Location: North 60.52183, East 005.85119 (GPS at the summit)
Difficulty: (YDS) class 2
Climbed March 12. 2016.
Information:
How to get there:
Drive E-16 from Bergen towards Voss. Exit (right) to Vaksdal, this is
immediately after a more than 2 kilometer long tunnel. Turn left and follow
the road up the main valley. Pay attention as you want to turn right (across
a bridge on a very narrow road) where the sign says Herfindal. Carefully
drive this small road into the very narrow valley. Just before the road
starts uphill with hairpin curves, a fork right gets you to a parking area
near a local hydroelectric powerplant. The uphill road has a sign saying
"not plowed in winter". If the road is unplowed (no signs of car traffic),
then drive down right and park there, location N60.47629, E005.77726, at elevation
about 200 meter.
Route description:
Ski uphill on the summer road, higher up, the road continues more
levl into the valley and the old farm houses. Continue down a steep hill
to the right, then further in the valley and more uphill. You will arrive
at a fork where the summer trail climbs left while the snow-scooter
track turns right and downhill. It is perfectly ok to ski up the summer trail,
it is a bit steep, but plenty wide enough to be skied.
As you finish the steep uphill section, the route contours around left while
staying on top of the cliffs below. You now enter a pretty flat and wide
valley called Budalen. Ski directly in and across towards the steeper hillside
in front in order to get this slope on your left hand side. Continue up the
valley with the bigger hillside up on the left. There is a small
waterfall that may be easily passed on the left side. Higher up, the valley
becomes quite narrow, but it is nice to ski all the way until one
exits at the top end. From here, continue in the same direction as you
traverse a pretty gentle slope. Further ahead, turn left where the terrain
naturally permits this. From here continue along gentle slopes directly towards
the summit. The summit is marked with a very nicely built cairn. Comments:
I drove my wife Heidi to the airport, then picked up Fredrik with whom I
had agreed to ski on this Saturday.
We started at 1145, rain below and hopefully, a bit of snow higher up.
It was nice to get out despite the rather questionable weather.
We skied uphill and the higher we skied the less we could see.
The last few kilometer - whiteout. The cairn showed up ahead in the
fog and we arrived there at 1450. Pretty windy and inhospitable, we took
a few pictures and left at 1500.
The return ski was pretty easy and we were
back at my car at 1630. Many thanks to Fredrik for good company.