Brathay Exploration Group

Norway 2007

Leaders: Alyn Griffiths, Louise Smithson, Samantha Hardman.

Members: Nicola Bateman, Barnaby Angus-Southall, Angharad Porteous, Sarah Greenham.

Dates: 22 July – 11 August

In July this year 4 members and 3 leaders set out to complete a 180 km un-supported canoe trip in the Femundsmarka area on the Norwegian Swedish border. This trip involved paddling, sailing and portaging open canoes across lakes, down white water rivers and across water sheds. During the expedition members and leaders increased their canoeing skills, achieved British Canoe Union star awards and the John Muir Award as well as producing an account of the expedition. As well as increasing the technical canoeing and expedition skills of the group members also developed their team work skills, their self reliance, problem solving skills and their communication skills. On the 22 July 5 members of the expedition set off from Liverpool Airport to fly to Oslo. After a night in Oslo they then made their way by public transport to a campsite on the southern end of Lake Femund (Norway’s second biggest natural lake). After a night at the campsite they were joined by the other two leaders who had driven via Holland, Germany, Denmark and Sweden to get the canoes and equipment to Norway.

After a further day and a half based at the campsite, which was used to sort equipment and receive further instruction in canoe skills, the group set off down Lake Femund. 55 km of paddling against headwinds then sailing with the wind took us to the head of the lake. From here we spent half a day crossing the watershed. This involved dragging, floating and carrying the canoes and equipment through a series of log flumes that linked small lakes. This day ended at a National Parks Bothy in which we spent the night; this was a welcome luxury after a day of rain followed by heavier showers at night. The next two days took us through a series of lakes and rivers (up to about grade II) to reach the start of our longest Portage. This was 8 ½ km of trolleying with over 150 metre of height gain. The last 3 ½ km tested the limits of the trolleys often requiring the whole team to push and shove each canoe on difficult sections. The next day we covered only about 7 or 8 km as we push shoved, paddled and carried our canoes down the river Korssjoen (another 5 cm of water would have given us an exciting paddle and probably a faster trip. That night we camped on an Island on Lake Siksjoen. The next morning we left our island paddling only a few km to find a campsite on the shore for a rest day. After a further trolley and a paddle down the river Tufsingdal we were back on Lake Femund.

Our third trolley took us to the river Somaa. This gave us two days of technical gradeII /III paddling to reach Lake Isteren. On Lake Isteren we encountered strong head winds which slowed our progress. Our last trolley took us up to Lake Galtsjoen where we had our last wilderness camp, and the next morning we paddled back to Femund canoe camp, our starting point. Over the last days all the expedition members had been trained and assessed for the British Canoe Union 2 star canoe test. We had spent 14 days on our trip with 12 nights wilderness camping and one in a bothy with only one rest day and 3 half days, including the first and last day, and even on these days we covered an average of 9 km. On returning to Femund Canoe Camp we loaded the trailer, sorted and dried kit. That evening the van and trailer set off on its journey back to the UK. The flight party set off next morning back to Oslo where they spent two nights before catching their flight back to the UK. Over three weeks we had travelled to Norway, completed a difficult canoe journey carrying all our own kit and food using a variety of different means of propulsion, learnt lots of canoe and expedition skills as well as about ourselves. A hard but rewarding trip.