How to get there:
From Jondal (ferry from Tørvikbygd), drive towards Odda. As soon as you exit the
10 km tunnel, fork right and drive along the coast to Gjetingsdalen. The road turns sharply
right and starts ascending. Beyond the upper farm, a forest road continues. Pay NOK 60 (2025)
by Vipps, then continue on a good quality road until it ends. There is (limited) parking here.
This is the trailhead,
location N60.15124, E6.23744, elevation near 425 meter.
Route description:
Continue on a good trail
(wooden boards across wet sections, small bridges etc.) that serves
the mountain farm buildings Norddalen,
north of the lake Norddalsvatnet.
A vague trail continues up
to the col seen above. This trail is marked with orange paint.
Leave the trail as it turns right and continue into
the more narrow valley
approaching lake Isdalsvatnet.
It is best to stay all the way on the left to avoid an area with large boulders. Just as you reach the
lake, turn sharply left and
ascend the (big) ramp heading south. Initially, stay left, then later
stay right and ascend a pretty obvious ramp that ascends steeply, but quite easy to walk up. Continue
in the same direction (south) while looking for a passage up (climbers) right. The terrain is easier
if you continue more before attempting the final uphill to gain the plateau above. Finally, proceed
to the small hump that forms the highest point. Note
that the very highest point is a few meter away
from the location of the cairn.
Comments:
First local climb after 3 weeks abroad. Harald and Kjell came along.
We left the car around 1015 after a good drive plus ferry. A nice morning
with sunshine as we hiked the nice trail to the Norddalen mountain farm.
The next uphill, on a faint trail was warm
in the good summer weather. We
arrived at the upper lake and proceeded uphill after making a sharp left turn.
Here, I got separated from my friends as I took a slightly steeper route. This
brought me to steeper terrain higher up with several option for some
scrambling. I resisted the temptation and went a bit more left, searching for
an easier uphill route. Soon, this paid off and I arrived at the cairn around
1300. My two friends came about 15 minutes later having taken a somewhat less
direct route.
Nice views, in particular of the Folgefonnen glacier. We had already agreed
that one option would be that Harald and I did a cross country hike to climb
Storahorga,
while Kjell would return to the car and drive it around in order to
pick us up near the fjord where a forest road looked like a good place to descend.
This still looked like a good plan, despite of darker clouds that promised some
rain. We left around 1315, this report continues under Storahorga.
