Norway, July 2005

After finishing a year in Afghanistan, I rewarded myself with a trip to Norway. This trip was a combination of paddling trip and family get together. For the first half of the trip my Parents, Aunt and a Cousin were along. Matt and I paddled during the day while the others went and did whatever tourists do and then we all met back up at night for dinner and story swapping.

Jake above and Matt below drop into the Money Drop waterfall north of Voss.

Our plan was drive through the Telemark Region up to the town of Voss, then across to the Sjoa River Festival in Sjoa and finally back to Oslo Via Lillehammer. My Aunt and Cousin stayed with us until Voss where they broke away to see Bergen and then head back to Oslo. My parents left us at the Sjoa Festival and made there way back to Oslo by train with a day spent exploring the Olympic City of Lillehammer.














We found this gem road side durring our drive through the Telemark Region

For the most part we stayed in a variety of Norwegian cabins, ranging from simple bunk house type accommodation with shared community plumbing, to a nice cabin with a fully stocked kitchen leather couches and beautiful views. The price range started at $50 a night for 4 people to stay in a rustic cabin with out plumbing to $200 a night for 6 people to stay in the "nice cabin". The one night we stayed in a hotel cost us close to $200 per person for a decent hotel room with breakfast (Hotels are expensive in Norway). Groups who are prepared to camp can camp for free 500m from buildings or cultivated fields.

The water was pretty high so a lot of the "clasic" kayak runs were too high to run. We put on one river ran the first drop and walked the next three before taking off after deciding that the water was probably a bit high. We did manage make 7 runs on Norwegian rivers in the first 4 days of paddling. We had a lucky break and ended up linking up with a couple of English guys who were also on a paddling vacation on the third day and paddled with them for the rest of the trip.

The Sjoa festival was a great time as well. There were paddlers from all over the world there, with clinics, races and great parties. We spent most of our time there exploring paddling in the Sjoa region and again found water levels to be to high for a lot of the standard runs.

In all it was a great trip, we barely scratched the surface of whitewater paddling in Norway. There are so many rivers to explore. It is definitely on my list of places to come back to.

Here is the Video from Norway:

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