Last Sunday we planned another attempt to the top of Tromsdalstinden (a.k.a. “The Beast…) but we decided to abandon that plan when we found out it was an extremely windy day. Tromsdalstinden was not actually visible (despite clear skies) because of all the blowing snow! Instead we drove to a village called Straumsbukta. We found a valley on the map that looked like it should be out of the wind. And indeed it was 🙂

The valley is very beautiful. In Summer there are marshes, now just mostly big empty spaces. We didn’t ski this time, we used the army snowshoes that Paul bought a few weeks ago for a bargain price. I am not exactly “army-sized” so they are a bit big for me but they work fine!

The second photo (below) is taken on the hill. Going steeply uphill is not that easy with such big snowshoes, and quite tiring – the trees became my best friend 😉 good for a little break.

In the middle of the forest we found tracks. We assumed from a skier, but when we looked closely, they were from a moose! Wow he made such deep tracks, very impressive! The tracks looked quite recent but we didn’t get to meet Mr Moose himself…

In the other photo I am trying to work out where we are… we actually climbed up quite a bit higher than we thought. Nice 😉

We had a nice view over the valley and the sunset – these photos are taken at 19:30, it’s getting very light up here these days.

We reached the top of Petterbolhaugen, at 367m. Click on the left photo to see what the army snowshoes are like! They actually have good bindings and quite good grip.

I was quite tired by the time we got up there, but we found that Grønnlibruna (400m) was blocking our view of Tromsø… and it was not that much further… so even though it was late, we decided to continue. It didn’t take that long, and the view of Tromsø was nice indeed. Unfortunately it had gotten too dark for good photos by then though. We got back to the car very late, and quite exhausted, but it was a nice trip!

Time is flying, and I’m soon going back to Norwich for a while. Paul is preparing to go to sea until early June, a very long cruise! They do get a few days off in the middle, at Spitsbergen, and I decided to fly up there as well, I’m very excited about going there!!

Spring has also arrived to Tromsø, even if it still looks very wintry. The constant dripping of the snow melting is getting louder and louder. Many of the streets are snow/ice free now – makes walking a lot easier 🙂 The birds are coming back as well, which is really nice. I’m passing through Tromsø on my way to Spitsbergen in early May, will be interesting to see the changes by then!