En Route to Rauland

29 June 2015

On Monday morning, most of the team met up in Oslo and we started our journey in our rented nine-seater van (which Alex nicknamed “The Slug”). We were heading up to the chilly mountains of Rauland, which is about 210 km west of Oslo.

On our way to Rauland, we stopped at Heddal stavkirke. A church built completely out of wood!

Lunch time!

Five hours of driving through breathtaking terrain brought us to the beautiful Vierli Tourist Centre near Rauland. We met up with Pia and Emma S, signed in, then made our way up one of the many ski hills to our cabin. At the top we were greeted with an astounding view, a ring of large, snow-covered mountains surrounding an area of rolling hills, and a lake. The fashion for houses in this village and along the way seemed to be black wood paneling, red trim, and a grass roof.

Some of the cabins in Vierli

After admiring the view and a quick team meeting, we drove down to the Sauraai map. The terrain has several hills scattered with hard-to-read rock features. There is a lot of contour detail and plenty of marshes that go up the sides of hills. They are, however, very runnable. “The marshes are like highways.” Emma W. The key for this map is simplification to marshes and contours since the mapping of rock features is quite inconsistent.

The team went out for a map run and a few controls just to get used to the Norwegian terrain. After returning to Veirli and grabbing some pasta, we went outside the cafeteria and played around with several attractions they had. This included some scooters and tricycles, a giant chess board, a trampoline, and a zip-line. And goats…

Emma W made a new friend