This trip was a real eye opener for me, a young Scottish lad on a big adventure abroad. I have done lots of Scottish winter climbing, even a few Alpine routes but this was a real leap up for myself and the team. I was amazed at what you can do with good skills honed on small mountains, careful judgement and really good weather window.
Store Skagastølstind, 2405m, otherwise known as "Storen" is the third highest peak in Norway and the highest mountain in Scandinavia that requires climbing to reach it's summit. It is a magnificent tower of Gabro, quite an exceptional landmark in the area as the peak is a promote feature on the skyline. It has always been in the backdrop of our adventures since I arrived in August.
Storen is cherished by the Norwegians- It's first accent in 1876, by Englishman W. C. Slingsby, symbolised the start of mountaineering in Norway ( Baxter. J, 2005).
This photo was taken the day of our climb, by a party of friends skiing on the neighbouring ridge. What weather we had!
Storen is quite a popular climb in the summer, with many of the local guiding companies capitalising on it's reputation and allure to Norwegian climbers. Winter ascents are comparatively rare, we did however find a few winter trip reports on local climbing blogs from previous winters. Other climbers reported good winter climbing o
n Andrews renne route.
Conditions were good- little snow for January and two days of exceptional weather forecast. We had to try!
The adventure started with a days skiing to access a cabin. The team consisted of my long term adventure partner Calum and his Alaskan friend Trevor who contributed with snow conditions observations and phrases like "dude" and "Gnarly."
Skinning into the minge with heavy packs.
5am, Alarm goes off. We ski a further 3 km then adon crampons for crossing the glacier.
Delighted with the conditions underfoot, we reached the start of the climb at sunrise. Sprints were high as we knew conditions were on our side. We had a chance!
What a sunrise!
The spectacular Hurrungane in the early morning sun.
The approach consisted of about 500m of 35 degree snow slope: again each of us commented on the good snow conditions for safe and speedy passage upwards.
The first two pitches were rimed up slaps and corner lines- relatively straight forward. Above we moved together a little and belayed below the start of the real climbing. At this point the climbing ramped up a notch or two. Franky I found it quite intimidating peering upwards at the seemly endless steep climbing.
Me and Calum shared the more technical pitches, the climbing was relatively straight forwards mostly Scottish tec 4 with a few harder sections. However the real difficulties where trying to place the protection. The cracks (often blocked with hard ice) wouldn't accept our rock gear. It was like looking at perfect placements through unbreakable perspex. I did manage to get a few runners in here and there and found that digging in the corners reviled accepting cracks that had been insulated by the snow but this was very time consuming. Around midday the wind picked up, sending golf ball sized lumps of rime onto our faces one of which burst my lip- very distracting on lead!
Myself leading high above the Hurragane.
What an environment we were climbing in now- we were easily higher than any of the surrounding peaks and still moving steadily upwards. The climbing was impressively sustained- easily as challenging as anything I had climbed before the Northern Corries of the Cairngorms!
Trevor seconding. the view looking down was awesome.
Calum leading the last of the steep climbing as the lighting changes.
The sun dipped blow the the mountains. As the rope came tough and we new Calum had made the summit.
Trevor and I followed the scary run out climbing and found a exhausted but uplifted Calum on the summit as the sun went down. The look he gave me said it all and I claped him on the shoulder and immediately reconfigured the anchor block for the abseil.
We had pushed ourselves and our skills far, it was time to carefully descend. We took it in shifts to abseil first into the darkness choosing the stances we had identified on the way up. Double checking each other and the ropes as we descended.
I was last to decent on one of the rappels. I turned my head torch off to conserve the batteries as I waited. There was not a breath of wind and I have never seen starts like that. After a moment of lonely darkness and contemplation attached to a block pitched high on a cold mountain, I quickly turned my head lamp back on. The whole situation seemed much more manageable condensed into the beam of my head torch.
At 11.30 we were on easy ground ground again. We drank the very last of our water and skied back down the glacier to show of the northern lights. By the end of the 19 hour day we were exhausted.
The next morning we enjoyed a short ski decent to the car. We were knackered and our legs sore but the scene of achievement began to settle in. Wow that was Storen- whats next?
