HURRUNGANE WANDERINGS.
By Anthony Toole.
The Hurrungane from Turtagro 
I tried to creep up on the Hurrungane from behind. That proved not to be a good idea. In terms of energy consumption a frontal assault would have been preferable. Nevertheless, my roundabout approach enabled me to view the mountains from several angles before I ventured into their midst.
The Norwegian Jotunheimen contains the highest mountains in Northern
Europe. More than 250 peaks rise above 1800m. Here the remnants of the Ice Age
linger and glaciers abound, carving steep-sided valleys into the bedrock and
leaving narrow arętes and sharp pinnacles to stand proud of the snow like
mini-Matterhorns. The Hurrungane, the most rugged of the mountains, occupy a
niche somewhere between the Alps and the Cuillins, though much closer to the
former. With summits hovering just below 2400m, they cluster around the
south-west corner of the Jotunheimen, a few miles beyond the eastern
extremities of the Sognefiord.
It was the Cuillin-like nature which first suggested itself as I stepped
off the coach at Turtagro. The Alpine aspect only became apparent as I neared
the 2068m summit of Fannaraken. From there the Styggedal and Gjertvass glaciers
looked dangerously unstable, while the ridges and pinnacles above stood blade
sharp against a pure blue sky.
The view to the east extended over the whole of the Jotunheimen, with
countless peaks, glaciers and snowcaps catching the sharp light of early
evening. To the west the Jostedalsbreen, Europe’s largest ice sheet, glared
with the gold of the dipping sun.
I spent the night in the spartan comfort of the Fannaraken hut. Standing
on the rocky summit, perched above its own glacier, this is the highest hut in
the Jotunheimen. It is owned by the Norwegian Mountain Touring Association
(DNT), and provides excellent meals and a night’s sleep at very reasonable
prices. No one who arrives at a DNT hut will be turned away, whether they be
members or not.
The following day began misty though this soon cleared. I moved south to
a col, then up Kaisaren, the next peak, before dropping to the frozen
Gjertvatnet lake. The Hurrungane glaciers looked even more formidable from this
closer distance, certifying that the scenery was still in a state of flux and
the grinding forces of the Ice Age had not yet completed their work. Another
visitor to the Fannaraken hut told me that, after decades of retreat, the
glaciers were now showing signs of advance, contrary to the predictions of the
global warming speculators.
Gjertvasstind from Kaisaren 
The track led downhill with the result that in an hour I dropped from
winter chill to summer valley heat.
The hut at Skogadalsboen proved quite luxurious and very spacious, more
like an up-market Youth Hostel than a mountain hut. After a comfortable night’s
sleep I decided to head for the Skagastolsbu hut, set in the very heart of the
Hurrungane. This decision led to one of the toughest days I have ever spent in
a mountainous region, and I never left the valleys.
I followed a track down to the bank of a
river, which crashed its way southward through the narrow gorge of Utladalen.
The track was there all right, as were the bootprints of a recent traveller,
which I followed all day. But it was the most tortuous track I have ever taken.
It went up and down over cliffs, through dense vegetation and across a
precarious bridge. It then continued
with equal difficulty along the other bank.
At first I was in shade. Then I moved into
the sun which became merciless. The thick shrubbery and near vertical walls of
the gorge precluded the possibility of any cooling breeze. Only the abundance
of water coming down the hillsides prevented my dehydration. After little more
than three miles, which felt like ten, the track began to lead upwards,
climbing very steeply for more than a thousand feet, finally rising above the
stifling heat of the near jungle into the welcoming cool and openness of
Midtmaradalen.
Here the gradient was negligible, but the
valley was long, and by seven o’clock I had had enough. I had not met a single person all day. I prepared a
comfortable bivouac beneath a huge boulder that lay on a moraine between the
ends of two glaciers.
Here I began to encroach on the
mountaineering history of the Hurrungane.
The smaller, higher glacier to the
north, which grumbled and thundered every half hour throughout the night as it
shed chunks onto the moraine, is called after William Cecil Slingsby, a man
revered in these parts, whose photograph hangs almost everywhere, and whose
name is brought up in conversation as soon as any visitor says he is from
England.
In the 1870s, Slingsby began a series of
assaults on the Hurrungane which the Norwegians claim as the birth of
mountaineering in their country. His most notable climb was that of Store
Skagastolstind, the highest peak in the region and third highest in Norway.
This was accomplished, by way of the Slingsby glacier, in a single day.
Rising early from my bivouac I crossed what was left of the moraine,
then kicked steps up a series of snowfields until, by 9 a.m., I had reached the
Skagastolsbu hut.
This was a real hut, the smallest I have seen, completely basic and at
the opposite extreme in the spectrum of comfort from Skogadalsboen. It stands on
the col between Skagastolstind and Dyrhaugstind and is the main launch pad for
the major rock climbs in the region.
I cooked myself a meal on the hut’s single functional butane stove,
then, feeling refreshed, moved up in the direction of Store Skagastotstind.
Above Skagastolsbu 
Much of the ridge involved steep scrambling up boulder and slab, with
the occasional snow patch. The gabbro was rough, but the hard crusty black
lichen that covered it was rougher, and after several hundred feet the tips of
my fingers were beginning to bleed. About 150m from the summit I decided to
stop. The rock was getting steeper, I was alone and unroped and knew nothing of
the routes to the top. I was, however, well higher than the surrounding peaks
and could look across them to the next line of summits and the great North Wall
of Ringstind, one of Norway’s last big unclimbed problems.
I slept the night in the hut,
sharing the cramped accommodation with six climbers. In an emergency, perhaps a
single other person could have been squeezed among us. The next day, I crossed
the narrow snow bridge over the bergschrund and descended the Skagastols
glacier and the three-hour walk to Turtagro.
After a few days on
Galdhopiggen, Norway’s highest summit, and some of its satellite peaks, I
returned to the Tutragro Hotel as a base for some final trips to the
Hurrungane.
Dyrhaugstind looked an easy
two-hour walk. It turned out to be a four-and-a-half-hour effort up tussocky
shrub and vegetation, steep boulder slopes and several extensive snowfields.
The rewards were more than adequate compensation.
I reached the summit ridge
quite suddenly, and gazed over a cliff that fell some two-and-a-half thousand
feet to the Skagastols glacier and its meltwater lake. Beyond, the walls of the
far side of the valley rose impressively toward the summit of Store
Skagastolstind. The high point of my previous visit was hidden in cloud, but
from my position now I could see the mountains to the west, which had been
partly eclipsed on that occasion by my present mountain.
The ridge narrowed as it rose until it became a small pinnacle. There I
caught up with four others who turned out to be the first English people I had
met in nearly two weeks in the Jotunheimen. We moved on together, scrambling, often
precariously, over several more pinnacles to the highest point. The ridge
continued farther, descending over a few more narrow humps and a distance of
about half-a-mile before it plunged vertically to the col on which stood the
Skagastolsbu hut.
On Dyrhaugstind summit
The following day, cloud hung low over the mountains. More in hope than
anticipation I set off for Nordre Skagastolstind. The terrain was similar to
that on Dyrhaugstind, but with much less snow. 1994, I was told, had been a
lemming year, and several small, sandy-brown carcasses lay at intervals on the
lower slopes, as witness to the swarming phenomenon of these strange little
rodents.
I rose into the cloud, through which a vague sun tried to break. For a
time I was cocooned in a mist-free space surrounded by a pale grey wall. Then
the gloom thickened and only a final rock scramble to the summit gave something
of interest. A ridge similar to that on Dyrhaugstind began from here, but I
could see none of it. Nor could I see the view down to the Styggedals glacier
and across to Fannaraken, and reverse of that which had first stimulated my
interest in the Hurrungane. My English companions of the previous day had
assured me that the view was worth the struggle. I would have to be satisfied with
that, along with the purely personal satisfaction of having climbed another
2100m peak.
That evening, I stood on the balcony of the Turtagro Hotel as the cloud lifted and a sharp sunlight bathed the mountains. My visit had allowed me little more than cursory inspection of the region and a tantalising glimpse of its possibilities. Despite my short acquaintance with them, these hills were beginning to feet like old friends and I perhaps sensed a little of what had drawn Slingsby back to Norway year after year.
There is little possibility
that I shall ever emulate Slingsby, but at least I have made a start.