Hovden time! (check out “My Training” and find out where I was shreding snow)

We were supposed to do make a self-organized trip at weekend (20 – 21/2) and another self-organized trip next week during Norwegian winter holidays. By reason that we wanted to spend as much time as possible at mountains and that we had tickets for X-Games Oslo which were next weekend (27 – 28/2) we made a decision to connect those two events and make one big field trip. Our destination was famous East-Norwegian mountain resort Hovden. Hovden is situated 200 km in northern direction from Kristiansand just before the Hardangervidda starts. The area has some nice mountains with altitude up to 1400 m. Some of them have nice steep slopes but most of the area is quite flat. We stayed at Hovden Fjellstoge camp in one of their cabins. We were 10 people on that trip: me, Julian, Jonas, Max, Line, Sædis, Chris, Yannick, Jonas H. and Mike. Not all of the guys had the same interests (for example Chris was very interested in building a snow-hole). My plan was to do there some alpine skiing, cross-country skiing (skating at prepared tracks) and some ski-touring.

Thursday 18/2

18.54 – I’ve just came back from cross-country skiing run. We arrived to Hovden around four o’clock. I was the only guy who went skiing that day. Skiing made me hungry. We are having cooking groups and I am in cooking group with Jonas, Julian and Max. Everybody is expected to cook one dinner. Nevertheless it took Max too long to get there so I’ve joined girls with dinner that day. We made a brief plan for Friday after everybody arrived and went to bed.

Friday 19/2

9.45 – I am sitting at the chair lift for my first skiing on winter holidays. We’ve bought 3 day lift ticket (quite expensive – maybe not for Norwegians). The snow conditions are very good. There is some fresh powder around slopes. Let’s rock the slopes!

Saturday 20/2

15.36 – just ended with skiing. Conditions were again spectacular. There was snowfall during night and it’s semi-bright during the day. As the day went it was harder to find some untracked areas accessible with lifts. Nevertheless it was very good skiing day. No wait! It still is very good skiing day.

17.21 – I’ve came back from third cross-country skiing session in Hovden. I love it here. The tracks are perfectly prepared and there are so many possibilities where I can go.

Sunday 21/2

12.15 – we are having lunch during our last alpine skiing day. The weather is crazy. There is one moment sun and 5 minutes later comes the snowstorm. And it’s repeating. It seems good weather’s coming again. We are going out.

14.22 – That were 2 awesome skiing hours with completely new powder. Very nice conditions were for tree riding. We are leaving now. Another snowstorm’s approaching.

Monday 22/2

14.57 – Arrived from huge cross-country skiing all day trip with Jonas. I am totally exhausted and Jonas as well. We made 44.2 km with speed average 14 km/h and total ascend 2000 m. We didn’t have so much stuff with us, just food for lunch, drink, map, phone and some snacks. The crisis came on the way back when we made a navigation mistake and went 7 km extra. This moment was crucial for Jonas. We had to climb back to Hovden almost 600 altitude meters and he was already very exhausted. I was trying to make a nice pace for him make regular stops. I was also trying to make some fun on the way, gently. Approximately 10 km before Hovden was crisis worst. I had to give Jonas my last snack and last beverage with some fast sugars. Nevertheless we made it back home and we were so proud of ourselves. Although some troubles it was very good skiing day. It’s time to buy some super-sweet drink right now.

Tuesday 23/2

15.14 – back from another cross-country session. Jonas is on drugs or something. We made another 22 km. I was so exhausted in the end. Jonas left for some more skiing after we came back. The weather conditions were again perfect. Sunny weather – I hope I’ve got some tan.

Wednesday 24/2

8.00 – there is Christmas Eve in 10 months!

12.21 – We have finished our only ski-touring here at these holidays. I was with Line and we picked mountain called Kaldseggi. We had some struggles since we started. There was an Otra river between our parking place and the mountain. We had to go about 2 km extra and cross the river over the bridge.  We soon found out that the mountain is very flat. It was one of the first ski-touring experiences for Line and it influenced her behaviour a lot. She was nervous and oversensitive. We made it to two thirds of mountain around 10am. It was obvious that bad weather is coming so I made a decision to go back. Descend was total crap. We couldn’t ski north slopes because of high avalanche risk so we went down on east slope. Snow there was influenced by sun and wind so it was very icy. The only nice thing that day was the surrounding nature. Norway is just awesome.

Winter holidays were just exactly what I was expecting from Norway before I came here. There was everything: alpine skiing, cross-country skiing, spectacular nature, wild evenings with friends, … I have to say that we had very nice time and we were able agree on everything what we needed. Love Norway!