Villmarksmessen

Yesterday I went with Thomas to Villmarksmessen, reputedly Norway's biggest outdoor exhibition, now in its 30th year. Norway has such a massive focus on the outdoors, with 700,000 of it's 5 million population being members of some sort of outdoors organisation. A big focus of the exhibition was on hunting and fishing although I'm not sure how hiking and backpacking for it's own sake could be represented other than gear stands. Instead it comes across as the means to an end (of an animals life).

Anyway, it was still exciting to enter the first of two large halls in the exhibition centre in Lillestrøm, the first stand I saw being Woolpower which has a decent following in Scandinavia, known for it's high quality ullfrotte wool - synthetic construction. I've been on the lookout for some Woolpower mittens, being a convert since using Thomas' on a walk months ago. Unfortunately they've been discontinued, which was quite a disappointment as they are super warm and the fit is so nice, so I guess I'll revert to eBay...
[Note that since I wrote this, Woolpower emailed me to say that their mittens are still being made and that the guys on the stand were wrong; happy days!]

After that we decided to just try to follow the grid system set up in the hall; next stop and bypassing the taxidermy stand (oops, a hunting stand) was the Bergans brand; rucksacks, clothing, rucksacks, a couple of sleeping bags and more rucksacks. We were interested to see how Bergans had adopted a few lightweight looking aspects to it's bag design, (reminiscent to me of the Osprey packs); looking at the Skarstind 40L, it felt reasonably light for an internal frame pack (1.25kg) and was quite a departure from the monster load luggers Bergans is known for. It's still not what I would prefer to carry, but a move in the right direction.


The next stand that made us stop was for Lånan, where a beautiful lady (Hildegunn I think) spoke with Thomas about how she continues a traditional practice of harvesting shed eiderdown by hand. The company is named after the island it all happens on, part of the Vega archipelago, 30km from the main Vega island and now part of UNESCO's World Heritage List. What had attracted me was first of all the lovely pine basket full of down, but then Thomas quickly pointed out a pair of Edderdunsvotter, or mittens with an eiderdown fill. Trying them on they were toasty and very light.

Almost next door though was the highlight for me; visiting one of the unassuming bushcraft stands towards the back of the hall. So unassuming in fact that I didn't get it's name and trying to trace it from the exhibitor plan equally successful. I admired the birch and pine crafted baskets, backpacks and cups when a lovely lady from the stand spoken to me in Norwegian - too fast for me to understand - and then asked her partner to show me how to make one. He very deftly showed how the sheet of birch was folded across the grain, then pinched on itself as a crease was made. Then snipping with an unbushcraftlike pair of scissors to round off the shape and lodging the cup into shape with a short twig. I was most impressed. I asked him in Norwegian (go, me) how long he had been making these, and of course, he'd been doing it since he was a boy. More than the bushcraft aspects, I was struck by how lovely and open these two people were, how willing to share information and to encourage people to learn. I'm not sure I would rely on my cup making skills if I found myself out in the woods tomorrow; but there is a glimmer of a spark of wanting to have a go that I think I will flame.

After crawling around the lightweight tents on the Helsport stand followed by an extortionately expensive hamburger but without the taste to match, we circled the hall and into the next one via a visit to the alpakkas (not the packrafting variety though). Inside there were a couple of representations from Sami people, in their traditional dress and examples of lavvo and their wonderful handcrafted knives and sheaths. There was also a working dog corner with representatives from the Norsk Retriever Klubb (with a lovely Nova Scotia Duck Tolling dog and lots of Flat Coated Retrievers), as well as different varieties of setters and spaniels. It was nice to see how the spaniels hadn't been docked.

A surprise was to see Matt Hayes, the English fisherman, giving a talk on fishing in Norway. He's recently completed a show about this which is on the Norwegian Discovery Channel this week at 11pm every night. I only know about him through my Dad's love of fishing, so I couldn't resist emailing a photo of Matt to Dad and my brother to let them know I'd seen him. No Dad, I wont be taking up fishing! (Have a look at Matt's blog though; his photos of the Norwegian landscape are stunning!).



Like Norwegian waffles, all too soon good things come to an end and we had to head back to Oslo. Unless I'm hiking this time next year I would love to come back, but would hope for a bit more representation from the DNT and similar organisations - and, dare I say it, bloggers - who are more focussed on the hiking and backpacking side. We shall see!

To go or not to go

I've debated with myself whether to post about my last trip or not, but not every trip is going to be a success or 'epic', 'awesome' or even just rosy, and there could be value to others in reading about my experiences and thoughts.

So, last Thursday afternoon, Thomas and I headed out on the T-bane from where we live to Jernbanetorget in Oslo. A diversion to the bussterminalen before remembering that actually we had to get a train to Lillestrøm first, proved to be our 'morning' backtrack. We didn't have more than about 10 minutes to wait for the train, which was good especially considering that this was the Thursday before Easter and a public holiday in Norway. The train journey was followed by a bus journey to Flateby on route 501. With our Ruter reisekort (travel card) it only cost an extra 20 Kroner for the train and bus combined which is great value (roughly 2 quid). It was nice for me to see the scenery on the bus as it made it's way on roads somewhat reminiscent of Scotland, twisting around above the side of Øyeren fjord, passing farms and small villages, the farm building usually wooden and painted in a deep red, pretty much standard here but very pretty.

Getting off a bus stop short (my fault), we set off through the rest of Flateby village and tracked back where Thomas had walked with his friend Glenn the previous weekend. The foot was already hurting back at the bus station in Lillestrøm, and, despite consumption of Ibuprofen, was unremitting in giving me pointed feedback. We walked past a small ski centre and out on a forest track, compacted ice and snow moulded to the bends where the sun had failed to penetrate. It was nice to be out and walking with Thomas; it is what had brought us together and is very much a shared passion. He had booked a couple of beds in the DNT hytte at Bøvelstad (scroll down for pics), renovated about a year ago; I found out about it last summer when I walked in Østmarka on my own and a kindly elder man had given me a 1:25000 map of the area. He had told me about it being renovated and I remember talking with Thomas. It looked cosy on the DNT website and from the photos and articles we'd seen in Østmarkas Venner magazines.

However the foot wasn't behaving and we stopped at a junction with Gjeddevann below us to have a drink, more painkillers and to review the situation. We had a reasonable amount of light left; it was about 5pm and doesn't get dark here until past 8 now. But if we were to turn back the buses were only running every two hours and we could be faced with a fairly long wait. Decisions. It was hard to make a well thought out decision because of the pain I was in. If the painkillers kicked in would we have enough time to get to Bøvelstad? If we backtracked would we have a 2 hour wait for the bus? Could we make it back for the next bus at 18:23? It was hard to say but even after sitting down, having a brew and putting my foot up for a while the pain had't gone.

We decided to head back for the bus.

Less than 1km later though the pain had lessened considerably. I could walk a lot more easily. I asked Thomas how he felt about having turned around. Disappointed naturally, although there was no bad feeling from him at all, no grudge, just wanting me to be alright. With the pain having diminished I put it to him that we might turn back around and try to head back to the hytte. We still had a couple of hours of daylight left, the route a mix of forest road and then trail - following the blue stripes painted on rocks and trees, so we decided to go for it. I was happy with that and felt pleased to resume our hike and to make Thomas happy, and at the prospect of seeing the hytte for real.

It wasn't too long before we got to the end of our section on the track and pulled off heading west. I think we had about 5km of forest trail to cover and was pretty confident of being able to make it before dark. Not being as active because of the foot, my fitness was (and is) pretty rubbish, and my body has accumulated some excess baggage partly as a a result of that and partly as a result of eating naughty food and drinking beer and wine - maybe something to do with moving in together akin to a Freshmen's 15? Anyway I had a bit more luggage to move than normal although my pack was pretty light with just a sleeping bag liner in it rather than a shelter, bag, mat and what have you that goes along with staying out under your own steam. It wasn't long before I felt tired, mentally and physically. Mentally was mostly to do with dealing with pain, not knowing if was going to reappear, being somewhat fearful that it would reappear because of knowing that it would a) hurt and b) we didn't have a margin of error; a limited amount of daylight was left.

Thomas navigated us through the forest, on trails he had recently walked before. I was behind him, pain starting to return, my head down, feeling sorry for myself, worrying about making it to the hytte, feeling a bit of a failure, feeling frustrated and angry with myself, with my foot, with deciding to try for the hytte. Progress was slow but I didn't see much of the land, I was too wrapped up in my head and my body.

Progress was so slow in fact that we started to run out of daylight. I didn't find it especially cold; it was overcast which helped a lot, compared to clear, dry skies that have been over Oslo for most of the last 3 weeks. In the dusky half light it was slightly worrying and thrilling at the same time, though the pain took the edge off the experience. It got darker as we wend our way through the forest, over rocks, down hillsides and across bogs. The bogs were a rare treat as being largely frozen you could walk over a lot of it rather than sinking through, although a couple of wet feet were later testament to occasional boggy revenge.

By now the moon was out behind the clouds, a soft, cold light in the dark of the forest. Thomas got his E-lite out, but when I came to look for mine I couldn't find it. I rummaged through my pack, took everything out but to no avail. More kicking myself ensued, more for being disorganised than for not having a light; my night vision was fine in these conditions, unless I looked at Thomas. The E-lite just left an oval blob of pale gold in my middle vision, but wasn't bright enough to leave me completely blind. Thomas led the way and I followed, sometimes a little distance behind as I felt my way over rocks and roots. We reached the shores of Børtervanna and clambered in the less than half light over large rocks and boulders on the lake shore. Thomas pointed out tricky bits to be wary of, and when we had to scramble up over roots or narrow earth ledges or where it was slippery. We reached a river, fed by Grinderen. Thomas crossed over and scouted around for the path. After a minute or so I walked in the darkness upstream to where I made out a bridge and a slightly luminous blue stripe on a tree, so yelled down to him that the path was up here. It was too much further of following the path to the hytte. Sometimes the path was really easy to make out, a channel through bordered with moss and rocks. Sometimes in particularly mossy areas it was less defined. Remarkably but probably a virtue of wearing trail runners rather than boots, I actually felt more sure footed over rocks and stones, because I could feel my way over them. Not that I was fast by any stretch of the imagination, but it lent a certain feeling of resilience that with partial vision I could still make way; even the paths themselves felt different enough that you could detect when you'd wandered off.

Much as I 'enjoyed' this section of night hiking, it was with a fair amount of relief that we emerged on the hillside above Bøvelstad and made out the hytte below us. We couldn't see any lights on, although I think it was only about 9:15 by this time. We knew from the online booking system that 8 other beds had been booked out already (of a capacity of 17 beds); maybe they'd gone to sleep? However, as with many hytta, there wasn't electricity and the candle light from the kitchen window didn't penetrate far.

The hytte was populated with a couple of Norwegian girls, a couple from Germany and a Brazilian guy there with his Norwegian girlfriend. A woman and her child and a man accompanying them 'of unknown relationship' had already gone to bed. A pretty friendly and warm environment was to be had, made more so by a good fire in the wood burning oven in the kitchen. I was relieved to have made it there, although at one point, and Thomas doesn't know this, I had even wondered if we would have to walk through the forest all night, out the other side towards home! I bagsied a bed with my pack, laid out my sleeping bag liner, found my E-lite (huh!) and swapped out my clothes for warm, dry ones. Food and surprise beer from Thomas helped things seem more rosy. I went to bed in the cold bedroom with my hood of my Smartwool on, with my merino beanie too, and still had a cold head so didn't sleep that well, but it was a bed and we planned to stay put in the morning and relax a bit.

Looking out the cabin windows the next morning down to the lake, we could see a fine dusting of snow over everything. Snow was still trying to fall but it gave up the ghost after not too long and during the rest of the morning it melted away. Breakfast was accompanied by DNT literature about the local area; a real treat that's been in every hytte I've been to so far. Books about the history of the place, folk tales, peoples' lives, turs to go on and more besides. The woman, child and unidentified man were already up, the 2 Norwegian girls who had been in the same room as us were playing the Easter quiz from a magazine; there was a really nice, warm vibe. Plus the fire was on! Porridge, multiple cups of coffee, both of us messing about with our cameras (Thomas is so much better than me); it was a nice way to pass time and to relax. We decided to have our lunch there before heading back off.

It often makes me chuckle how, setting off I want to stop only a few meters away to faff with my pack or get myself 'set'. It was lovely to be out again, a bit colder than the previous day, even with the night hiking, but no snow or rain; pretty nice conditions. I wore an extra layer under my windshirt though, and kept my merino long johns on this time. It wasn't long before I started to feel pain in my foot. Even writing this now I feel a bit of a resigned sigh, exasperation. Feeling a bit peed off! The landscape was lovely and normally I would rejoice in it, but instead my attention was just focussed on the locus of the pain. And the thought that there wasn't a choice other than to walk out - the hytte isn't linked by road (not that many are).

We stopped at an idyllic camp site, overlooking the lake, half a fire ring with loads of dead wood right next to it. Thomas had remembered it from his walk and without much fight from me we decided to stop there, have some painkillers and have a fire. Fire making is good in a sense for keeping your brain occupied, something different to focus on. I sat on a boulder looking out over the fjord, drinking Solbærtoddy and starting to feel better. The wind whipped around the promontory, bellowing the fire up. The ban on fires was only just over a week away and after so very little rain and such dry conditions underfoot it was understandable why this is needed. A place so much less populated than the UK, a fire could spread over a great area before the fire brigade could respond with helicoptering water to douse the flames.

After half an hour or so we put the fire out, Thomas collecting water from the fjord to douse the flames. On one of his trips to the shore I was joined by a man who basically said that it was pretty risky to have a fire, but I think once he realised that we weren't irresponsible people and had some amount of savvy, he seemed to relax. Plus we were united by having the same Ortleib mapcases and knowledge of the Kjentmann magazines which somehow reassured him! He had been up Grinderkollen, a hill further north at 315m high. He said it had taken him 45 minutes to bushwhack through to the top from the trail, and 5 minutes to get down! I would imagine this is pretty typical in a way thought the blue (summer) and red (winter) trails are well marked and maintained, but so far in my experience when you go off trail you're in back country.


Even after having had the break, after just a few meters I was in pain again. Most of the time it's a pain in the toe next to the pinkie on my left foot, a burning or sharp, stabbing pain as if someone is trying to cut my toe off (and the thought has crossed my mind to do just that!). Accompanying that is a pain on the ball of my foot where that toe joins, a bit like if you rammed your foot down hard on a thin metal object. Very occasionally the toe actually goes numb but of course that doesn't give me any grief. All this happens though when I bend my foot, so any striking off or landing movement, climbing up or going down hill results in pain. This means that every step on that foot is painful unless I try to walk with a flat foot; if you're hiking at all that's pretty much impossible! I had taken 1000mg Ibuprofen, Volterol and Paracetamol and none of it impacted the pain. We walked through some lovely areas, along a gorge with fallen pines and snow, through a narrow gap of rock 20m long, through mossy dingle dells and on Thomas' favourite pine needle paths, soft underfoot. These 4 areas stand out for me in an environment where if I'd not been in so much pain I would have appreciated all the more.

Thomas worked out we had about 1km to go before we hit the road from Rausjø to Fjell. All I had in my mind was to get through this, but on the road with growing pain levels I just broke down in tears, feeling frustration and letting myself and Thomas down. How the pain ebbs and flows with almost no regard for the synthetic chemicals I was feeding my body to rid it of the issue was (and is) incredibly frustrating. It makes planning difficult - whether that is planning what day to go on a hike, or even how long it will take to walk 1km.

Again we were servants to the bus time table and with 1 hour 45 to walk the 7km to the bus stop we thought it would be ample. But then when 2 minutes later I am hobbling along at barely 0.5kph every estimate is brought back into question.
Refusing to allow me to be a martyr, Thomas wisely flagged down a car who drove us to Fjell, saving me a few hours of torture. We parked ourselves in a windy, glass-less bus stop to wait out the hour or so left for the bus. I made a brew with the Questionable Mental Health stove while he used his Backcountry Boiler with meths. It kept us busy and passed the time until the bus driver swerved and slowed to a stop for us, smiling at how pleased we were to see him.

So, this isn't a rosy, "how great was this hike" kind of report, but considering it now, almost a week elapsed, I still question the decision whether on balance it was right to have continued to hike to Bøvelstad in the first place. In truth I think it's difficult to say.
Generally it was a pretty miserable experience, both for me and Thomas, although it was great to see the hytte and meet the people in it, and Thomas once again demonstrated how kind and patient he is (thank you Thomas!).
I need to resolve the issue with my foot; currently I am wondering if it's something like Morten's Neuroma but I need a proper diagnosis from a doctor I can communicate properly with.
My svelte-less-ness and fitness is somewhat dependent on my foot; I have to make the most of the pain free times, which is the majority of the time when I'm not using my foot, but then when I'm on it...
And thankfully, not finding my E-lite wasn't a massive problem on this occasion because of the moon (despite the cloud cover), but on another occasion could have been a nightmare. I had changed my approach to packing my rucksack before we went out, and clearly remembered showing it to Thomas, but not finding it when I needed it wasn't great. However I think with the light output from it, and reading the mighty Skurka's book, I might change my approach to that anyway.
So, over to you; hopefully someone else can benefit from some second hand experience and if any readers want to share their thoughts it would be much appreciated! Thanks.