Picture above: Henrikafossen, it’s steep and it’s long.

We climbed in three different spots in the valley. First one was the famous Henrikafossen. Henrikafossen is probably the largest, both in terms of height and amount of ice. The difficulty seemed to be between WI4 and WI5. Route was roughly 5-6 pitches long, though due to weather and time constraints we didn’t go all the way up. We climbed roughly four pitches and according to friend of mine, who were climbing there next day and saw our abalakovs, we were one pitch away from the top. He also said that there was less ice than usual this year. First pitch at the Henrikafossen was pretty steep. After the first pitch there’s fairly short snow section and some easier ice, which gradually gets steeper and more difficult. When we climbed there it was formed of packs of small icicles. After this first snow section the profile of the fall stays pretty steep at least to the point we climbed to.

The good thing with Henrika is the fact that it offers plenty of choices. In case you’d like to climb something a bit difficult and steeper just choose the line accordingly. The falls both sides of Henrika offer even wider selection; On the right there’s a one which seems, and is said, to be pretty steep and difficult mixed climbing, on the left there’s a one that’s slightly shorter and perhaps easier but with similar profile than Henrika.

Picture above: It’s snowing and it’s getting dark, there’s still one pitch to go.

Next day we chose an easy route right across the valley. As we were able to climb the entire fall without belay it proved to be almost too easy. Well, I insisted on having a belay on one section first, but going down I got the ropes stuck and as a result I climbed the section without belay as well. It really wasn’t a big deal. I think that snow conditions might have affected to it somewhat, there might be conditions when there’s more visible ice and in it might get steeper depending on the conditions.

We spent the third day on a cluster of two pitch falls with easy approach on the north side of the valley. There were at least three to four different routes, from which we climbed two. Each of them was two pitches. All of the climbs were fairly straight forward, though the rain (water) affected to the climbing attitude a bit. It also turned the snow into a lot heavier stuff; slush. Jari actually got hit by a small slide of slush. Fortunately it wasn’t serious and did no real harm; it merely boosted the excitement. Anyways, after the day we were wet like sunken rats. It was a good time to head up to Branvoll, have some pizza and head home.

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Few images from Spansdalen climbing trip:

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Picture above: The second ice fall we climbed during our trip.

We arrived at Thursday evening. Since it was dark, it was a bit hassle to find the right fjord, I mean they all look alike and often fjords have kind of sub fjords, that fool you to believe that you’ve already arrived to the end even though you haven’t. A bit of help from Nokia maps, circling around local small roads (and some fields, which were marked as roads in the map) we eventually found the right spot. All though we couldn’t really verify it until morning we actually ended up just few hundred meters away from the first fall. Exactly on the spot we had planned to camp (which was surprising given the fact that I had forgotten to take GPS coordinates with me). We put our tent, were too tired to eat all we did we just basically went to sleep.

The first day and first 340 meters
We got up quite early, the morning was beautiful and few degrees below Celsius and a clear sky, our target right behind us just few hundred meters away, waiting for climbing. We ate, did lunch packages, prepared some hot tea and drinking water for the day and grabbed our backpacks. Since there were just few centimeters of snow, there were no use for snowshoes (again a large plus). Approach was easy, just followed the stream bank to the magnificent canyon, short uphill sprint and we were right below the fall (“Kåfjord fall 1″ in the map below).

Picture above: Tea time, I’m getting some refreshing tea while on our first climb.

While we geared up, couple French mountain guides came by as well. They were there checking out for possible spots for their clients. They were spending several weeks there (I wish I could do the same) and we were the first ice climbers they bumped in to. This gives a good picture about the arctic Norway from ice climbing perspective. The country is full of magnificent ice to climb, plenty of which within easy approach, with varying difficulty and length, the season lasts relatively long and you’ll be able to have your privacy with the nature if you wish. No wonder why Norway is referred as heaven of ice climbing.

Anyways, we were ready first and able to pick our line first, this wasn’t problem though; fall was wide enough to accommodate us all comfortably. It was great to see how the pros did the thing. The French guys needed 3 screws where we needed 5, they climbed with admirably systematically, one swing, two steps, and it just seemed so effortless. As it later on turned out they were able to climb two falls in a time we did one.

Fall was fairly straight forward to climb. Ice was good and relatively easy to secure, the snow bits weren’t too long and most of the fall was just straight forward climbing, grade varying between WI3/WI4. Only the last portion required a bit planning in order to get to trees (yes there were large enough ones for descent) a bit of snow and few meters of rock / mixed (though rock could have been avoided). The climbing went fairly effortlessly. The only real mistake we did was the fact that we didn’t take our water bottle up, only the thermos with tea. As a result we were pretty thirsty, though there were few “positive” surprises like the water tap which emerged trough one of our screws.

Picture above: Improvised water tap, wonder if that would hold?

For the evening we made fire, there were plenty of scrap food available nearby, and had a dinner. It was pretty fancy dinner actually on camping standards, some green asparagus soup, fire-roasted pork file and South-African red wine. We were even able to temper the wine by the fire.

Day two, onionskins
The second morning was clear again. We were lucky, since we had a plan to a bit of scouting. So I thought at least. So we drove back to direction of Skiboten a bit and spotted several suitable climbs, actually pretty close to our camping place. The two we selected (one for each remaining days) were both on the south side of Kåfjord. Both were flowing over the tunnel right next to Birtavarre, a village at the bottom of the Kåfjord.

For me the climb felt rather difficult. Approach wasn’t too bad, tough much heavier than the first one (and we actually made a mistake while choosing our approach route), but I didn’t feel secure at all with the ice. Axes didn’t feel like holding, my swings were detaching large onionskin blocks of ice and my feet felt like slipping. Perhaps the mixture of snow, water flow and the moist from the sea right below us provided ideal mixture for onion skin to form. This being said, my colleague Jari said that he didn’t experience it as difficult. Wonder if the mixed-blades (though sharp ones) in my axes made it crack, whereas Jari’s ice blades were just thin enough to keep the ice together. As a result of these difficulties of mine, Jari did by far most of the leading and we decided to skip the highest section of the fall. I kind of regret it though.

AAccording to French mountain guides we met day before this one was harder than the one we climbed first. I would agree, both in terms of approach, climbing as well as ice conditions. I guess grade for this fall would fall between WI3 and WI4+ depending on the section in question. There were also pretty impressive icicles and some rock roofs on the right side of the fall, so I guess even very experienced climbers would be able to face decent challenges, if they would like to.

Day three, easy climb
On third day we got up really early, I guess it was already around five a clock. We packed our base camp ate a bit and got ourselves to the third fall. Since it was early we also had time to take a short side track to the opposite side of the fjord and take couple of TOPO-pictures.

The weather wasn’t as nice as the other two days had been. It was much warmed, though not so warm that everything would be melting too fast. Instead it made ice pretty easy to climb, axe placements felt secure, is elastic and it didn’t fracture too much. The third fall we had selected was purposefully an easy climb, fairly high tough. We wanted to chill out and take it easy. The third fall had fairly long snow sections, requiring running belay and the ice sections weren’t too steep. While Jari led most of the ice, I led most of the running belays. I guess I still felt a bit shaky from the experiences on previous day.

There were some signs of recent avalanche. On the last snow section one could see very clearly where a fairly large pack of snow had broken and slid down. Because there were a bit feeling that the snow still there could do it once again we took that section extra carefully. The final pitch, or actually two pitches (though the last one was only perhaps 20 meters), went through a narrow ravine, which was really interesting to climb. There would have been another alternative, a wide formation of ice on the right as well, but since the ravine looked more interesting we chose that way.

Once we got to the top of the fall the weather even cleared out a bit and I have to say I enjoyed the scenery and I were really happy that we got there. Overall it was magnificent trip and I wish to be able to end up there soon again.

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Few images from the trip below:

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At some point our plan was to get our selves in to Skibotn valley and climb the Hourglass fall there (see Almost a serious accident article). Since we found some very prominent falls, up to 300 meters high, with much easier access, from Kåfjord valley we’ve changed our plans. Still I feel it kind of tempting to go for Hourglass as well, and perhaps we’ll try that on our way back as well.

I’m going to take plenty of photos and write a detailed trip report once we’ll get back from there. There’s a slight chance that I will post some on the spot thoughts too. Won’t promise though. It might happen that I just don’t want to spoil my time out there on front of computer or writing posts on my mobile.

More information:

• Kåfjord in Wikipedia
• Google maps: Arctic Norway ice
• Picassa web album: Ari / Kåfjord 2008

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While the other article is still in the making (should be out fairly soon though), I thought to list the top three stupid things, I’ve done on the mountains. I’ve (luckily) learned something out of each, I hope you’ll either enjoy or learn from these three small stories as well.

Top three stupid things I’ve done on the mountains:

Number one was the large stone on top of a glacier formed stone ridge close to Annapurna base camp in Nepal. Well, not really the stone, but the fact that I had to climb on top of it. In 1996 we were hiking there with my friend. The last part of the path to the base camp goes on the side of a kind of stony ridge, there it was, right from our trail, a HUGE stone on top of the ridge hanging half out over about 200-300 meters high cliff, not exactly vertical, but steep enough to result deadly fall. Obviously I had to climb and get myself photographed (too bad, I couldn’t find the photo anymore) there. Once I was coming down from the stone I felt how the stone moved slightly. It was a scary moment. I’ve been avoiding such stones ever since.

On the same trip we did quite a few other stupidities as well. Like walked just in few days to the base camp (4130 meters above the sea level) and we didn’t stop there, we went about 700-800 above it without any acclimatization what so ever –> we were lucky and we didn’t get any serious mountain illness. Besides providing few opportunities for danger Annapurna is extremely beautiful spot, there is several over 7000 meter peaks around the base camp and there’s probably no other place such as this in the World. And if you’ll just do it like guide book says, it’s pretty easy to get there as well.

Number two I did while my first trip to Kebnekaise, Sweden. It was late on the summer. We were going up the east side route with my girl friend. She’s slightly afraid of heights and at some point we were so in so steep and high spot that she didn’t want to go further, especially because the next portion would have been on the glacier. Luckily there was another pair coming up straight behind us and one of them agreed to continue with me to the glacier. So we put on the crampons and all the other gear tied the rope (wrong way) and started ascending on the glacier. Neither one of us had any experience on glaciers nor red anything about them. Eventually I fell in to crevasse, which luckily wasn’t too wide. I managed to grab both sides of it with my hands and pull myself up from there.

Though on those first two I didn’t suffer any damage what so ever, the number three got nominated because I got some (though small) damage while being stupid. It’s the sliding incident that happened at the Hourglass fall, where I slid (and rumbled) down several hundred meters on a steep snow slope. If you’re interested, read the full article.

During the trip we climbed three ice falls at Tamok valley, Norway. It was surprising how easily the first two climbs went. We did both of those in a single day, each required three pitches with 60 meter rope. As we found few old Ablakov threads and attached prusik ropes while climbing it was kind of evident that these three were pretty popular falls for ice climbing. Only difficulty with the first fall was the top, where the stream had carved out most of the ice especially under the snow.

On the second day we had the longer and more difficult climb. It required four pitches and included some seriously thin ice plus a bit of planning while creating decent Abalakovs. After first pitch there was also a long snow section, where it was impossible to place any ice protection. This led us in to running belay situation. To avoid such next time, we will carry some pitons and hexes in future. I have to say that I was well above my comfort range there.

I was really enjoying the climbs. Those were our first climbs, which really required multiple pitches. In addition to those three real climbs, we did a probing climb, which almost turned in to accident, at the ice fall called “Hourglass”, which is located in the Skibotn valley.

Picture above: The third climb, this was four pitches.

During the trip weather was surprisingly nice. The sky was clear (in Norway that’s not that common) and temperature was between -5 (day time) and -15 (night time) in Celsius. Simply put, it was perfect from climbing stand point. We were able to find a camping location right by the road directly in front of three nice falls with easy and fairly short approach. Though we had to dig a small pocket for our car there was a small widening at the road, which made safe parking a bit easier. The location also had a good access to clear water from the small river between our camp and ice falls.

Picture above: Our camping ground and Jari.

Lessons learned and few tricks you should try, in case you already haven’t:

• If you don’t know all the details about the fall you’re climbing, you should cary some rock protection as well. There are situations where one might need to place piton or two to avoid running belay situation. Since pitons are fairly cheap, they come handy also while rappelling in places where you can’t create an Abalakov thread.
• We burned small candles inside the tent, which greatly reduced the amount of condensation (and resulting snow). Though we used improvised lantern hooked to the loop at the highest point of tent, there are some commercial alternatives as well. For instance you could try UCO Candle Lanterns.
• You can store your food by digging them in to snow in a plastic bag. Being below the snow prevents the food and drink from freezing quite effectively.
• If you’re having expedition-type climbing boots, you can wear the inner boot inside sleeping bag. This dries the boot and you can climb the next day with warm and dry feet.

In regards of camping the only problem was the Jari’s HUGE Exped Downmat 9DLX, which filled our Haglöfs Genius tent almost entirely. I didn’t have a chance while competing over sleeping space with my tiny Therm-a-Rest Prolite. I’ve prepared for this year’s expedition with my own Downmat (though smaller version), so that I’ve got an equal chance in the competition.

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Few images from the trip below:

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This particular occasion happened last year in Skibotn valley, northern Norway at ice fall called “Hourglass”. It’s very beautiful late season fall, with height about 250-350 meters. Since we already had two full days of climbing behind us at Tamok valley, we weren’t there for climbing. We were just probing for possible spots for the next season.

Picture above: I’m approaching “Hourglass” fall.

Under the fall, there’s quite long and steep approach on the snow. At the bottom snow wasn’t too hard, but once we got closer to the fall, it got harder. Eventually we almost had to put our crampons on to reach the fall. So we got there, had some tea and bread, put up the gear and my friend Jari did a short probing climb just to see what to expect later on. He came down successfully and we wrapped up our gear and started our descent.

At Korouoma, which is much smaller and never has such a hard snow, we have had habit to slide down the hill by our foot with a great speed and fun. Because it’s fast and because it’s fun we decided to slide there as well. I’ve done the fast sliding fun thing couple of times successfully in Sweden at Kebnekaise as well, again with a lot softer snow. Jari took the first ride and he went down really fast, but managed to slow down with his axe. So I jumped on. Unfortunately my speed got too fast and once I tried to slow down, I just couldn’t. The slide was out of control.

I tried to turn on so that I could hit my axe on the snow, and hit it couple of times, but without luck. This was mostly because the fact that at the point I started the slide, I had grasped my axe from the middle, not appropriately from the handle. In other words I wasn’t able to get enough strength to the swing and I wasn’t able to hold my axe tight enough to stop the speed either. At this point I did my fourth mistake; I tried to use my foot to slow down. This resulted an uncontroled rolling effect. So there I was rumbling down with astonishing speed. Fastest descent I’ve ever made, and roughest. Axes were flying, my backpack was flying, and equipment tied on the backpack was flying. I couldn’t do anything.

Fortunately once snow got softer and slope less steep, speed slowed down, just few meters away from large pile of stones. In case pile would have been located higher on the slope, it would have turned me in to a bag of broken bones. I was fortunate to have just a twisted arm and equally fortunate to have a friend with heavy duty pain killers. Later on in the evening I noticed that my chest was bleeding a bit as well. It was due the small puncture that my axe had done. Fortunately there was no any serious damage what so ever (though I guess I was lucky also with the axe).

Lessons learned:

• Ascents and descents can pose risks, so one has to pay attention. Don’t play if you’re not 100% sure about the conditions and the place. Since people tend to be more careful while climbing than while doing their ascents and descents, I could almost claim that those “easier” situations can pose greater risk due carelessness.
• Be prepared to use axes efficiently also during ascents and descents. Have a good tight grasp on the axe.
• Don’t use your crampons or foot to slow down, if the speed is too fast, you’ve probably already built enough momentum to throw you rolling if you do, use the axe instead. Try to use the axe as a rudder and keep them against the snow to gradually slow down your speed.
• Helmet is a good thing, also on ascents and descents. I had mine on. The only thing I did right there.

Location details:

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Few images from the spot below:

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