Rondane – 50 years with national parks

• bentehaarstad

In Norway we like to believe we live in a green country, with all that unspoilt nature and also doing a lot to keep it that way. Actually we have had national parks for only 50 years, while Sweden, our beloved neighbor to the east, was the first country in Europe to create national parks. In 1909, and that is more than a hundred years ago. But last weekend I visited our first national park, Rondane National Park. And that was a great experience.

I went to the valley of Dørålen in the midst of the park, and could drive there, which is highly unusual in a norwegian national park. Most of them are created in remote areas where no one lives, and you have to hike for hours or days to get there.  There had been frost, and the autumn had coloured the landscape.

I went with a group of photographers, and we went out to see the sunrise in the mountains. It only lasted about a minute.

There wasn’t time for hiking, but I climbed this hillside were I get a view towards the Rondane mountain massif, and to Døråseter, which are old summer mountain farms that now provides food and lodging for mountain hikers. The red T shows how the Norwegian Trekking Association markes the routes through the high mountains. There are more photos from Rondane in my photo gallery, and I also made a small video.

https://vimeo.com/49637166

35 thoughts on “Rondane – 50 years with national parks”

  9. Just from the railway between Oslo to Bergen, I saw this kind of land scape
    and felt how beautiful your country is.
    (Even though, half was covered with snow, still I could see it)

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  13. It is’t far from Hamar, Lillehammar and Mjøsa isn’t it – it looks familar – been there a couple of times last time at the 1994 olympic winter games – before that when I in my youth lived in Viborg (danish city) in the late 1970s which a twinned city with Hamar – we played handball against them at that time – og do a little hiking in the area with some of the host families – unfortunately, there wasn’t much time…

    Really some beautiful and attractive shots – personally, I love the norwegian nature reserves they are in my eyes “right” in terms of naturalness and rawness – unlike the swedish which I think is too “polished” and our own in Denmark is primitive and almost non-existent… ‘smile’

    – “our beloved neighbor to the east”… ‘smile’

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