The highlight of this trek is the famous Besseggen Ridge. Besseggen is a knife edge ridge with staggering views of two glacial lakes: Lake Bessvatnet, a deep rainwater-fed blue lake hanging over a thousand feet above the sparkling bright green Lake Gjende. At the top of the ridge a vertical drop plunges 1,200 feet down to Lake Gjende and offers an uninterrupted view west toward a sea of jagged mountain peaks. The south shore of the lake is a wall of wild and rarely visited peaks. At the top of Besseggen the panorama is awesome, and a little intimidating. The two lakes are so close it seems you could reach out and touch them, but it strains
the mind to see one sitting so far above the other, and to see such bright
and different colors between the two. Lake Gjende, by the way, is well known by Norwegians
as the place where Ibsen's Peer Gynt fell from the ridge into the lake.
Looking down the trail where it descends to Lake Bessvatnet, still 1,200 feet above Lake Gjende, I gasped. I am rarely susceptible to vertigo, but I couldn't help but wonder how I was going to get myself and my pack down that trail. I had never seen a trail like that in a United States national park.
This was not a user-friendly trail: one false step and one would tumble headfirst a long distance into an icy cold lake. And that applied to either direction, as there was a lake below each side of the trail. I decided to take it slowly but had to chuckle at the audacity of the Norwegians. There it was: a red trail marker on a rock just ahead, a tiny step or two away from a violent plunge. The Norwegians
were certainly not coddling their national park visitors and the trail markers were clearly not designed to assist anyone in finding the easiest or most direct path. Later in my Jotunheimen treks I would laugh at the blatantly sadistic nature of these trail markers, as I would come across one painted above my head on a vertical rock face. What were they thinking? I eventually grew to love the challenge of these trails and to respect the Norwegians' hiking philosophy. Finishing one of these treks was a feat to be proud of.
By the time I made it down to Lake Bessvatnet, it was getting late and I was getting nervous. The plateau up there (I was still high above Lake Gjende) was incredibly desolate. As I hurried along thinking of the warm hut that awaited me at the end of my trek, I met a Norwegian couple arriving at the plateau from the opposite direction. They told me they planned to camp there that night. I looked around at the bleak rocks everywhere and the now dark glacial lake water, felt a chill wind and noticed that the sky had turned gray. I did not envy them at all. I wished them luck and hurried on. Of course at this point, it was well past 6:00 o'clock in the evening. I continued up and down along a desolate plateau and
passed another dark, icy, but much smaller glacial lake. Finally, much, much later, Memurubu, a place which I had no idea even existed just 24 hours earlier, was in sight. Although I didn't know what awaited me there, the prospect of warmth and food gave me my second wind. Good thing, too, as the descent from the ridge was not a gentle one. In true Norwegian trail style the trail simply plunged down a rocky slope. Although I was grateful to not have to climb up that slope I couldn't believe how difficult it was to descend it with my pack.
My arrival in Memurubu was, to say the least, unexpected. Apparently the Norwegians are not as foolish as I was, and everyone in the handsome lodge was relaxing by the fireplace or reading in comfortable chairs, having eaten hours ago. I was sweaty, dirty, cold and starving.
Luckily, they found a bunk bed for me and I even managed to cajole some food from them, for a price. Although I was a little disoriented at first, I finally began to appreciate the comforts of the lodge. The decor was a warm honey-colored wood with a slightly rustic look. More importantly, everything one could want was to be found in the lodge: hot showers, a warm fire, comfortable chairs and sofas, hot tea, even candy bars and blister kits
at the front desk! I was beginning to warm up to the Norwegian style of hiking. Yes the trails were punishing, but look at the reward at the end! Little did I realize that things could get even better.
My roommate at Memurubu was a gentleman from England who was a veteran hiker in Jotunheimen. I envied him when he told me that he flew from England to Norway in only 2 hours. I was in awe when he showed me on my map where he'd hiked that day and where he was planning on hiking the next. As I was exhausted and my brain was hardly functioning, I barely followed the Norwegian names of the peaks he'd climbed. He pointed on the map to a peak he'd climbed that day which seemed very far from the hut, and which was clearly in the middle of an area of many glaciers and high peaks. I tried to imagine what it must be like to master that trail, but in my tired state gave up. My new friend announced his plans to
climb to Glitterheim the next day. When I found it on the map and realized how far away it was, and how high the climb would be, my mind reeled. His pack looked like it weighed twice mine. I noticed his legs were about as thick as the logs the hut was made of and decided I would hike whatever trails he wasn't going to hike. I was clearly a novice in the Norwegian hiking world.
While I was at Memurubu I also met two hikers from the Netherlands. As sometimes happens in one's travels, it turned out they were following the same route I was now planning to follow.
We were to run into each other several times over the following days. After studying the map I decided to stay away from the northerly portion of the map my British friend was eagerly plunging into: a vertical wall of jagged rock and ice. I decided to take the trail over the ridge to a hut at Gjendebu. Why? It was heading toward a western exit from the park and seemed like the only logical choice given my time constraints. I was also intrigued by the prospect of more stunning views of Lake Gjende and by the thought of hiking a portion of the trail called the Bukkelaegret. I wasn't sure what the Bukkelaegret was, but everyone spoke animatedly about it, and it seemed to involve a lot of effort and a chain in the rock. More than that I would have to find out along the way.
Norwegian breakfast buffets are perfect for loading up on calories before a long hike. When I woke up at Memurubu I sat down to a feast: cereal, oatmeal, eggs, sausages, sliced meats and cheeses, several kinds of bread, butter and jam, several kinds of pickled herring, fresh fruits, strong coffee, juice and more. I quickly learned a new Norwegian hiking ritual. Immediately after finishing breakfast everyone grabbed a few slices of bread and started making trail sandwiches out of the cold cuts and cheeses. They put them in cellophane bags and paid at the register, charged per slice of bread. Ignorant of the "system" I made some mistake for which I got scolded in Norwegian, but eventually succeeded in getting my trail lunch packed (I think I had an odd number of bread slices which wasn't permitted in their bread-slice calculation system). Some people even had lightweight thermoses which they filled with strong Norwegian coffee before leaving on their hikes. I was disappointed I hadn't learned of this aspect of the Norwegian hiking "style" earlier: a hot cup of strong coffee on a cold bleak ridge would have been a nice mid-morning treat.
 
© 2000 by Robert Cannon
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