Norwegian Mountains, Møre og Romsdal
Rødlandstua w/Torill & Inka, May 12 2008
To the main Rødlandstua page (maps, route descriptions, etc.)
Sunset
(Click for larger image)
was the day Torill & Inka visited Rødlandstua for the first
time. Not bad, given the fact that Torill lives as far as 9,8Km east of the
summit 
In any case, they were here now, with me and my dog Troll. We hiked up from the Brusdalsvatnet side and the weather was just fine.
Up in the forest, the sergeant devil in me woke up, and I commanded Torill up in a tree. Not a very tall tree, but OTOH, nothing like a bush. Being on a steep hillside, the fall would be longer than the climb. On past trips, and with good intentions, I had commanded her to climb cliffs, jump rivers, balance on rocks, etc., etc. It's a true miracle that she still wants to hike with me. Her patience seems to be of the endless sort.
As Rødlandstua is a gentle forest top, I assumed her guard was down. And when I presented the tree challenge, I expected the following to happen; Torill would, after the initial shock, observe, analyze, consider, reconsider, give me the "you're pushing it.." look and finally, climb the damned thing. Not so. She just climbed it. In an instant, like a cat, and with this clever smile on her face.
Torill's school was definitely out, and the joke was on me now. My turn. The tree was swaying and squeeking sounds increased proportionally to my elevation above ground. I realised I didn't like trees and concluded I should try to follow some of my own classes..
On top, we were blessed with a brilliant sunset. A storm of black flies should confirm that winter was over, but 10 days later, there was a new snowfall. It must be very confusing to be an insect in this day and age of climate changes...
