Mountain Huts in the Norwegian Jotunheimen
Where to Stay in One of Northern Europe's Most Spectacular Regions
Jan 28, 2009
Trekking from hut to hut in the mountains of Norway is a popular activity, catered for by the Norwegian Trekking Association (DNT), which owns around 450 cabins countrywide. The highest concentration of these occurs amid the glaciers of the Jotunheimen, “Home of the Giants”, where the tallest peaks are found.
The maps of the region are good and footpaths well marked, with a large red T painted every few hundred metres on convenient boulders. The huts are of three kinds: fully staffed, unstaffed but with stores of food, and self-service. Membership of DNT costs 495 kroner, though non-members may use the huts at an increased cost. The membership fee is recovered by staying three nights at any of the huts.
The beauty of the staffed and unstaffed huts is in the fact that one does not need to carry food with one. The unstaffed and self-service huts are entered using a key that can be hired from DNT, and payment for accommodation and food is left in an honesty box, either as cash or by filling in a form with credit card details.
The extremes of what is available to the mountaineer can be seen at some of the huts in the Hurrungane region of the Jotunheimen.
Fannarakhytte
This is a fully staffed hut, indeed two huts, standing on the summit of Fannaraken mountain. At 2068 metres, it is the highest hut in Norway. It is reached most easily by a steep, sustained climb from Turtagro, on the Sognefjell road. There are 34 beds and the hut is open from the end of June to mid-September. Conditions are somewhat Spartan, but the meals, which have to be brought in by helicopter, are all that an active mountaineer would require. And the views, south to the Hurrungane mountains and east over the Fannaraken glacier toward the central Jotunheimen and Galdhopiggen, Norway’s highest peak, are stunning.
Skogadalsboen
A four hour descent from Fannaraken and trek to the south-east brings one to Skogadalsboen, one of the most beautifully situated huts in the Jotunheimen. This can also be reached by a five-hour walk from Turtagro. Skogadalsboen, though 833 metres above sea level, is a valley hut, nestling amid precipitous peaks near the northern end of Utladalen, the deepest valley system in the Jotunheimen. Catering for up to 87 visitors, it is staffed during Easter and the summer months, but is self-service for the rest of the year between mid-February and mid-October.
Accommodation is much more spacious and luxurious than at Fannarakhytte, and there are shower facilities, a drying room and a large, comfortable sitting room. Food is served by waitresses, and visitors can take wine with their meals. Yet the isolated nature of the hut cannot be ignored. A notice on the wall states that, in the event of fire, visitors must retreat 100 metres up the hillside and await evacuation by helicopter.
Skagastolsbu
Perched on a narrow rocky saddle beneath Store Skagastolstind, Norway’s Matterhorn and third highest peak, is the self-service hut of Skagastolsbu. This hut is extremely basic. Perhaps ten visitors can squeeze into it in an emergency, and they will need to bring their own food. Water is obtained from a nearby snowfield.
The hut can be reached by a three-hour trek across a glacier from Turtagro, and commands a truly spectacular view down the classically-shaped glaciated valley of Midtmaradalen toward Utladalen. Store Skagastolstind, which rises directly above the hut, was first climbed in 1876 by British climber, William Cecil Slingsby, an event that marks the birth of mountaineering in Norway.
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