to the hut was wet and foggy, as was the climb the next day up to the peak. With good weather the incredible scenery will blow your mind away - in our case, only the hoods of our rain jackets got almost blown away and the view was hardly good enough to see the next stone to step on. Bummer! We returned as fast as we could to the hut, had a warming tea break, and continued down to Sørvågen where we’d left our cars.
Wet and cold, we were looking forward to a long hot shower and a warm room to dry our stuff, therefore we chose a campsite for the night. Unfortunately, the showers at this site were limited to 3 minutes, there was no common room to warm up or dry, or sit and eat, and on top of all that, also the water canister that we had in our car leaked and about 3 liter of water were nicely distributed over the climbing gear and clothes. Aargh! Even better, the expensive dryer we used to do something about our moist clothes was located in the kitchen and saturated all our shirts and trousers with an unpleasant roasted beef smell. Great!
Thankfully, at least the sun was shining the next morning and a funny gang of sparrows bouncing over the camp site cheered us up.
We drove together to the northern end of Moskenesøya, where a beautiful wide white sand beach could again evoke the illusion of being somewhere on an Caribbean island - if it wasn’t for the cold wind. :) Unfortunately, this was the point where Anne and Frank's, and Micha and my way separated already. Frank and Anne had planned to join a whale safari on Andøya, the far away northern most Lofoten island, and of course they also had to drive some kilometers more back home, so they had to take off already, whereas Micha and me had some more time and stayed on Moskenesøya to use the better weather for some hikes that could actually also offer a view!
We started right away with such a hike and followed a vague path to the north cape of the island. From here, we scrambled up a steep gras slope to the top of Mulstøtinden and walked back along the ridge when a sudden weather change brought us again wet clothes but also an amazing rainbow reaching all over the bay.
We spent another night at the Reine parking, from where Micha took a boat along Kjerkefjorden to Vindstad the next morning in order to climb Helvetestinden, and I caught up on hiking Reinebringen for the breathtaking view from the peak.
Reinebringen's view point peak is only 450 m high, but the path up was steep and muddy from the rain of the last days. After having enjoyed the view and taken lots of pictures, I got curious about a ridge leading to the real peak of Reinebringen and maybe an alternative path down. I followed the ridge to the highest point and started to decent on the other side until I reached a small cliff that I could have slid down, but possibly wouldn’t have been able to climb up again. As I wasn’t sure that I would make it down that way, I turned around and followed the normal path back down again.
As I had still some time left until Micha would be back, I drove again to the northern end of Moskenesøya and did a short hike to the beach of Kvalvika, one of those nice and hidden bays on the remote western side of the island.
Our big plan for our last day on Moskenesøya was to hike all the way from Å, where the E10 ends, to the southern most tip of the island to “Hell”. There is no marked - nor unmarked - trail leading to Hell and because of the steep granite peaks, the whole trip was more an hellish experiment than a safe hiking route.
After following a trail around the lake Ågvatnet for about 1.5 hours, we turned off to natural terrain to get across the main mountain ridge to the western side of the island. The pass we’d chosen was already about 700 m high, and partially we had to fight with dense vegetation and unstable shingle slopes. Luckily, the (again 700 m) decent on the other side was mostly not too steep grass and blue berry slopes, so we made it safely down to the lovely wild and pristine beach of Gjerdvika.
As we progressed south along the coast, hopping from boulder to boulder, leaving lonesome trails in the unspoiled sand, climbing up and down the cliffs that separate the beautiful beaches, the weather also got better and better, and suddenly the whole coast was dipped in golden sunset light. Oups, sunset? Damn! The difficult terrain had slowed us down too much and it got late! We made it to the last bay on the west coast, Refsvika, but didn’t have the time to cross over the last mountain ridge to Hell. At least we were sure now, it must be possible!
We hurried up to go back - back over all the cliffs between the beaches, jumping from boulder to boulder again, back up also the 700 m pass, and back down again, and back along the lake, until we reached Å shortly before midnight. Wow - what a hike. Certainly the most beautiful we did on Moskenesøya, certainly also the most exhausting, and surely worth staying longer on this island that originally planned.
We waved goodbye to Å, Reine, and the rest of Moskenesøya, and continued to the next Lofoten island, Flakstadøya, where we visited one of the oldest and best preserved cod fishing villages: Nusfjord. In February commercial and leisure fisher flood the little town and battle for the biggest cod. In July, tourists block the small landing stages and battle for the best picture position. In August however, the town was pleasantly empty, the sun was heating up the wooden bridges, the remaining cod heads were smelling like sea, and the only crowded places were the ledges suitable for nesting gulls.
On the same day, we drove on to the next island: Vestvågøy. Here we were highly recommended to visit the beach of Unstad, apparently the best surf beach in Norway. The remote bay was beautiful, although windy, and it was possible to park directly at the coast. However, we could spot neither big waves, nor ambitious surfer. Probably it wasn’t the right season… . We stayed for the night, cooked salmon pasta for dinner, and celebrated into Micha’s Birthday with 35 tea candles that were impossible to light up because of the wind… .
And on we went, next island: Austvågøy. This is the island with the highest mountain of the Lofoten (Higravstinden) and also the one that is most famous for rock climbing. Henningsvær, a small fishing village at the southern coast of the island, is the main hub for climbers. Here, the forgotten gear and stylish beanies can be bought, guide books combed through for the best routes, a climbers cafe serves yummie food, and climbing partners can be found. We made good use of the books and a nice fluffy cup of Cappuccino, before we went to “Pianokrakken”, a beautiful cliff with a fantastic view, where we did our first multi-pitch trad route!! On the Lofoten, most of the climbs are traditionally protected (trad climbing) - which means, no bolts, no anchors, nothing is in the wall, but all the gear for protection has to be placed yourself. It should be the normal way of climbing, but as we’re first of all boulderers, and secondly sport climbers (climbing on short routes with set up bolts), this way of climbing appears rather scary for us. However, due to the nice weather, the beautiful view, and the easiness of the route (4+), this climb was a rather pleasant one. :)
We slept near this cliff in Henningsvær, and continued the next day to Kalles Paradiset, an area of short, south facing sea cliff walls, perfect for another pleasant trad climbing experience. For the afternoon, we had planned to do something more scary - climbing up the “Svolvær geita”, the two rock pillars that are the landmark of the town of Svolvær. If you’ve seen a postcard from Lofoten, probably you’ve seen the picture of a climber jumping from one of the geita (meaning goat) horns to the other. Funny enough, the Svolvær geita towers about 300 m above the local church and graveyard - just ready to take up the crazy horn-jumpers :)
I reckon climbing the geita was an appropriate end to our stay on the Lofoten islands. Hardly to top - not even by a lonely Minke whale, which emerged in a bay just next to the highway close to Svolvær. We slept a last night at a beach close to Kalles Paradiset, before we continued back to the mainland the next day.
However, this perfect end of our stay on Lofoten doesn’t mean that the highlight of the holidays is not to come anymore.
Stay tuned for the last part of this trilogy:
Lofoten part three: the battle with Stetind and 22 hours driving
