Snowhole trip
– 23-03-15 / 26-03-15
This is our big ski trip in Berdalsbu with overnights in a snowhole and in a DNT- hut.
Monday
I go with the bus of 8:45 to Berdalshu. We arrive at 12:00 and Len and Tim are waiting for us with a van. We drop our backpacks in the van and walk up to the place we start our trip. We do a short check on equipment. We wax our ski’s and separate the group in two.
One group goes with Len and one group goes with Tim. We ski over a track to the first hut. It’s warm and even rains a bit. The track is uphill and the wax isn’t working. It makes it a hot, and we ski in t-shirts. Most of the time I’m in the back of the group with Miriam and Kirbby. We are not in a hurry and talk during the trip. We arrive at the hut round 15:30. Our group is in the small hut and the other group is in the bigger hut. We order our stuff. Fill up big pans with snow start the fire in the stove to melt it. Len comes over and tell us about
the DNT hut system. And gives us information about building a snow hole. Our group is divided in 4 smaller groups for the snowhole. We are looking for a good spot to build a snowhole this afternoon. Every group gets a winddirection to look for a spot. We go to the west and find a good place 100m downhill of the DNT-hut. The place has a big slope and underneath it is a small stream we can use to provide us from water instead of melting snow. We have time left and play around the hut on ski’s. round 18:00 we go back into the hut and cook our dinner. I’m eating lentils with dried carrot and paprika, butter, Kerrie and 
green beans. I do the dishes together with Florin. I walk bare feet to the toilet who is set in a small hut next to our huts. And the cold snow under my feet feels awesome. We have enough beds for everyone to sleep on a matrass. Len is sleeping on our couch this night. At 22:30 is everyone in bed.
Tuesday
At 6 o’clock in the morning Jochen’s alarm is going off and everyone is annoyed, but continue sleeping. Most of us wake up at 8:00. I have breakfast in bed, oatmeal with hot water. I pack my gear and help doing the dishes. We are ready at 9:30 to leave the huts. The weather is lovely, it’s warm, the sun is shining and we have a perfectly blue sky. We ski to the snowhole area’s people picked out and discus if they are good or not.
Without backpack the area was nice to ski, with backpack is hard and a lot of people are falling down, including myself. Most of the time I’m falling is more for breaking than actually falling. Again it’s too warm for the wax and it’s not working at all. The area our group has 
chosen is good enough for the whole group of Len and we split our group in three smaller groups for digging and sleeping in the snowhole. Tim’s group is at the other side of a hill in our area. I lost my sleeping mat while falling and go back to find it. Luckily it’s on the last place I felt down. I return back and help Kirby and Miriam with building a cooking place with a couch and wind shelter of snow.
The boys are digging the snowholes. It’s so warm that they are digging without shirts on. We switch after a while. The boys take a break and I start digging with Miriam. I’m in the snowhole group with Daniel, Morrits and Miriam. We have fun during the digging. We find out it’s easier to use the snow saw to dig. We saw big blocks of snow out and Miriam started to build a wall around our entrance. I’m building a road to our snowhole, to make it easier to reach and to prevent walking on the roof of the snowhole underneath ours. 
In between we sunbath and enjoy the weather. We have a break and take a look at the other group. They are building a combination of snowhole and igloo. They digged a tunnel with a hole and 5 people are standing in the middle of the whole with an emergency shelter over them. We all start throwing snow on them and it creates the dome of the igloo. After 10 min we stop throwing snow on them and the people in the dome sneak out one by one. The “sniglo” is build and we go back to work on our own shelters.
Jochen made a fire place out of our kitchen. Round 5 o clock we finished the snowholes and sit round the fire and make dinner. I’m eating couscous with dried mushrooms, carrot and Kerrie. I go to the snowhole at 21:00. Miriam is already there and a candle is lighting the snowhole. The snowhole is warm and looks cosy.
Wednesday
I slept really well this night. The alarm went off at 8:00. I had breakfast and went out for a pee and boil water for my thermos. I pack my stuff, and we can leave the gear we don’t need for skiing in the snowhole. I wax the ski’s and at 10:30 everyone is ready to leave.
It’s cold and cloudy today. Will is taking the lead and we go uphill between two mountain tops. My wax isn’t working and Len tells me to put on more wax. The wind raves between the mountain tops and blows us away. I’m glad I’m wearing goggles, the wind and snow smashing in our faces. I’m in the back of the group again. I’m not so fast on ski’s. I’m so bizy with skiing that I don’t pay attention on the map. On top of the mountain we gather the group and build a shelter for a short break. We dig it on a slope and a part of it is coming down like an avalanche. The snow is coming over the slope and the break is cold and wet, 
but it feels good to have a break. We continue and do a practice with the compass for shooting grades to a certain point with people for when the weather is too bad to see features in the landscape. Jochen takes the lead and lead us back down at an other side of the mountain. It looks like an half pipe. Luke is last of the group and looks after everyone. I try to follow Jochen’s route but I’m falling over every time and get snow under my backpack and a bit in my jacket and its cold so I start to make my own route with more zigzags. I’m not falling over any more. We go back to the huts and take a break in the big hut. It’s for getting warm and dry our clothes. We do an evaluation about the ski trip we just did. We find out that some people have a different perception of being part of a group. Tim’s group also arrives at the hut. After a while a Norwegian class is in front of the hut and we have to leave to our snowholes. The weather is getting worse and I stay in the snowhole. I cook water at the door and write my note book. I make a hole above the entrance in the roof to provide the hole of more air. I go out for the toilet and find Norwegian students digging a snowhole next to our toilet. I have a nice chat with them, they tell about their snowhole and I tell them about our toilet next to them, so they won’t dig there. I help Anne and Katja with carrying water to their ‘sniglo’ and go look for another toilet place. I go back to my snowhole and go to bed.
Thursday
We have to dig ourselves out today. The entrance is totally covered with snow. It’s nice and warm in the snowhole and it’s good that I made a hole above the entrance for some air. We dig it out and face the weather outside. It’s stormy outside, a hard wind and it’s snowing. We wait for instructions of Len in our hole. We will ski at 10:00 and leave the snowholes. We pack all our gear and are ready at 10:00.
Len is telling us that we ski back to the road we came from and we are digging one person snow shelters somewhere there. Morrits is taking the lead and keeps the group together. The weather is getting better on our way down, and we can take our goggles of. We take a break next to a boulder and Lenn is telling us about making a snowprofile. We continue and stop next to a small hill and get the task to be under the ground in 20min. We start digging. After 20min Len gather us and gives us the news that we don’t have to sleep in this shelters and that we are going back today because it’s still stormy in the mountains. We walk along all the shelters everyone made and Len tells who will survive and who might not. Just one of our group wouldn’t survive. We ski back to the road and put all the gear in the vans. Someone off Troll active is driving us back to Evje because the bus had already left. We take the bus back to Kristiansand from Evje.
