Kongevegen over Filefjell
In 2017 my mum and I walked The Kings road over Filefjell. The Kings road was built in the 1790s and was the first carrige road between Christiania (mordern day Oslo) and Bergen.[1] The plan was to walk from Øye to Lærdal. We had four days to do it, which meant we woud have to walk about 20 km a day to get there.
When we talk about this hike we generally just refer to it as: the one where it rained all the time, even when it was sunny. It is probably one of the wettest hikes I have been on to date. That isn’t to say that we didn’t have any sun and dry weather. It just never lasted long enough for our clothes and shoes to dry.
Day 1:
On day one we walked form Øye to Kyrkjestøylane. From Øye to Tyinkrysset the road has a slight to steep incline almost all the way. It is also really, really straight. Like straight as a nail. I have litterally never seen a straighter road in Norway.
The rain started pouring down not long after we started walking, and before long we were soaked to the bone. When we got to Tyinkrysset we were happy to find a bench under the roof of the gas station where we could eat our lunch out of the rain. We were also delighted to find that there was a sports shop right next to the gas station. My mum wasn’t able to find her second set of long wool underwear before we left and was only wearing short wool underwear under her rain gear as she new she would be cold when sleeping if she didn’t have the long ones to wear during the night. But at this point she was freezing even when moving, and when we saw the sorts shop the desicion was imideate. We were going in to get mum some long wool underwear. We also got a wool buff for me, witch is maybe the best buy I have ever made, and from that day has been my most favourite piece of outdoor gear that I own.
After eating lunch and geting ourselves some more wool to ward of the cold from the rain, we continued towards Kyrkjestøylane. When we started to near Otrøvatnet the clouds parted and the sun came out, but even with clear sky above us there was stil a slight misty rain coming down. We continued through soaking wet trails to Kyrkjestøylane. When we got there we were beginning to feel quite exhausted, but decided to continue a little further in to the low birch forrest at the base of the mountain to set up camp for the night. The forrest was denser than expected so we setteled for the first end best clearing we came over. It was a bit bumpy, and just big enough to fit our tent. As we set down our backpacks the rain finally stopped, and stayed away just long enough for us to finish setting up the tent. As soon as both of our backpacks were inside the tent the rain started up again. So we got in the tent, put on our dry change of clothes, made some dinner and went to bed.
Day 2:
On the second day we set out from our camp near Kyrkjestøylane, and started hiking up and over Filefjell. We got a bit of sun at the start of the day, and then some rain showers every now and then througout the day. The road up to the toppoint was quite alright, and after reaching the top there was a relatively flat section befor the decent.
If anyone has ever told you that going down is the easy part of climbing a mountain, they either have never climbed a mountain or they are lying. The decent towards Maristølen was steep. We had several small stops on the way down to try and give our feet a little break, but by the time we got down my feet were seriously aching. We also discoverred on the war that this section of the road is called «The seven dissapointments», due to the fact that if you are going up from Maristølen you will think you are at the top seven times before actually reaching the top and you will therefore be dissapointed seven times.[2]
After resting out feet for a bit the trail continued on a mix of paved road and narrow trail that cut through the terrain where todays road were taking some longer turns. Continuing on paved roads did not make my feet any happier, and my mood was gradualy turing sour as I got tiered and my feet continued aching. After what felt like an eternity we finally reached a campground at Bjoråk where we got to stay for the night. Lets just say that pitching a soaking wet tent has never been more lovely.
Day 3:
On the third day we continued on from the campground we stayed at the previous night. With our feet beeing as sore as they had never been before, the prospect of starting the day of with several kilometers of roadwalking did not seem great. But we got too it with renewed courage. We new that we were going to pass some really cool places this day. We just had to get past the stupid section of paved road. After what felt like an small eternity of roadwalking we finally reached Borgund stave church. Bulit arround 1180, the church is the most distinctive stave church in Norway,[3] and reaching it on foot felt kind of cool. We stoped to put down our backpacks and to take the opportunity to get a guided tour of the church before we continued on or way.
Not far from the church lies Vindhella which was the next place of note on The Kings road. The winding road through the narrow pass is a facinating piece of enginering and even with a slope of 1:4 just geting of the paved road felt great for the feet. Unfortunately it was back to a new section of roadwalking after this. Thankfully it wasn’t as long as the last one.
We stopped to eat our lunch and get a ice cream at Borgund camping. The rain had finally let up at this point, and thankfully stayed away for most of the rest of the day. After talking to a local at the campground we decided to probably drop the last 20 km of the hike from Seltun down to Lærdal, as this section is essesntially just roadwalking. He also recomended trying to camp near Galdane as this was probably the only place on this section of the trail where it would be possible to set up a tent. Galdane has been a homestead from arround the 17th century,[4] and it is a sight to behold. High up in the steep valley side a small cluster of buildings is crammed in on several small leveled of areas. The fact that people lived here once, and farmed this land is kind of facinating. This part of the hike was also the most beautifull, in my opinion. The narrow valley, with the steep cliffs, the river beneath and lots of greenery was absolutely stunninig.
When we got to Galdane we didn’t really feel like it was a great place to camp, so we decided to continue on and see if we could find a place to camp before we reached the road. And if not, to hopefully reach the road in time to catch the bus down to Lærdal to stay there for the night.
We didn’t find any other place to camp on the way, so we went with plan B and found a busstop when we got to the road and got on the bus to Lærdal. At this point we were totally exhausted, and our feet hurt like hel. So even if the initiall plan was to hike all the way to Lærdal, taking the bus for the last leg of the trip was the right desicion. In Lærdal we got ourelves a spot at a campground, got a nice and warm shower and made ourselves some dinner that we just about managed to finish before the rain starte once again. The following day we got on another bus back to where we left the car, and decided to take a long detour on our way home seeing as we now had a day to spare.
Sometimes things does not go as planned, the weather isn’t on your side and every step of the way hurts, but these are usually the adventures you remember best. And they also make for much more interesting stories 😉
Sources:
[1] https://www.visitkongevegen.no/om-kongevegen/
[2] https://www.visitkongevegen.no/opplevingar/delstrekningar/kyrkjestoelen-maristova/
[3] https://www.stavechurch.com/our-stave-churches/borgund-stave-churc/?lang=en
[4] https://www.visitkongevegen.no/opplevingar/delstrekningar/galdane/
