The first thing I noticed about the rivers in Norway is that they are BIG!
I was surprised when I arrived in Norway at how lush the country is. Scattered throughout the countryside are beautiful farms, whose green fields stretch from the banks of the rivers up the steep mountainsides. And flowing through these wide valleys are BIG, beautiful rivers. The view from Mariann Saether's farmhouse down the Otta River valley reminds me of looking at a masterful work of art; the epitome of perfection. It IS the view I conjure up when I think of what a river should look like. Leave it to mother nature to craft such a beautiful scene. Complimenting the beauty of the rivers and valleys are the farmhouses themselves. Crafted of mighty timbres and topped with grass and slate roofs. Amazingly, many of these farmhouses, including Mariann's are centuries old, dating back to before the United States was first colonized.
One of the farmhouses on Mariann's farm, which dates back to 1608.
Another one of the farmhouses on Mariann's farm. This is the guesthouse where we stayed on our trip. The house was built in 1608, and is rumored to be haunted! We left the bunkhouse door opened at night for the cool breeze, but didn't hear anything from John's ghost.
The crew consisted of Tyson T, Jason S, Ben C, Luke P, Justin M and myself, C Mo. We came to Norway upon the recommendation of some Germans that we met last year. After much searching and attempts at planning an international kayaking trip for 6 people, we stumbled across Mariann Saether and Tyler Curtis's Norway Daze. To put it simply, they made things VERY easy for six people looking to travel to the land of the midnight sun and make the most out of limited time. Tyler & Mariann's first hand knowledge of Norway ensured that we had quality paddling everyday; and their first class accomadations and amazing hospitality made sure we were uber fat and happy for the whole experience.
The crew ready to get after it, Luke is showing us some of his cheerleading moves from back in the day.
As I've mentioned several times already, the rivers in Norway are BIG. To paraphrase from Olaf Obsommer and Jens Klatts' excellent Norway: The Whitewater Guide, there is one difference between the rivers in Norway compared to just about anywhere else:, "everything is bigger, everything is higher and everything has more volume." Upon reading this, I thought, it can't be THAT big a difference. Well, I was wrong...
The Big Ones:
The Sjoa River: Asengjuvet, Playrun and Amot gorge. Big waves, big holes, and a few beatdowns!
The Sjoa River was the our first foray into the "bigger" rivers of Norway. The Sjoa drains out of the Jotunheim Mountains, some of the highest in Norway, and carves down into a deep canyon, alternating between steep gorges, open farmland and wooded valleys.
Putting onto the Asengjuvet section of the Sjoa, the sun was shining, and we were all stoked for some big water action. The river was running on the high side, I'd estimate about 3,500 cfs. But it was only class IV, right..
Upon putting on, the Sjoa bends into the deepening canyon for several miles providing ample warm up before coming to the highlight of the run : "The Gut." The Gut consists of a 300-400 meter long rapid and necessitates threading several large holes, a few of which, we were informed, were to be avoided at all costs. Despite Mariann & Tyler's verbal instruction, and strong warning about the holes, Ben decided that he would plug one,...for fun. After a thourough tooling, several loops, and a few reverse un-intendo's he was uncerimoniously spit out. While I got the pleasure of looking upstream to see the conclusion of his tooling, I turned downstream just before Tyler decided to plug the monster. Apparently, he also had seen only the last of Ben's surf, and figured the hole would just spit him out. As Ben found out, this was not the case, and our guide proceeded to get a little beat down of his own.
Too shortly, the Gut ends, and the gorge opens up, marking the end of the Asengjuvet section, and the beginning of the Sjoa's playrun. The Sjoa playrun is just that, another beautiful section of river with some fun play features. More noticable for me, however, was the amazing gorge that the Sjoa carves through in this section. A non-threatening beauty, the waters of the Sjoa are free to course through at a liesurely pace allowing the passer to enjoy the beauty with no threat of getting swallowed.
While we floated through the casual playrun section, Mariann and Tyler jumped out in order to run shuttle for the Amot Gorge, the lowest section of the Sjoa before it joins with the Lagen. I should mention here that besides our crew, Mariann and Tyler, Logan Grayling, a friend and fellow Canadian to Tyler was staying with Mariann and Tyler durig our trip, and paddled with us almost everyday. Aside from being a seriously ripping kayaker at the tender age of 20, Logan is a serious smart ass. But a smart ass in a good way,...like your smart ass best friend from college. So while taking a breather at the take out for the Playrun, Logan mentioned to Ben and I that it would be best to stay in our boat through Amot,....OR we would die. (I should also mention here that despite Logan's generally sarcastic flavor, he was serious)
Now I had no idea what lay in store downstream in the Amot gorge. But the Gut had been big and pushy, the weather had turned cool and rainy, and we had already paddled 20k....I was beginning to have serious reservations about Amot. I didn't mention Logan's comment to anyone else during the several K's before the gorge began, as I didn't want the thought eating away at everyone else. But Ben and I discussed jumping out prior to the gorge. The consequences of death for swimming just didn't seem too appealing at this point.
However, as we approached the regular put in for Amot, Tyler and Mariann peeled out into the water from river left and caught an eddy river right. We were in now...
We got verbals about the immediate rapids, and peeled out. I was super nervous, as big water is not my specialty, and I had no idea what to expect except a locked in gorge, that squeezed the almost 3,500 cfs down to 10 metres in spots. Not to mention the possibility of death.
When we rounded the first corner and entered the first rapid of Amot, my anxiety eased substantially as we were faced with big waves, powerful reactionaries and hole dodging goodness. We blasted our way down into the gorge until eddying out above the corridor. I vividly remember sitting in the boiling eddy, looking over the horizon line downstream and seeing nothing but white, and hearing Tyler say, "what you see, is what you get." The rapid below was a fun mess as you drop into a huge reactionary coming off the right bank, dodge a few holes and then shoot through the narrow constriction at the end of the corridor.
Once through the corridor, we regrouped in the eddy above the exit rapid to Amot. Once again, we found ourselves in a boiling eddy, looking downstream at yet another large white monstrosity, which once again required hurling ourselves downstream through the burl, dodging holes and squirly eddy lines...and then, it was done!
The Amot, though spicy with higher water turned out to be one of my favorite runs in Norway, and a good introduction to the higher volume gems that dot the country. Thank goodness I didn't pull out early!
The Lagen: Rosten Section: Big, Steep Rapids in a Spooky Gorge
The Lagen begins in the lake Lesjaskogvsvatnet, and flows south towards the town of Otta. For most of its journey, it meanders through lush farmlands. But before the Lagen joins the Otta, it digs down into a deep gorge, peppered with steep rapids. With the exception of a few rapids, the Lagen is mostly read and run class IV. And while the run is mostly roadside, the gorge feels far from civilization, and has a rather "spooky" feel to it. Maybe its the size of the rapids in a tight gorge, or the undercut walls or just being in a gorge with that much water. Whatever it is, the gorge is spooky.
The sun was shinning bright, and the water was yet again on the high side. We put on and negotiated the put-in rapid without incident and began making our way down into the gorge. The highlight of the run is definitely the triple combination which comes up fairly quickly into the run. Dropping about 20 feet, the triple combo consists of a straightforward ledge drop, which leads into a slide that bends 90 degrees to the left, slams into a big reactionary, and then charges another 90 degrees to the left and crashes through two BIG holes, the second of which is an ass beater. Scouting from river left, it was clear that there were two options: the chicken run, far left down the slide avoiding the reactionary and the two big holes, or straight through the reactionary and into the maw.
After contemplating for a minute, Tyson smiled at us and said, "I'll go for the cowboy line." So we set up for safety, and watched the big water Idaho boy show us how its done.
After watching Tyson style the line, we all decided to go with the hero line, and made it though,...with varying degrees of success.
Jason, coming through the bottom
Once again, Ben caught the best hole ride of the day, getting worked over pretty well in the bottom hole. To his credit, he rode it out, hootin like a cowboy the whole time. Wish I had a picture of him as he bounced like a cork in the hole!!
Directly below the triple combo lays the Rosten waterfall. At lower levels, this is a sick 12 footer, but at higher levels, as it was on this day, the base of the waterfall has a nasty towback, deserving a walk.
The falls. Hard to see how big the towback in this pic is, but you can be sure that a clean line would have been tough to hit, and even though it was hard to walk away from, a beating in this hole could be very ugly.
After scrambling around the portage, we put back in and continued our way down the tight gorge. The last major rapid was a fun right to left move down a ramp, through a hole, and back out the end of the gorge.
The Sjoa: Ridderspranget Run
The Ridderspranget run is the uppermost section of the Sjoa, and yet another big volume gem. The Ridderspranget also has one of the best histories of any river I've ever paddled.
Directly above the put in for the Ridderspranget, the entire volume of the Sjoa is constricted between gorge walls to less than a metre. Legend has it that a young knight stole the bride of another knight from a neighboring land. While fleeing from his pursuers, the knight leapt the Sjoa gorge on horseback, escaping his pursuers.
Not as daring as the young knight, we declined the jump, and opted for the seal launch into the turquoise water exiting the gorge.
Justin, sliding into the Riddenspranget
After everyone was in the water, Tyler gave us the beta for the first drop, which lies directly around the corner. Once coming around the sweeping left bend, you just had to drive right, break the lateral coming off the right wall, and maintain your right momentum to avoid the hole at the bottom. Easy enough, right?
I peeled out after Luke, came around the corner, and came face to face with a much larger lateral than I had expected, barely made it through, and looked downstream towards the monster hole. I could see the hole had a nice green tongue on the left side, but I was already committed to the right line. I could also see that Luke was stuck in the hole. All I could think was that I did not want to be in that hole, especially with Luke. I continued to drive right, and managed to break through the strong towback, and escape its clutches.
Pulling into the river right eddy below the hole, I looked back upstream to see Luke was still being throttled. I had enough time, as did several others in the crew, to sit in the eddy, laugh at the series of loops, windowshades, and various other sweet rodeo moves that Luke was throwing down in his creek boat. Then after his ride seemed to be lasting way longer than he would be able to hold out, I had time to pull up to the top of the eddy, jump out of my boat, get my bag out, and watch as Luke pulled one final BIG loop, and flush outta the hole. Fortunately, the hole was not backed up by any immediate rapids, and we all had time to collect ourselves and recount what was by far the best ride of the trip. Yet another one that I wish I had a picture of!
The next rapid on the Riddenspranget is by far the highlight. A sweet 12 footer.
Mariann on one of her favorite backyard runs
Tyson going deep
After the 12 footer, the Sjoa meanders through beautiful wooded scenery, before the mandatory portage. This monster is huge, with several big holes in the lead in and culminating in a 30 foot falls. With maybe 500 cfs, the falls and preceeding lead in looks like it would go, but with the 2,500 - 3,000 cfs careening over the lip, the hole and horendous recirculating eddy lines at the base of the falls made it look, well, absolutely horrendous. After staring with dropped jaws for several minutes, we continued our portage, entering into the fast moving gorge and class IV rapids below the big falls.
The next rapid was another monster. A triple drop, which at more normal flows is regularly run, was ferocious. Three big holes, replete with undercuts, and definite potential for disaster. This one, especially at with high water, was an easy walk for all in the group.
The final drop of the day was yet another big'n. Another triple drop. The first two were good to go, and while the last drop had clean lines on both the right and left, a monster pour over lurked in the middle. The 8 foot pourover looked like it dug its way to China, and didn't come back. Tyler decided to go first, and in typical Tyler style made it look good. Logan was next and pulled off an even nicer line. Jason was inspired and pulled off the best line of the day, barely getting his head wet. The rest of the group, with the exception of Mariann decided for the dry line. Mariann buttered up the top drop, and got flipped in the second. Making a quick roll, she was nonetheless far down the pool towards the lip of the third drop when she rolled up. Showing serious grace under pressure, Mariann went with the right line, ferrying directly above the lip of the pourover in the center, charged right, and made it to the safety of the right side of the drop.
Luke and Tyson taking a look at the entrance to the bottom drop
Tyler, entering the left line on the third drop
Though Norway runs in general have more water than a bunch of southern Rocky Mountain paddlers are used to, these three sections felt bigger than the rest of the runs we ran on our journey through Norway. But despite the intimidating nature of some of the big gorges with lots of water, we found the rapids to be relatively forgiving and some of the best of the trip.
Stay tuned for part II of the Norway extravaganza: Slides and Waterfalls are cool...
