With so much ice having formed this season, I was keen to vist Rjukan to climb some routes that had evaded me during milder, drier winters. There was plenty of ice, but there was also plenty of snow to contend with, particularly after the preceeding 48 hours, and the snowfall wasn't due to ease up today. Perfect skiing conditions in fact... To Menn og et Foster seemed a good choice of route due to the moderately short approach. I had climbed the neighbouring route Bølgen in 2008, during which there had also been a lot of snow, and I remembered no epics in reaching its base. I had seen To Menn ..read more

Telemark's human population was possibly outnumbered by the resident insect population on Hægefjell's campsite on Saturday morning, but was at least all the more reason for Kristian and myself to pack our things and go as swiftly as possible. At least the insect leave you alone when actually climbing on Hægefjell, which doesn't happen in Scotland. Our chosen route was Sunset Boulevard. It's 12 pitches, 500m in length, and gets two stars in the Gå Telemark guide, and so seemed the next logical route to try, having climbed Hægar on the previous visit. I think this route is maybe off a lot of pe ..read more

The hardest element of climbing Hardis at Sørstulen seemed to be getting through the barrier at the start of the private road. The 200kr fee for using the road is around three to four times the typical rate, and arguably exploitative, but pragmatically it's still cheaper than Jeroen and I visiting a climbing wall together, and the quality of climbing at Sørstulen was top notch on my last visit a few years ago. It was worth biting the bullet and paying. We sent the text, with the car registration details as described, waited for the barrier to lift, but nothing happened, apart from receiving ..read more

Plan A had been the general area of Vang, which we hoped would offer enough options and flexibility, but in reality nothing was ready so early in the season. Luckily Jacob had driven down from Sogndal early on the Friday, so we had plenty of time to switch plans.  Hemsedal was the obvious replacement, although there was no obvious new plan beyond that. There had been a recent dump of snow, which made the likes of Skogshorn possibly too slow going. Jacob is also Mr Skogshorn and has climbed most of the well-known routes. We knew that Grøtenutbekken was in steep, good condition currently but w ..read more

Hydnefossen is a waterfall that I was in awe of long before I ever felt capable of climbing it. Its prominent position over the main Hemsedal valley makes it impossible to miss. It has drawn my eye during both summer and winter and it is undoubtedly Hemsedal's jewel in the crown when it comes to ice climbing. This awe has become somewhat an obsession of late. It's a waterfall that I've geared my winter season around. I even turned down an offer to visit the Canadian Rockies in case Midtlinja on Hydnefossen came into condition in my absence. Nobody successfully climbed Hydnefossen to my knowled ..read more

With winter back from the dead for an encore I paid one more visit to Rjukan for what would certainly be the final, final weekend of ice climbing for the season. Above all else because I was flying to the Alps the following weekend. I've climbed none of the big A-list objectives that I had chalked up in my head at the start of the season, although I can take consolation that nobody else has managed to due to poor conditions. The season can be summarised by four weeks of solid cold temperatures in the middle of the season, with some very patchy conditions either side. On the plus side I've fo ..read more

I haven't been the biggest fan of Rjukan in recent years as I prefer less frequented places where the ice is free from hooks or steps. That often isn't what Rjukan does best, and in leaner times it has been the polar opposite due to limited options. In better years there can be a huge volume of climbs, although I've generally been unlucky with injuries and illness on such occasions.  There's actually a fair number of three star routes in the Rjukan guidebooks that have no entries in the UKC logbook. A lot of these routes have a relatively moderate approach of one hour or less, however by Rju ..read more