SUP Norway - Second Stand Up Paddle Expedition in 2019 - 3 of 3

Kumaran Geopaddler
Oct 2
7 min read

Previously on SUP Norway 2019

...This time, I learnt a lot about what being an expedition leader really meant...

...It was as if we were going into a cave in Middle Earth, with rain clouds above us....

...Unable to overcome the strong winds and the rain, one of our team members fell into the water...

Day 0: September 2, 2019,

Stand-Up Paddle Board Expeditions India SUP Norway

It was a humid day with a mild but constant drizzle. The incessant drizzle gave us a beautiful rainbow. From the valley below where we camped, I could see the powerful winds through the waterfalls in the hills, and could sense that the weather was changing. At around 12 noon, my friends Prajeeth and Abhihit arrived. I took them hiking to Gudvangen, where we shared a good meal in a restaurant at the tourist centre. By 3:30 pm, the participants of the expedition started coming in.

Later that evening, Titus made a welcome speech where he made a mention about me as well. We instructed the participants on pitching tents, paddling techniques, and camping basics; despite doing this a hundred times over, each time it was an opportunity to gain new perspectives. After the customary barbecue and champagne, we rested for the night, ready for the expedition the next day. Like the previous one, this expedition was going to have a drastic turn of events as well, only we didn’t know it yet.

Day 1: September 3, 2019, Odnes (9 Km)

We lined up the paddle boards at 10 am, where Titus detailed the team about how to handle bags and gear. Soon we started paddling towards Odnes. The weather was gloomy but not bad. We reached Bakka at around 2 pm, but kept on paddling as we did not want to be stranded lest it rained. My chafing wasn’t getting better either, in fact it was getting worse.

Titus’s paddling techniques were quite different from what I am used to. I tried adapting some, but eventually decided to keep them as tricks in the bag that would come in handy whenever required. I was happy that my friends did great - it was a personal pat on the back. We reached Odnes in 45 minutes; the landing was smooth. Like clockwork, we lined up the boards, established the tents, and went out scouting for firewood.

Prajeeth, Abhijit, and I went on a long walk on the other side of the camp, gathering firewood and hunting for the best spots for discreetly answering Mother Nature’s calls. I requested Abhijit to give a Telugu commentary on the journey here, and like a reporter, I recorded it. For my part, I too recorded a sound byte on Paddle for Future, in English though. Just old buddies having fun in a foreign land. After dinner, we crashed to the sound of the crashing waterfalls.

Day 2: September 4, 2019, Wild Camping (Original plan) (15 Km)

I woke up early and opened my tent to the beautiful sight of the valley. The weather seemed good, but it would change to literally alter the course of the expedition. The night before, we had heard a loud crashing noise from the waterfalls. It was the rumble of a distant glacier breaking away.

We started early, paddling continuously towards Dydral. By around 9:20 am, it started raining, and all of a sudden, the temperature dropped from pleasantly chill to freezing. The waves started swelling, and one by one, people started falling into the waters. Although as always, we had a mix of different people with the team this time, three of them did not have much experience handling choppy waters.

I experienced severe cold-induced muscle cramps in my hands and legs. Titus expressed his concerns about the huge waves and how the expedition would go on, but I reassured him that my boys were seasoned enough to handle the rough conditions. However, as I was saying it, Prajeeth fell into the water, and as a cue, Abhijit too fell down.Their clothes weren’t designed to handle such a drastic change in temperatures. Not just falling, we had to make an emergency stop for a team member’s emergency bowel movement. All discretionary protocol for open relieving was out of the window.

In one hour’s time, the situation went from concerning to out of control. Titus considered calling rescue boats, but knowing the wind patterns of the fjords (if there are winds on one side, there won’t be on the other), we decided to carry on, not to the planned tri-fjord junction but to Undredal. We struggled on for 3 kilometers in the cold and choppy waters; not going to lie it was hell. We made a right turn, and the winds literally disappeared. The water was so flat, like it wasn’t one minute ago it was literally pulling us down. This was the same place where a few days back we had to initiate a rescue for a team member.

We took a breather, paddled, and reached Undredal. A team member took one look at the day we had been through and nope-d out of the rest of the expedition, saying this wasn’t what she had signed up for. That’s when Titus and I discussed that expeditions in this route during this season should be reconsidered.

My chafing was getting worse and I had also developed a urinary tract infection. In this distress, the Undredal campsite was heaven sent. Under the hot showers, I slowly eased my cramped buddy back to form. Lesson learnt - When your body tells you something, drop everything and listen, else that is the only voice you will keep hearing.

The rest of the day ended up being an antidote to the morning’s adventures as we chilled around the campsite with pizza and goat cheese. I slept deep that night.

Day 3: September 5, 2019, Undredal

We woke up to the beautiful sights of Undredal. Today was a no-paddle day, as the weather was very inclement. We went on the Undredal trek, where we passed by the beautiful waterfalls that had added layers of personality due to the rains and winds. As friends, I felt that this trek helped us bond even more.

Back at the camp, some of the team members went paddling in the nearby waters for a short stretch. The mountains of Flåm were starting to get snow caps, and I was watching this from the valley below; it felt like the descent of the Age of Winter in Narnia. Titus arranged for a good dinner for all of us. After having what was like the entirety of Norwegian cuisine on a plate, we had a good night’s sleep.

The decision to skip the wild camping and re-route to Undredal was made to prioritize the safety of the team over the planned itinerary. Such decisions would seem to be taken on the spur of the moment, but was not impulsive, on the contrary it was instinctive. This stuck with me, and back home, every seemingly last minute decision made during the Kollidam Expeditions would have layers and layers of thought beneath them.

Day 4: September 6, 2019, Undredal to Odnes

After breakfast, we started towards our next stop - Odnes. There’s something about bonding people - total strangers go on an adventure, cook together, share a couple of drinks together, brave storms together, and suddenly, they are an indelible part of your memories!

For the first time, I experienced the fjord cruise on the Nærøyfjord, the Flåm ferry to Gudvangen. It was specifically designed keeping the fluid dynamics of the fjords in mind - hollow at the base and almost making no sound. It has a capacity of 300 people, and it glided on the waters as smooth as a stone skipping the surface. The challenge - to load our inflated SUP boards and to board ourselves and our gear within the five-minute window we had at the ferry’s Undredal stop. And we were deft and nimble, much to the amusement and excitement of the other passengers in the ferry.

The ferry ride took us twenty minutes, and it was beautiful to look at the fjords from the deck. We would be dropped at Drydal, from where we would paddle to the Odnes camp. The stretch was very smooth with glassy waters, almost as if the fjords made up for the turbulence just a couple of days back. This decision too, was taken in the morning, the original plan being to paddle from Undredal back to Gudvangen. But the waters from Undredal to Åtnes were extremely choppy, and taking the ferry was definitely the right decision, although it was an unexpected financial cost to the company.

We reached Odnes by 11:30 am, and to our surprise, found a full bottle of good alcohol there, unopened. As they say, finders keepers, so toasting to our anonymous benefactor, we had a blast. We played a game where we rolled people from over a small ramp-like cliff into the grassland. In the evening, we had a campfire, and ended the day on a high note.

Day 5: September 7, 2019, Odnes to Gudvangen (9 km)

We started from Odnes at around 10 am, paddling back to base at Gudvangen. One member of our team accidentally dropped her phone into the waters. We helplessly watched as the phone swirled and spiralled before sinking down, like the infamous Titanic’s diamond. Poor thing, not only did she lose her phone to the fjords, she had lost photos of the last two countries she travelled prior to Norway. Bad luck, iPhone.

The stretch back from Odnes to Gudvangen was amazing, given the glassy waters and the cliffy backdrop. We crossed the ferries carrying the anorthosite and navigated the waves they created, and we reached camp by 12:30 pm. As usual, we unloaded the tents, laid the tents and sleeping bags out to dry, and started packing. Just like that in two years, I had done expeditions here in the summer, winter, and the rains.

Expedition 3 of 3, a success!!!

It was a rather long stay for me this time, and saying farewell was quite odd. Yet, like leaving my hometown for the city, I left Gudvangen to go back to Chennai.

My friends and I left for Bergen by bus and reached by 7 pm. We took another bus from there to the hostel we had booked, on the mountainside in the outskirts of Bergen. After dropping off our luggage, we came back to Bergen and had some good biriyani at the Madras Restaurant, the same one I had visited last year with Sathish. Norway is expensive when it comes to good Indian food.

We had an early morning flight, so we checked in quite early at a near-empty airport - a sight that one can never even think of in India. We had a stopover at Stockholm, Delhi, and then reached Chennai on September 9th. 19 days, 3 expeditions, countless hours of fun later, I came home.