Stenemarka and Furutoppen – Patricia McLellan's Blog

It was Sunday again and time for a walk, though I wasn’t that enthusiastic. Warm nights have meant that I haven’t been sleeping well, though I know that getting out in the fresh air and walking is good for me, no matter what my mood is. We didn’t want to drive that far, so decided on two posts that are about a 7 km drive from home.

We parked near the recycling center for our municipality. It is only open two days a week, Tuesday and Thursday from noon until 7 pm. “Garbage” delivered here is sorted by the person bringing it. We have gotten to know it quite well since this new place was opened in September 2018 about the time we started fixing up our house and creating a lot of construction garbage. There are some bins for garbage that are available at all times. The red containers seen behind the fence are for clothing. We sort out metal, wood, impregnated wood, electrical appliances, paint, batteries, light bulbs, etc.

The recycling center where we have parked our car is seen as the eye-sore in the picture. It is quite practical for the residents and we put our garbage in different places or containers depending on what type of garbage we are delivering. This picture is taken from about halfway up the hill we climbed.

As you can see from the pictures, the weather was cloudy, but there was no wind or rain. The temperature, according to the car, was about 14 degrees, so a nice walking temperature.

We climbed this hill which was logged not so many years ago.

The first time we walked up to this post, called Stenemarka, this was a newly logged area. It was interesting to look at what vegetation has grown up since the first time I climbed this hill. Now small trees have started to grow, primarily birch and rowan. The old forest was primarily spruce. Ferns were abundant where the moisture collected.

Where there are open spaces, small ground cover plants are blooming and there is a lot of berry plants growing too. Not all of the plants am I familiar with and I’ve had to look up even the Norwegian names for some of the ones in the pictures below.

In Norwegian this is called “maiblom” (May flower) and in Latin it is called *Maianthemum bifolium*. In English it is called May lily or false lily of the valley.

Later in the walk I found this small mound covered in *Maianthemum bifolium*.

In Norwegian it is called “tepperot”, in Latin *Potentilla erecta*, and in English erect cinquefoil. It belongs to the rose family and will bloom from May until September. It usually grows in colorful clumps.

I’m not sure, but I think this is “skogstjerne”, *Trientalis europaea*, or chickweed-wintergreen or arctic starflower in English.

Raspberries grow wild here, especially on newly logged areas.

Here is the undergrowth once we were back in the spruce forest. They are mostly blueberry or lingonberry (“tyttebær”).

The lingonberry (“tyttebær”) is very common here and people will go out in the woods to collect the berries in August. For those of you who live in North America, it is used to make jam used with meats and tastes similar to cranberries.

Where the logged area meets the old forest, the trees may have a hard time standing up if the wind blows hard from the open area. So along the edge of the old forest there are often a lot of dead trees.

Here is where the logged area meets the old forest that has not been logged.

In storms, spruce trees are very susceptible to being blown over as they have very shallow roots. You can also see a tree that has cracked in the wind.

We were going to two posts today, Stenemarka and Furutoppen. The first one is in the open and gives a beautiful view over the area called Utøy and out to Trondheim Fjord. To reach the first post, one has a bit of a climb. The second one is in the old forest. The walk between the first post and the second post is pretty much a level walk. After the second walk one has to get down to the starting level again, so there are a few steep bits where one needs to be careful. We have had very little rainfall this spring, so the ground is very dry. There can be a lot of cones and dead needles on the ground which can make steep areas a bit slippery. Canes and gloves are useful, especially going downhill.

We’ve reached the first post, with information about the farm and a beautiful view over Utøy and the fjord. Here I’ve taken a picture looking south-west.

Utøy has rolling hills and a lot of farms. The fields are primarily green now.

The second post is in the woods with only a view of trees and ground plants.

There is a well-used trail through the forest and it was not difficult to follow.

When we came out of the forest, there was a red bench and a red gate. The red gate is more symbolic than being used to close off an area.

We used about an hour on our walk, which is the minimum that we like to do on a Sunday. Cooler temperatures meant that we were able to keep up a good pace, even on the steeper sections, though there wasn’t really a large height difference. This is actually a walk that suits being done on a cool evening.

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