Trip report: Rondane - Preface

View from the cabin towards Rondane

Obsessively checking yr.no seems to be a requirement for northern European walkers and the reports left me a little nervous. Luckily I didn't read Thomas' horrible experiences with yr until I came home. My father had been reporting good weather that didn't quite match up with what I saw however the week leading up to our walk my sister who was spending a week in Rondane were reported walking around in shorts and getting a tan.

The journey from Amsterdam to our cabin in Rondane was rather uneventful, we chose to drive and take the ferry from Kiel to Oslo. The only amusing incident was the Norwegian toll officer talking to me in English (I'm guessing because of the Dutch number plates) and me instinctively answering in English...

After a couple of days re-acquainting our daughter with my parents we were almost ready to go, but on the last night before we were off my lightweight ambitions were scuppered by a joint assault on my plans to completely ditch heavy walking boots for my Merrel Trail Gloves. Under multi-pronged pressure I was convinced to add my heavy (1.4kg) shoes to my pack, "just in case"... So much for a pack under 10kg.

Here is our final gear list. (There might be some inaccuracies for my wife as there were some last minute changes unknown to me.)

This was the first time out for most of the gear and I was quite looking forward to see how it all stood up to the experience. We had luck in that the weather looked like it was going to fairly warm and calm, if not dry. In the round-up post I'll do a general description of how the gear performed, what worked and what didn't. For the gear that deserve it the most and the gear I was most excited about, I'll do a full review.

In the end I don't think we brought anything we didn't use, and there was nothing I wish I'd brought which I didn't have. (Not true, we only brought one book and my wife had dibs on it.) I brought way too much fuel, I only used just below 300ml and I had brought almost 500ml.