Snøhornet trail head by Årset.
Start of forest road towards Snøhornet.
Overview of the route to Snøhornet.
Upper part of the skiing route to Snøhornet.
| Snøhornet from Årset (ski) Snøhornet |
| Estimated net time | 4-5 hours | ||
| Difficulty | No technical difficulties, but navigation can be a little difficult around Litlesætra (at 360m), and skiing through the forest can be very cumbersome. The best time of year is probably when the snow has melted up to approximately 400m and you can carry the skis along the forest road and path up to here. | ||
| Drinking water | Several sources of running water in the lower section during spring. | ||
| GSM coverage | Coverage throughout the route (March 2015). | ||
| Parking | Room for many cars by the old school at trail head. | ||
| Start height | 102 metres | ||
| Vertical metres | 1220 metres for the roundtrip. | ||
| Trip distance | 8.9 km | ||
| GPS-file | X | ||
| Map |
|
||
| Route photo |
| ||
NOTE: Skiing Snøhornet via this route is probably best done when the snow line has crept up to ~400m as this will allow you to carry the skis by following the forest road and path up through the steep and partly dense forest.
Start measuring from the junction where roads E39 and 60 intersect 2 km north of the east end of lake Hornindalsvatnet. Drive road E39 in the direction of Ålesund and Volda. Turn left after 19.6 km, towards "Årset", 200 metres after you have exited Årsettunnelen. Drive 600 metres and park next to the old school on the left hand side of the road.
Start your hike by walking 120 metres along the road from the old school. Turn left onto a forest road and follow it 350 metres uphill. Turn left onto a path signed by a small wooden sign and follow this path up to the old wooden building at Litlesætra (at 360m), or alternatively turn right at 330m and follow a steep path up to the height on the right hand side. If you walk all the way up to Litlesætra turn right after the house and aim for the right hand side of the valley going uphill. When you get up to the flat section continue approximately 500 metres north-east and then head uphill towards the long hill above you. Find your best route uphill, a little west of north, towards Snøhornet's south ridge, and then turn a little right and ski east of north all the way up to the large summit cairn. Note that the highest point is probably found 60-70 metres south of the cairn.
Descend by reversing your ascent route.
With excellent weather forecast I decided to take this Monday in the Easter week off work, and Sigurd and I travelled to Austefjorden to hike Snøhornet. When we got to the trail head we decided to turn around and find some other mountain since there was practically no snow below 400m. But after 50 metres driving back along the road I turned around again and decided to "stick to the plan". In hindsight this was probably a wise move since I would argue that skiing Snøhornet is potentially best done when you can carry the skis through the forest and take advantage of the path up to Litlesætra.
When we got to Litlesætra I was sloppy when studying my GPS and we turned left as this seemed to offer the least cumbersome terrain. This took us into some very nasty terrain, at least when carrying skis, and when we realised the mistake we got into some slightly awkward scrambling across slab covered with wet moss. This whole de-tour took us close to one hour, and I was starting to get very tired. When we finally got out of our problems we had 600 metres of skiing across semi-rotten snow before starting the long hill up to Snøhornet. This section had some fairly steep parts but on snow partly softened by the shining sun we didn't have any problems. And when the mist around the summit lifted a little before we got to the summit it made us forget all issues from further down.
The descent down to 400m was in the region good/very good, and after some minor messing around before we found the path down from Litlesætra we could take on the walk back down to the car.