|
Heimste Synnalandsheia from Fjellbu,
via
Synn.horn &
Hestevatnet |
| Estimated net time | 1½-2 hours |
| Difficulty | No difficulties. |
| Drinking water | No access to running water but the lake Hestevatnet is the reservoir for parts of Haram and the water here is safe to drink. |
| GSM coverage | Coverage throughout the route. |
| Parking | Room for many cars at the north end of lake Synnalandsvatnet. |
| Start height | 90 metres |
| Vertical metres | 360 metres for the roundtrip |
| Trip distance | 6.1 km |
| GPS-file | X |
| Map |
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| Route photo |
If arriving Brattvåg from south on road 659 continue for 2.5 km after having entered the 50km/h zone. Here you will pass the Coop and the "Ingebrikt Davik-huset" (on your right hand side). Turn left, continuing on the Storgata road for another 250 metres. Just before a small bridge, after having passed the Brattvåg primary school, turn left. Continue upwards for 1.1 km, and turn right after having passed the first speed bump. Drive another 200 metres until you reach the parking place by lake Synnalandsvatnet. Here you will find ample parking space. In the unlikely event that this parking place is full then more parking space can be found by the Brattvåg kindergarten; go back 200 metres to the last junction and turn right. After 250 metres the kindergarten can be found on the left hand side. Parking here during day-time Monday-Friday will require permission from the kindergarten.
From the parking place cross the Synnalandsvatnet dam and head up to the floodlit road running along the west side of Synnalandsvatnet. Where you meet this road turn right and 15 meters later turn left (west). After having passed the offices for Brattvåg Vassverk (water supplies) the road forks, with one leg heading uphill towards west and the other leg going northbound. Follow the northbound leg, and continue upwards for approximately 550 metres. Here the road makes a small drop in altitude before making a final small climb. On top of this small climb there is a path going off to the left, into the forest. Find this path and follow it upwards in a northern direction. The path is easy to follow, but can be wet in some (most) places, although Knut Gunnar Korsnes and others have done a tremendous job in digging ditches and putting in place stones. It will take you all the way to Synnalandshornet.
Synnalandshornet consists of three small "tops", with the lower and upper having a cairn, and the one in the middle has a trigonometric point (this is the point usually referred to as "Synnalandshornet" by the locals).
At the first top you will have a very good view down to Brattvåg and Synnalandsneset. From here the path makes a left turn up to the trigonometric point. This is where the book for registration can be found (worth 3 points in the Brattvåg IL point collecting competition). The actual high point of Synnalandshornet is another 100 metres further west, marked by another cairn.
From Synnalandshornet continue on the path towards south-west. About 850 metres from the trigonometric point you get to a small lake (~20m diameter). You can then see Heimste Synnalandsheia 150 metres to the south. If loosing the path here it doesn't really matter; just make sure you enter the small top from north, and then continue along its ridge in a western direction. Here the path is for most parts clearly visible. Continue on the path towards west. If you loose the path it is better to be on the south side as opposed to the north side of the hill. There are several paths going down to Hestevatnet, and any of them will do (and all of them are fairly wet).
By Hestevatnet you will meet the path that goes from Synnalandsvatnet towards Hildrehesten via Grønebakken, and you will see the registration point by Hestevatnet (worth 2 points in the Brattvåg IL point collecting competition). Walk along lake Hestevatnet in an eastern direction, staying on the wet path. After reaching the eastern most tip of Hestevatnet continue directly east, and down the Timbredalen mountain road, back to lake Synnalandsvatnet.
The Christmas tree erected last year was taken by the hurricane last Christmas so it was time to get a new one in place. We were eight guys in total (Arild, Bjørn Rune, Helge, Johannes, Knut Gunnar, Lennart, Olav Anton and myself) working for approximately four hours, and had no problems mounting and erecting the metal "tree". However, there was one small hic-up; two of the 9m light tubes melted as we had put power on them in order to heat them up to make them easier to work with. Not a big problem, but someone needs to go back up with new lights, and get them mounted.
After having got the huge construction in place Johannes and me spent approximately one hour building a wooden bridge across the boggiest section in the forest just below Synnalandshornet. And when this was done I walked back up to Synnalandshornet and completed the normal route across Heimste Synnalandsheia, down to Hestevatnet, and home.
The night had been very rough weather wise, and a hurricane had made a fair bit of damage to the west coast of Norway. But the winds calmed down on Boxing Day morning and I decided to go for a hike to see how much damage had been done to the trees along the path to Synnalandshornet and Heimste Synnalandsheia. And above all I wanted to find out what had happened to the Synnalandshornet Christmas tree, which I wasn't any longer able to see from my home.
As I walked up to Synnalandshornet I saw a number of trees that had had to give way to the hurricane, but things didn't look bad at all. And certainly not as bad as some of the roofs in the neighbouring houses to mine had looked. But the interesting thing now was the faith of the Synnalandshornet aluminium Christmas tree; not a fine sight. The aluminium pipe had bent more than 90° across the one metre high foundation and was lying "dead" on the ground. Some of it can be reused, but the main pipe will have to be replaced. That's for next autumn, I assume.
The wind and rain had also made most of the snow disappear, so hiking would have been relatively easy if it wasn't for the fact that I had pulled my left hamstring muscle during football last night. Walking was OK, but running was totally out of the question.
After having done all necessary preparations for Christmas Eve dinner, and having consumed the traditional cake and hot chocolate for lunch, Elisabeth, Sigurd, Njål and me did the almost as traditional Christmas Eve afternoon hike/run. This year we did the standard route across Synnalandshornet and Heimste Synnalandsheia, on a windy but else nice afternoon.
Last year the boys had put up a large Christmas tree at the lowest of the Synnalandshornet tops. This year the plan was to replace the star at the top of the metal tree with the text "100 ÅR" since the village Brattvåg was celebrating its first 100 years. And since the official birthday is 11th November this week-end was the last chance to get the job done.
Around six of us worked all Saturday, but in the end we had to give up rising the tree with the very heavy top, and instead we ended up setting up the "100 ÅR" arrangement straight on the ground.
After this work I continued my hike down to lake Hestevatnet and then home.
Njål and me decided to do an afternoon hike on this very fine Monday afternoon.
This was a fantastic Sunday, with mostly clear sky and a fair amount of fresh snow on the ground. The only hesitation I have for not using "perfect" was the chilling wind, which was a bit too strong when sitting down.
Njål and I did this hike together, while Elisabeth was enjoying sightseeing in Rome and the other boys were with friends. As usual Njål wasn't terribly keen on a hike, but he had spent too much time the day before watching television so today there was a need for activity. When we got to Synnalandshornet he was a bit disappointed that we weren't going straight back down, but I convinced him that a hike to Synnalandshornet does indeed include Heimste Synnalandsheia.
His spirit lifted considerably when we a little later teamed up with the Daviks, who also had brought Fredrik along, and Njål could play with Siver and Fredrik, as well as having hot dogs and biscuits. Conveniently the Davik family were going in the same direction as us, so Njål would have the benefit of completing the hike together with two friends. This changed the pace dramatically and the boys were doing more running than walking, and were of course the first to get back down to lake Synnalandsvatnet.
Photos 29.03.2009 - Wide angle of Storfjellet massif
Another Sunday hike with some of the 12 year old football boys in Brattvåg. After 24 hours of continuous rain the weather improved dramatically from noon this Sunday, and by the time we set out at 16:00 it was quite nice. Only four boys turned up (Andy, O-J, Robert and Sig), and three fathers.
The path up to Synnalandshornet reminded me of a small stream, but thanks to all the stones that have been put in place we didn't have to swim. After a short stop at Synnalandshornet we proceeded towards Heimste Synnalandsheia, where the boys were told to do three sprints up to the summit.
I hadn't done a morning hike since late July because of the sore foot, and was not yet in a position for a come-back. However, I knew that Knut was going to have his 200th hike to Synnalandshornet and Hestevatnet this morning, so I thought I would pay him the honour of turning up this Friday morning. It might be debateable whether 200 hikes in just over 11 months is a great achievement or not, and I don't think any of us were primarily "celebrating" Knut based on this achievement. But what we really wanted to honour Knut for is his tremendous job on continuously improving the paths for this very popular Brattvåg hike. Knut has spent hundreds of hours digging ditches, putting in place stones, and in other ways making the paths dryer and more accessible for all persons seeing the benefit of keeping fit. My admiration is immense!! Well done, Knut, and you're welcome to keep up the good work!
This was a beautiful Wednesday morning and Bjørn, Helge, Knut Gunnar and myself started from Synnalandsvatnet at 06:00. After the run we drove up to Arild's house to congratulate him with his 40th birthday. A number of Arild's music friends were already there, just having completed their wake-up salute (Arild was already out of bed when they arrived, but the rest of the neighbourhood got an unusual wake-up ....). After congratulations, Arild's wife offered us chocolate cake she had made, and the whole cake was gone within seconds ...
After a week in Sweden it was good to be back home and have the possibility for physical exercise outside asphalt roads or a squash court. However, the weather was terrible, so anything other than a hike in the local mountains was out of the question. I therefore decided to do good old Heimste Synnalandsheia, in company with Elisabeth.
The sky was only partly cloudy when we started 11:50, but the wind was strong and in the higher regions there was 5-25 cm of wet snow (I thought the snow would be dry, so I mistakenly had put on my running shoes).
Only two other persons had registered at both Synnalandshornet and Hestevatnet before us, and I suspect not many would bother with the mountains later in the day either.
We did the whole round without any rain or snow, but most of the day outside our one hour slot had hail, rain and snow.