Lee Harrison Climbing

With so much ice having formed this season, I was keen to vist Rjukan to climb some routes that had evaded me during milder, drier winters. There was plenty of ice, but there was also plenty of snow to contend with, particularly after the preceeding 48 hours, and the snowfall wasn't due to ease up today. Perfect skiing conditions in fact... To Menn og et Foster seemed a good choice of route due to the moderately short approach. I had climbed the neighbouring route Bølgen in 2008, during which there had also been a lot of snow, and I remembered no epics in reaching its base. I had seen To Menn og et Foster from the road while visiting Rjuken in mid-December, and it had looked already in condition, and so a relatively safe bet for this second visit three weeks later. Some obvious curtains high on the route form the crux, but I was fairly confident that these had suitably fattened due to the amount of snow resting on them. Both Dorian and Jamie seemed psyched, despite this possibly no...

Venstrelinja on Hydnefossen was not remotely on my radar as a climbing objective until a few hours after climbing the classic, easier neighbouring line, Midtlinja. Midtlinja had felt a full test of my abilities on the first failed attempt, but better route-finding on the second visit had made it feel a comparatively steady outing and benchmark for the grade. I definitely wasn't finished with the Hydnefossen experience, which meant I needed a new challenge to start obsessing about, and on Hydnefossen this generally means a harder challenge.  The first test was trying to find someone willing to attempt Venstrelinja with me. Moving up to a higher grade might have made partner recruitment a harder project, but luckily Fredrik said yes with little evidence of hesitation.  The forecast for the coming weekend wasn't ideal, but I was off to Scotland the following weekend, and so my next opportunity wouldn't otherwise be until mid-March. There seemed therefore a possibility of missi...

Hydnefossen is a waterfall that I was in awe of long before I ever felt capable of climbing it. Its prominent position over the main Hemsedal valley makes it impossible to miss. It has drawn my eye both summer and winter and it is undoubtedly Hemsedal's jewel in the crown when it comes to ice climbing. This awe has grown into an obsession of late. It's a waterfall that I've geared my winter season around. I even turned down an offer to visit the Canadian Rockies in case Midtlinja ('the middle line' in English) on Hydnefossen came into condition in my absence. Nobody successfully climbed Hydnefossen to my knowledge last season and the way the season was panning out, with some significant warm periods, I wasn't expecting much different this time around.  Then a report of an ascent of Midtlinja, with good conditions reported... That one took me by surprise!  My friend Murilo was visiting from the UK for four days. I popped the Hydnefossen question and he w...

The hardest element of climbing Hardis at Sørstulen seemed to be getting through the barrier at the start of the private road. The 200kr fee for using the road is around three to four times the typical rate, and arguably exploitative, but pragmatically it's still cheaper than Jeroen and I visiting a climbing wall together, and the quality of climbing at Sørstulen was top notch on my last visit a few years ago. It was worth biting the bullet and paying. We sent the text, with the car registration details as described, waited for the barrier to lift, but nothing happened, apart from receiving a 200 kr invoice by SMS. It was 8:20am and the customer services were not available to speak to until 9am. I tried sending another text ten minutes later but it was the same outcome. Another invoice. We waited patiently until 9am. Sending an angry email to the same customer services helped pass the time. Jeroen meanwhile Googled and tried several optimistic ways to trick the gate to op...

Plan A had been the general area of Vang, which we hoped would offer enough options and flexibility, but in reality nothing was ready so early in the season. Luckily Jacob had driven down from Sogndal early on the Friday, so we had plenty of time to switch plans.  Hemsedal was the obvious replacement, although there was no obvious new plan beyond that. There had been a recent dump of snow, which made the likes of Skogshorn possibly too slow going. Jacob is also Mr Skogshorn and has climbed most of the well-known routes. We knew that Grøtenutbekken was in steep, good condition currently but we also knew that a friend planned to a second attempt in successive days, and so we gave the route a miss on that basis. The loose plan instead was to drive through Grøndalen after dawn to inspect conditions but likely continue up the valley and try Hydalsfossen. This meant a slightly later start than ideal, given the limited daylight hours.  As largely expected, Grøndalen didn't l...

Telemark's human population was possibly outnumbered by the resident insect population on Hægefjell's campsite on Saturday morning, but it was all the more reason for Kristian and myself to pack our things and go as swiftly as possible. At least the insects leave you alone when the climbing begins on Hægefjell, which doesn't happen in Scotland. Our chosen route was Sunset Boulevard. It's 12 pitches, 500m in length, and gets two stars in the Gå Telemark guide, and so seemed the next logical route to try, having climbed Hægar on the previous visit. I think this route is maybe off a lot of people's radar due to a free online guide omitting it. It lies a little to the right of the better known classic Tyrion. Tyrion has a distinctive hard n7 bolted crux, which is considerably harder than the rest of the route, whereas Sunset Boulevard is much more uniform in difficulty, with three UIAA VI+ pitches to contend with. My form was partly a mystery after dislocating my ...