Glacier tour in Finse

I got a chance this week to join a glacier tour at Finse with Jøglagutane. Finse is located 1222 meters above sealevel about 45 minutes by train from Geilo. I took a bike though after working the day at Bikerental Rallarvegen in Haugastøl. That was 28 kilometers by gravel road that is made long time ago by the men who built the railway over the mountains. There is no other road going to Finse of this site so the locals drive even their cars by this narrow road.

Yearly there is about 25 000 people cycling rallarvegen, but on monday I only met few on my way to Finse. The weather had been brutal rain on monday. But I was lucky to face only 30 minutes heavy rain on my way. On tuesday we checked the weather forecast in Finse and decided that it would not be too ugly weather. In a Finse way that still met rain almost the whole day and also a short period of hailstorm by the glacier.

It’s not about the rain, it’s about your attitude I told to myself once we started our tour. The four other participants of the tour are working at Finse hytta so it wasn’t any surprise for anyone that it was raining in Finse. We walked about 2 hours from the village to get close to the glacier. Then we got the crampons on shoes, helmets on our heads and seals to get in touch with same rope. Walking by connected in the same rope would help us to rescue someone if you are dropping in to the cracks of the glacier. The reason you should always join guided hikes on glacier is that the glacier changes all the time. Local knowledge and knowledge of the movements of glacier are crucial even though the thick ice would feel all good under your feet.

On the very steepest parts Hardangerjøkulen glacier is 380 meters deep and it is the sixth biggest glacier in Norway. It is melting away, but it seems that this glacier will stay in here for another 100 years. Partly the snow on the top is also creating some new ice.

Once we got crampons on and got into the glacier you forgot the bad weather. It was nice to feel ice and snow under feet. While walking up and down the glacier and looking at the blue ice in a crack you forgot everything else for a while. You also started to see smile faces in the group. On our way back to Finse, we saw incredibly nice rainbow. Someone said that if you can’t see the sun, you can always see nice rainbows in Finse. After couple hours at the glacier we walked back to Finse. All wet, but happy. The whole tour took us 6 hours.

I decided to cycle back to Haugastøl even though before changing dry clothes it was quite attempting to take the train instead. From Finse to Haugastøl it’s mostly downhill. The sun came up and there were beautiful autumn colors on the ground. I felt spoiled having the chance to live close by this area.

You can book glacier tours at https://www.geilo365.no/en/summer/glacier-tours/