A Vibrant Adventure in the mountains

The Vibrant Hiking Club planned the Vidden Over hike for Easter Saturday. The standard time given (by Norwegians) for this hike is 5 hours. It is from Ulriken (the highest of the seven mountains around Bergen) over the plateau (vidden in Norwegian) behind the big lake (Svartediket), up Rundemann, and down Fløyen. I have posted about it a couple of times so far, when Ed and I did it in 8 hours, and when the WesternGeco hiking club did it overnight and I finished, sort of, in 5 hours.

Yesterday, I got back home 10 hours after leaving.

What an awesome group the Vibrant Hiking Club is. We had 14 people there. Ye, the leader, put 10 am to 4 pm on the Facebook event, but we didn't start walking up from the bottom of the Ulriken cable car until 10:40. I did my usual leading from behind. ;-) Got to the top with just enough time to wolf down my PB&J before everyone took off again.

Ye at the far far left, me behind the table, and other Vibrant hikers

That was a couple of hours in to the hike, but the plateau part was next. Much faster walking. The day was lovely. Light breeze, sun with high clouds, just cool enough for hiking. I love listening to all the conversations around me with this group. The majority speak Spanish. We had a couple of people who were speaking in classroom Norwegian. I got to learn about attitudes toward higher education in Nigeria, about marriage in other countries, and about why people were here in Norway. The language tests are changing now - maybe I'll take one and see how I do! Anyway, interesting people, all.

Almost up Ulriken

With the flag at Ulriken's top

Sometime around 3:30, Darius and I were tailing and we came up on a group of us who waved us over for help. Asmar had sprained her ankle! With my usual Girl Scout leader background, I had Ace bandages and knew how to wrap them. We got her shoe back on, and I loaned her a walking stick as a cane, and everyone tried to help her walk, but it was hopeless. We were at the halfway point, not near anything. Lots of discussion - call for emergency help? Would that cost a ton of money, to get a helicopter? Can we somehow carry her to a road? A Norwegian couple came along, and we called for a helicopter.

My brand-new GPS unit came in handy. We had exact coordinates. Hooray! I also had my external battery for my phone, so the emergency people could call me with any more questions and to let me know when they were coming. Another hooray! Darius had a real camera, so took some great shots of us, and made movies of the helicopter coming, landing, and loading up Asmar and one friend for the trip back to Haukeland hospital. At some point during all this, I turned off Endomondo, so that 5-1/2 hour trip on my Facebook is from start of hike to helicopter adventure.

Ye came back to our group, while the larger part of the Vibrant group went on. We had 5 of us left. Ye's phone kept on working, and she found out that it only cost 500 NOK for the whole emergency trip! That's $85. Asmar had an insurance card from her work, otherwise the cost would have been 1500 NOK. So incredibly cheap! Asmar is resting at home for a few days. She owes us who waited with her - I suggested Margaritas and they asked, "Is a Margarita an American drink?" and suggested Mojitos. :-) Anyway, we have to get together again, just for the fun of it.

Bryggetav - something to do with brewing beer?

An emergency supplies box

Spring green against fir green.

The top of the world

When we got to the upper and lower dammed lakes, they took the low trail instead of going up Rundemann. So we walked down beside Svartediket and took a bus to town. I sang my favorite hiking song, "I love to go a'wandering, along the mountain track", and it turns out that same tune is for a religious song from Catholic school for one of the other hikers. So we had to compare songs. She sang a sad one about a lover dying, and it was the same tune as "My Darling Clementine". Everyone sang "Frere Jacque" as a round.

Another thing about hiking around Bergen - there are benches with sayings posted on the backrests. My favorite from this trip? "To wander is to live."

My legs were SO tired. A shower and leftovers were just what the doctor ordered. What a memory.

I'll add photos as the others post them on our Vibrant Hiking Club FaceBook page...