Day 75 – 10 Sep, Unset to Hannestad

(28 km, total 2030, 7h, 1020 to 1700, 1830 to 1850)

It rained continuously all night but I stayed perfectly dry. I had been invited to join the family for breakfast and had a great time with good food and good conversation.

They then had to leave for work and school and I grabbed my now dry clothes and went back to my tent to start packing up. I then sat there reading waiting for the rain to stop as I really did not feel like getting soaked again so soon and knew it was only a short day today.

In my tent waiting for the rain to stop

Finally Just after 1000 the rain eased so I finished packing. I had packed everything into my pack and was just finishing taking my tent down when it started raining again, though not as heavily as before. There was no wind so I was able to use my umbrella. Loving my umbrella- warm, dry and happy


I was walking on a sealed road surrounded by the noise of the bells of the livestock. Everything had a bell; sheep, cows, horses and goats, definitely not a quiet time.


The walk was pretty and I was making good time, though my left knee was a little sore again. It was a really quiet road so I decided to just stop on the side of the road for a wee and that is when a car came, causing and undignified rush to finish. One car in 30 minutes and it choses right then.



After 6 km I reached the tiny settlement of Elval and turned left. Less than a km later I turned right onto a forestry road. It was quite a pleasant walk on the forestry road as it was sheltered from the wind and my umbrella was protecting me from the rain. As I had missed the important 2000km marker celebration yesterday I did a 2010 km photo, though without me in it as it was still raining. 2010 km completed!

I was pretty chuffed to have passed the 2000 km mark as, after losing so much time to my injury I was not sure I would make the revised target I set myself.

There were lots of different types of mushrooms and toadstools and even a big patch of blueberries that I took my time to appreciate.


The rain started to ease but a neat atmospheric mist hung around. The road stayed in excellent condition until the abandoned farmstead Gammellia.


From here the track was overgrown and I was meant to continue past the buildings to a junction but when I got to the spot there was no junction. I pushed a bit further along and still did not see a junction. I wasn’t 100% sure that there was going to be a track across to where I needed to go so I decided to just follow my compass for 1 ½ km to get between two lakes. These would then filter me to the road I needed to find. The ground was covered in really deep moss with rocks underneath. It was quite tiring walking through and it was also slippery on the downhills as the moss was not held onto the rocks underneath and just slid when I stepped on it. This terrain was fun but my knee was really complaining about the abuse. Moss sliding off the rocks belowDeep moss was hard to walk on

I veered a little further left than I planned but still hit the second lake and was able to follow that around and meet up with the track as I planned.



The track was a nice gravel road through the forest that dropped down to a main sealed road. It rained on and off while descending but by the time I reached the main road it stopped completely.
Now it was a 7km walk on the busy road. Thankfully there was a wide shoulder to walk on and I made really good time. One interesting distraction was the poles with painted Elk antlers.

Painted Elk Antlers. Why???

There was a restaurant in the town ahead and I was motivated to a fast pace by a hot meal. The restaurant was open and I got a burger, fries and coffee. It was excellent and exactly what I needed.

I tried asking the waitress about accommodation in town but we were struggling to communicate. She did give me the number of the guesthouse but it had closed down and there was no other accommodation.

From here I knew I was heading up to 1100 meters a.s.l. and would be very exposed for 12 km of the next section. I checked the forecast and it was really bad for the next two days. In addition my knee was quite painful so I decided to take a zero and see what the weather was doing in the next couple of days. As there was no accommodation I walked through town, across a bridge over Unsetaa River and found a nice camp spot in the forest. Despite the shorter day I was still tired and was looking forward to a rest.

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