Fannaråkbreen

Either way, even if only in name, it does spice things up a little bit because I have been coming here a fair bit in the early season (5 days so far this season!). After the last trip out to the mountains in Frudalen and what I’ve been reading on some of the forums, I thought I would stick with what I know and what is sure to be a goer until conditions improve. The Fannaråk glacier has not let me down yet.

I didn’t have any one to play with this weekend, so it was going to be my first solo outing since I got frostbite on my toes last February. I decided to leave early on Saturday from Oslo (5.00 in the morning). First mistake. I should have left earlier. In fact, I should have left Friday! Then I came off the road between Lom and Otta. Second mistake. Luckily another driver was at hand to pull me out of the ditch and there was no damage to the car. All told I got to Steindalsnosi at 13.00, tired from the early start and from the driving conditions and stressing about getting there to have time to ski. Bearing in mind the sun sets around 15.30, I had driven 6hrs to rush up a mountain and be back at the car 2.5hrs later.  Hmmm…. Things were slightly off kilter…… So of course I rushed up the mountain to be back at the car again 2.5hrs later. Great. The wind was howling, I couldn’t make out the mountain from the road and it was snowing and I was running out of time. All highly motivating factors to draw me from the warmth of the car. But I had driven this far, God dammit.

Back at the car. Steindalsnosi posing majestically!

Needless to say, there wasn’t another soul around (and rightly so!). Thankfully, this is not a very long tour anyway, so I was through the approach and most of the way up (I didn’t bother summiting) in around 1hr and 40mins to get back down again and rush to the car.

There had been some new snow, so I was nervous before starting the climb until I had a chance to check it out. I took a conservative skin up and dug a quick 5-min snow pit down 70cm or so. I could see that there had been about 15cm of new snow (in the process of becoming wind packed but nice and sticky and compressed). I was curious to see whether the rime snow from Frudalen was present here too and sure enough the new snow was sitting on top of the rime. It did have some cohesion though but it was there. Make of that what you will.

On all accounts, if tomorrow was going to be a repeat of today, my mind was already back in Oslo enjoying a relaxing Sunday.  I drove back towards Lom, stopping where they close the road for the night and pitched the tent. My new sleeping bag did what it said on the tin and kept me nice and snug in -10. Encouraging for future projects.

The weather the next day was just perfect. Not a cloud in the sky and very little wind.

Okay, so there was one cloud in the sky. Fanaråkbreen far right.

After lots of faffing and melting snow to get water for the day, I was ready to hit the glacier again. Off at 11.00 and back down again by 15.00. That’s a bit more like it. I did two runs up for a total of 1,400m vertical gain. Again I stopped around 20m from the summit. The snow on the upper section was not very good, solid wind buff in places and sastrugi formations on skier’s left. Much better on the lower section, wind blown but creamy. Good for charging. And I got some nice views:

Nice views looking east

And more nice views!

It was pretty cold in the end. I’m guessing around -15 to -20. Looking good, Paul

Looking a bit punch drunk

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Steindalsnosi shrouded in cloud (taken from direction of Lom)

Steindalsnosi is well and truly open! As opposed to last month when we got our first turns of the new season and had to to scramble over rocks from the car, you can now put your skis on and skin the whole way! A pleasure. The crevasses are all filled in (where you ski at least).

As regards the snow: very much wind-pack and breakable crust. The mountain has taken a bit of a battering from the wind and hardened up the powder. But, as a result, if you look hard enough, you can find a lot of soft, fluffy wind accumulation in the features on skier’s left as you ski down.

As regards the weather: cold and windy. At the car is was -10 C. With the altitude gain and winds of around 20 knts (gusting 30 knots knts), the wind chill must have been in the high thirties (probably more). Either way, it was bloody cold. Most of the weather was in the last 300m of the summit, so as opposed to the first day where we went to the summit, we spent the second day at lower elevations and lapped the slope. Much more pleasant and much better visibility.

As regards traffic: Saturday, we saw our first people on the mountain as we were skiing down. About ten people in different groups. Sunday, a group of two.

So, that’s that. Steindalsnosi is looking good! Not so sure about the surrounding peaks just yet. Still lots of rocks. I’m sure you could find a line if you are desperate but might be worth waiting for more snow cover.

P.S. Friflyt users….sorry for the bad link. Friflyt adds a <br> tag in the link on their page (invisible. You can see it at the end of the address in your browser though) which corrupts the link and means you cannot go directly to the page. Sorry about that!

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The weather has been getting very crisp of late in Oslo and it had actually snowed around 40cm in early September in the Sognefjellet Pass area in Jotunheimen, so we thought we would chance a little outing to the mountains and check out the lay of the land.

Steindalsnosi is as good a place as any to start the early season with a better snow gurantee than most places. It’s all glacial and consequently holds the snow well. We left Friday night from Oslo, breaking the journey up on the way and arrived in the morning the next day. (It’s normally around a 5.5hr drive from Oslo).

As we first caught sight of the mountain, things weren’t looking too promising….The snow line was around 1000m and patchy at best and there was a lot of crevassing visible on the lower section of the face.

Steindalsnosi shrouded in cloud (taken from direction of Lom)

And it was cold! And windy! It’s pretty crazy to think it’s still September and the temperatures are comfortably in the minus, not including the wind chill. I definitely haven’t acquired my winter coat yet. I was cold! Winds were around 25kn and my board was behaving excellently as a sail.

Approaching Steindalsnosi. Windy!

The snow cover was nowhere near what it was when we skied this mountain last year. We were admittedly one month early but walking over rock and scree for an hour in ski boots is never much fun. As we got closer to the glacier, the crevasses looked nowhere near as concerning as they had from a distance. Firstly, they were clearly visible and secondly they were small. No sweat. The only thing to investigate now was was there enough snow!

Lars-Thomas at the end of the scramble before the glacier proper.

It wasn’t exactly a resounding yes. There was about 6-7cm on glacial ice….dry and fluffy. Great for skiing but you could blow it off the ice like dust. We pushed on and found things a lot better the further we went. I had forgotten my skins, so would be boot-packing for most of the weekend. Nice work, Paul (The Adventures of a Bootpacker ;)) And my camera… So thanks to Lars-Thomas for the great photos! As we got further up the moutain, things closed in but the snow was good! Oh yeah!

Approaching the summit in a whiteout.

The top half of the face was well filled in compared to the lower section which held windblown snow and exposed glaicer. So we skied the first half and then went up again for a second hit.

And on the way back down.

Classic Norwegian Tele-Turns.

I had already set the boot pack, so it seemed a shame to waste it

Lars-Thomas on Steindalsnosi.

And then we decided to call it a day.

Me on the last section of glacier before the delightful, boot-banging scramble back to the car.

What a great first day out on the board for the new season. Nothing too heavy and perfect to blow away the cobwebs. I think we clocked something like 1100m vertical gain in the end. Nothing crazy but why would you on your first tour.

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