Something posing as Brun

Day 61 – July 24^th 

We started the day with a stroll around Alesund absorbing the sun and atmosphere.  

Catching a few rays in Alesund.

After collecting some supplies at the supermarket Rema 1000 we were back in Maxi re tracing the route back to Andalsnes.  

When designing a rough plan for our travels around Norway we had always mapped out a trip up the Lofotan Islands which are approximately 600-700km north of Andalsnes.  Given the lack of any road that resembles a straight line and the time it takes to travel on them we decided to scrap that idea and head back into Sweden and get a ferry across to Finland. 

So we were now headed towards Sweden with a plan to do the overnight hike we had wanted to do a few days earlier. 

We took the E136 – another truly specular road and very unexpected. The E136 is lined with sheer mountain faces and plummeting waterfalls, it is home to Trollveggen (Troll Wall), which is the highest vertical mountain wall in Europe at 1800m!

The spectacular drive along Route E136.

Fierce rapids were created with so many waterfalls
feeding into the rivers 

1800m climb to the top, camera doesn't
do the towering walls justice!

I was stunned as we drove through the valley in absolute ore of the beauty of it all.  There were waterfalls everywhere at one time I counted nine in view.  We stopped off at one of them, probably the fiercest of them all.

A stop off at a very energetic waterfall.

Feeling the power of the water.

The E136 lead us to the town of Dombas where we stopped off at the tourist office and picked up a book of local hikes.  We found a hike that was a 22km circuit that wasn’t too far down the road.  The map was pathetic but we thought the trail would be marked as the previous walks had been. 

We found the starting point, packed the backpacks with the tent, sleeping bags, food etc and set off on our little adventure for the night.

Luke hopefully pointing us in the
right direction.

One of many scandinavian grassed roofed houses.

The long road ahead.

We followed the road and headed off into the hills.  Unfortunately the trail didn’t seem to be signed but we figured if we followed the road in the general direction it should work out.  After 10km or so we thought we best make camp and found a spongy cleared area suitable to set up the tent.  Luke made fire and I cooked the camp food. I’m not sure what we ate ‘brun’ something we think it means brown in Norwegian – it was out of a tin and tasted pretty rank but filled the hole.

Luke making fire.

Cooking Brun whatever the hell that is?!?

We had been invaded by mosquitoes and after battling with them through dinner we retreated quite early to the tent to read and sleep!