Jostedalsbreen
As I drove north from Bergen, the already-grand scenery became noticeably more dramatic once I got to the area near the town of Stryn, with steep mountains soaring out of the fjords, topped with glaciers. I pulled the car over, took a look at my maps and saw that this was the Jostedalsbreen range, a group of tall mountains capped with a flat glacier plateau. I decided that this would be a good place to spend a few days, and my guidebook recommended a good campground in one of the valleys, so I took the detour.
The campground turned out to be an amazing place, situated at the head of a rugged valley, surrounded by two glacier tongues and a huge waterfall. It felt great to finally be in the mountains, and such spectacular ones to start with too! This is why I came to Norway!
View of Briksdalen in the Jostedalsbreen range.
After staying a couple nights at the campground, I then went on a hike up Skåla, a mountain that holds the designation as the tallest peak in Europe that rises straight from sea level. The summit is over 1800m (about 5500 feet) above the fjord far below. The hike was fairly grueling to say the least, but the reward was an alpine hut at the top where I was able to spend the night!
Skåla rises 1848m (6,063 ft.) directly up from the Nordfjord, and thus holds the designation as the tallest mountain in Europe that rises directly from sea level. The reward for the grueling hike up the mountain, besides the awesome views of the Jostedalsbreen mountain range, is a summit hut where you can spend the night in comfort.
I stayed up there with about 15 or so other hikers that night and witnessed an awesome sunset from up top. Speaking of which, the sun set at about 10:30pm and rose at about 4am, but the orange glow of dusk stayed all night long. The sunset itself lasted so long, even the time it took from when the sun hit the horizon to when it disappeared seemed to be about 10 minutes. Needless to say this kind of slow motion light is fantastic for the photography!
Sunset light beams through the rugged peaks of the Sunnmøre Alps, as seen from the summit of Skåla, a high peak of the Jostedalsbreen range.
Twilight glow illuminates the Jostedalsbreen mountains above the Kjenndalen valley, as seen from the summit of Skåla. This photo shows the unique characteristics of the Jostedalsbreen range, a large mountain range topped with a flat ice-cap plateau, cut through by steep, deep, and rugged valleys. Steep glaciers pour off the ice cap into turquoise lakes below.