A nice day out, at last. (pic heavy!)

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Skaukraft

Settler
Apr 8, 2012
539
4
Norway
There are things going on all over the place at the moment. But the prime minister (i.e. my very pregnant wife) finaly granted me a day of (she was probably happy to get me out of the house).
The trip went to Fjellsjøkampen, which is Akershus countys highest "mountain". It is really more like a hill at 812 masl. Fjellsjøkampen is also a Nature reserve with interesting fauna and geology (northern europes only emerald mine is located some 10 km north-east from here, and there is also an old gold mine not far away not to mention a handfull of iron ore mines. And there is also a few interesting small lakes with trout and perch I wanted to check out.
I packed my pack and of we went, Balder and I (sorry for the picture quality. My camera is still crap, and dropping it onto a rock on this trip did not help either....).
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There was a info poster about the reserve at the starting point of the trail.
The walk up to the top was hard work...
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It went upwards...
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...and up....
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...and up. 600 masl at this point, only 200 to go...
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...and up. Getting closer to the top now.
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And there it is, after one hour hard march up-hill, the watch tower on the top. There used to be forest fire watch tower here from the 30's to the 50's.
The view is well worth the climb. You can see all the way to the swedish border, to Oslo and on clear days you can se Rondane.
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Balder was wondering what the h*** I was doing up there.

We had a sip of water and a piece of choclate before we went further.
There was quite a lot of kuseknott on the top (the tiny bloodsucking gnats), so it was good to be moving again.
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Kuseknott on my pack, and billions of the little ******** in the air.

I followed a well marked trail for a while, but I knew I had to get of the trail after a while and do some bush navigation to get to the lake I had pointed out. So I set the compass at the right course, and of we went.
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North-west we go...
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Through some dense spurce forrest...
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The area is known for it's variety of fungus. Saw this nice example of Rødrandkjuke (Fomitopsis pinicola).
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Suddenly I saw some thing behind the trees..
And this beautiful little lake appeared....
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The lakeside was pretty dense with trees, so I aimed for a open space on the other side of the lake.
And found a nice spot by the water:
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The walk through the dense forrest was hard, and took me close to two hours, so now it was time to refuel, both me and my dog.
Since the weather was warm I just set up my little primus and put the kettle on.
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Soon there was a nice smell of fresh coffe on the site.
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What more could a tired and hungry woodsman ask for?!
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Luckily there was a nice breeze by the water, so the mozzies and gnats stayed away.

After the refuel I rigged my fishing rod with a floater and a hook with earthworm. I didn't really expect to catch anything because of the unstable weather and the fact that it was in the middle of the day. But I kind of have to try when I got the chance. And as the worm did it's job I explored the area a bit.

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The cloudberry season looks promissing.
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The blueberry to.
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The cowberry is "en route".
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And I even found some craneberry flowers.
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One of my favourites...
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Another one of my favourites, tettegress (Pinguicula vulgaris). A meat eating plant (insects). The leaves contains a wide variety of enzymes, and was used to make what we in Norway calls tjukkmjølk, which is a kind of milk that can be stored for a long time (looks like youghurt).
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I also found a large area with harerug (Bistorta vivipara). The flowerbuds taste good, and are rich with carbohydrates, and so are the root.
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And this pretty little thing ithink is flekkmarihånd (Dactylorhiza maculata).

As expected I didn't get any fish (I didn't try really hard either. And it was time to find the trail back to the car.
I chose to follow a trail that led straight back to the road, but ended some 3 km west from where Iparked my car. But I had had it with bush navigation for the day, and I don't know the area to good, so I chose the easy way out.
So I packed my stuff and of we went...
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My pack for the day. An old Norwegian army day pack (which is the one I had when I did my duty) and a neven older Norwegian army gas mask pack for my fishing gear.

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The trail back down.
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And then we were back down on the road again.
Not the most exiting trip, but I was very happy. I had only three drops of rain, all my kit worked well and I had explored some new and interesting areas that imost deffinately will visit again...
 

Goatboy

Full Member
Jan 31, 2005
14,956
17
Scotland
Not a very exciting day he says! Looks like a great day to me. Lovely looking countryside round there and a nice range of plants. Like your bark boxes for your food kit (did you make them?).

Great trip & thanks for posting it up.

ATB,
GB.
 

Skaukraft

Settler
Apr 8, 2012
539
4
Norway
Not a very exciting day he says! Looks like a great day to me. Lovely looking countryside round there and a nice range of plants. Like your bark boxes for your food kit (did you make them?).

Great trip & thanks for posting it up.

ATB,
GB.

Thanks GB.
The birch bark boxes was a delayed birthday present from my parents. So I didn't make them my self.
 

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