The whole route, except the last few tens of metres, is done on forest road.
Åsnakken trail head above Åsbygda.
For Åsnakken do NOT turn left towards Langvatnet.
| Åsnakken from Åsbygda Åsnakken |
| Estimated net time | 1 hour | ||
| Difficulty |
No difficulties. The whole route, except the last few tens of metres, is done on forest road. |
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| Drinking water | Unknown. | ||
| GSM coverage | Coverage throughout the route (January 2011). | ||
| Parking | Room for many cars at car park by trail head. | ||
| Start height | 133 metres | ||
| Vertical metres | 180 metres for the roundtrip. | ||
| Trip distance | 2.8 km | ||
| GPS-file | X | ||
| Map |
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| Route photo |
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From the round about north of Vestnes, where roads E39 and 661 meet, drive 850 metres west on road 661. At the top of the hill turn right, and then fork left immediately after leaving road 661. Drive 800 metres along this narrow road, and turn right onto a car park between an old wooden shack and a house. Park here.
Walk along the forest road running up behind the house. Follow this forest road 300 metres. At this point the main forest road forks left, signed "Langvatnet", but you should continue straight ahead. Approximately 200 metres later you should turn right at a forest road junction, following signs for "Åsnakken". Follow this forest road, which gradually turns into a wide path more than a forest road, up to where it ends close to the summit. You are now in a small saddle, and should head for the highest point you see ahead of you, a little to the right. You will find some wooden benches here, and when you look closer you will see a fine wooden shed on the north side of the hill.
You can descend by reversing your ascent route, but there are several other paths that will bring you back down to the car.
It was time to test out something else than the usual Heimste Synnalandsheia route as part of my knee recovery, and I was also looking for a new mountain in the bag. Because of my limited radius in terms of walking I found Åsnakken to be a perfect hike, so after Sunday breakfast I drove across Nakkedalen and towards Helland. Thanks to excellent route descriptions both on www.westcoastpeaks.com and in the book "Til fjells i Vestnes" I found trail head with no troubles, and started my hike at 10:30.
I knew Åsnakken is a relatively popular hike so I expected the route to the summit to have hard snow, and this turned out to be exactly the case. Hence it was an easy hike all the way up to the small saddle on the summit ridge. From this saddle the snow was not packed hard by hikers, but this caused no problems. However, navigation suddenly became a problem as I didn't know whether to turn left or right to get to the highest point. Eventually I decided to follow some fresh foot-steps, heading a little right from where I arrived the saddle, but soon I decided the summit had to be left (south-west) and turned in that direction. As I got to what I considered to be the highest point I saw a father and his young son coming up from east. I asked them if they could tell me where I found the summit, but he wasn't sure, despite having been here many times, but assumed it was where I was standing. We ended up having a long chat, and he also informed me where I could find the shelter that had been built in the summit area. After our chat ended I walked across to this fine shelter, and standing there I concluded this was probably the highest point. Checks on the maps when I got home didn't make me any wiser, but I concluded that I had at least made my first new top in more than three months.
After taking photos and inspecting the shelter I headed back down to the car,
very happy with the hike, and very happy that threats of rain never got to any
more than a dark sky.
Photos 30.01.2011