The whole route is done on fine path, which might be a little boggy in wet periods.
Start of route to Signalen, in Sætredalen.
| Signalen from
Sætredalen Signalen |
| Estimated net time | 1 hour | ||
| Difficulty |
No difficulties. The whole route is done on fine path, which might be a little boggy in wet periods. |
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| Drinking water | Possible access to running water from stream below the dam. | ||
| GSM coverage | Coverage throughout the route (May 2011). | ||
| Parking | Room for several cars at trail head. | ||
| Start height | 15 metres | ||
| Vertical metres | 235 metres for the roundtrip. | ||
| Trip distance | 3.0 km | ||
| GPS-file | X | ||
| Map |
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| Route photo |
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From Ålesund drive road 658 towards Vigra, through the two sub-sea tunnels. When you get out of the second tunnel, at Valderøya, drive 3.3 km and turn right where signed for "Valderhaug". Then turn right after 300 metres, onto the road Glopvegen. Follow this road 600 metres, noting that it becomes a gravel road after a few hundred metres, to where the road does a 90° left turn. Find parking on the left hand side of the road immediately after the curve.
Start walking by heading south along the gravel road, towards the dam. This gravel road soon turns into a path, which runs on the right (west) side of the dam. Stay on this path, which runs directly south, all the way to Signalen summit. At the summit plateau you first reach a large cairn which holds a registration book. From here continue south to a smaller cairn with a metal disc showing directions to other geographical places. And in order to get to the summit proceed to the third small top, which does not have a cairn. There is no path between the small cairn and the summit.
Descend by reversing your ascent route.
I had been working in Ålesund this Thursday, and was due to pick up my mum at Vigra airport at 8pm. I therefore decided to hike a couple of Giske mountains while waiting for her. First on the list was Signalen, which was an easy hike on a fine path thanks to the dry weather the last couple of weeks.
As I reached the large cairn at the summit plateau I immediately questioned whether this really was the highest point, so I decided to proceed to the top with the smaller cairn, and then to the southern most top. Standing on this southern top, which doesn't have any form of cairn except a small pile of stones which might have been a small cairn years ago, I was still confused about what was the highest point. I therefore asked some of the many other hikers about what the summit is, but none were able to answer. It didn't matter much, and I had definitely been to the highest point, wherever that might be. Back home later at night I got sufficient confirmation that the southern top is the highest, as both my GPS readings and the 1:5000 map showed the southern most of the three tops to be slightly higher than the two tops marked with cairns.
Back at the car I headed straight to the local store and bought a couple of
bananas and something to drink before driving towards Vigra and Molnesfjellet.
Photos 05.05.2011