After a great trip to Slovenia, with a brief stop over in Austria to paddle the Brandenberger ache, thanks to Matty N for the recommendation that was a cracking river! Finn Burrows and I started our long trek north to Norway. This would be my third season in Norway and yet I still feel I could go back for another twenty and still not even scratch the surface of all the boating in this amazing country.
Finn doing what he does best, navigating...
This year we got the ferry from Hirtshals to Kristiansand, I would say this is one of the nicest routes to take to Norway, particularly if you are heading to the west coast as it includes a lovely drive through southern Norway's fjords and lakes.
waiting at Hirtshals for the early ferry. Photo by Finn
The first stop for us was Voss for the extreme sports veko, a brilliant festival where loads of different people interested in different sports get together and have a big party. Finn and I had managed to wangle a great job filming the kayaking for 'today's video' with Josh Neilson and Julian Stocker. It was a good experience and the edits produced were real crowd pleasers, well done Josh.
Lower Myrkdal, one of the best runs in Norway? Photo by Mike D
At the start of the week we had a great run on the Myrkdal and a few other classics around Voss with Joe and Mike (two English lads on a big old road trip). All of a sudden though, one thing really stood out in Voss... Rain, It wouldn't stop! As a result we had to look a bit harder to find some boating that was at a manageable flow. We went to the upper parts of the Eksingadalen, above lake to lake, it is briefly mentioned in the Guide book, but we thought we would check it out. It was a fun run with a few fun slides and rapids, if only it was a touch longer!
Nick Pearce, Joe Leader and Mike Durrant on the Eksingadalen
Nick P hitting a sweet line on one of the longer rapids
After a rather exciting week in Voss, Finn and I headed back to Sjoa briefly to pick up Nick Horwood before heading to Valdal. We had a few nice sessions on Jorgens wave and some great runs down the various sections on the Sjoa. The photos below are from during Sjoa festival and the Frig Freestyle Jam competition.
Charles Blyth sending a nice blunt on Jorgens. Photo by Sarah Tebb (ST)
Myself finding my feet again in a playboat, it took some time... (ST)
Going for a helix (ST)
Finn, hitting up a huge backstab showing the form that helped him win the biggest move prize! (ST)
Freestyle is all about having fun though really... King of the Wave! (ST)
Eventually we made our way to the land of strawberries and cake that is Valdal! We took loads of film and not too many photos. Here is a video still from a cracking new (we think) waterfall we found near valdal called Store fossen!
A really soft but still scary waterfall with a tricky line up...
More Norwegian updates to come including some video!
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