The Bald and the Beautiful

This weekend I was at Geilo with colleagues. As part of the trip we went skiing. At the top of the slopes, some 1100 meters above sea-level, you have Havsdalshovda. The slope is not that steep; hence, it was a nice chance to try out the video camera on my phone while skiing … to be honest I need a proper video camera next time around. Crappy quality! Still … it was a fun day!
Just to illustrate the difference … here’s a video taken by a colleague from the same trip using an iPhone, and edited with the Vimeo plugin … I’m the “bad ass” in the blue outfit and red hat

Viz Geilo 2011 from Steinar Søreide on Vimeo.

I dag var årets siste dag med idrettsskolen, og hva er bedre enn å avslutte den med en tur. Turen gikk opp til Langavatnet og Indianerplassen. Det var selvsagt kaldt og bekmørkt ute så alle kledde godt på seg, og brukte hode eller lommelykt.

Langavatnet er for tiden islagt, og vi fikk dermed årets første mulighet til å gå over vannet i stedet for rundt. Det var mange som hadde tatt turen. Ikke bare for å avslutte året med idrettsskolen sammen med oss, men også for å utnytte de gode isforholdene. Mange voksne og barn gikk på skøyter, og så ut til å storkose seg i det flotte vinterværet. Må innrømme at det var et ganske kjekt syn å se alle som var ute der de svinset over isen på skøyter …

Vel fremme på Indianerplassen ble det fyrt opp bål, og ungene fikk leke fritt i området. Etter hvert ble det også tid til litt pepperkaker og varmt å drikke før man gikk over til utdeling av diplomer til barna for årets innsats med en sjokoladebit som premie

På veien hjem igjen måtte vi selvsagt gå over isen igjen, og vel hjemme var far og sønn skjønt enige om at det hadde vært en fin tur. En tur vi gjerne vil ta igjen … gå på isen var gøy!

Today my son and I went for a hike to Orretua (at N 60° 25.751 E 005° 19.325). The weather was quite challenging as it was pouring down and blowing sideways. We took the harder route of the two and got wet pretty fast; however, we were quite determined that the weather would not stop us from placing our first cache

On our way up we stopped and logged our visit in EIL‘s log book, which is placed in a post box on top of the “first” real view point overlooking Eidsvåg and Eidvågneset. Once there we were greeted by a playfull dog It kept running back and forth wanting to play with us before it finally went on with its owners that had already left. IOW, I should thank “the man upstairs” my son is not afraid of dogs …

Heading on towards the top we got into more open terrain and immediately felt the wind catching us and the constant freezing rain hitting us like crazy. Still not wet enough we stayed on track reaching Orretua about 13:15, and immediately started looking for a suitable place to hide our first cache.

We decided to go for the most obvious place; firstly because we wanted people to see the view from where we hid the cache, and secondly because we wanted it to be easy to find. The latter reason was due to poor GPS support on my HTC Hero. If anyone was to find it we needed it to be quite obvious and easy to find based on the hints given for the cache. Knowing it was only 8m accuracy on the GPS it could prove to be a bit challenging If anyone finds it, and they have a proper GPS, they should send me the correct coordinates! LOL!

Anyways, on our way down we decided to take the hike down to Munkebotn, and not the way we came up. The trail down to Munkebotn is actually quite a nice hike for children as well as adults because it is not that steep. Note that on your way down you will also pass a crossing from where you can hike upwards again to Sandvikshytten and continue on towards the city … A longer trip mind you, but well worth it if the weather is nice!

Getting to Orretua can be done in several ways; however, the most common one is to hike from Langevatnet or Munkebotn. The first requires a bit more climbing than the latter. Both hikes taking you to Orretua are nice hikes that should not take more than 2-3 hours to finish.

Updates! Soon after the cache was approved the cache was already found! Talk about fast! It could not have been more than 1 hour after approval! I guess it was not that hard to find after all Go Team Brudvik !