Kirketaket. The church roof. 1439m. Described by Halvor Hagen in his Romsdalen guidebook as one of the top 10 ski touring peaks in Norway which is quite an accolade. It was 26 March and a perfect, windless, bluebird day with avalanche risk about as low as it can be. And boy was it busy.
We’d hardly seen a soul on our previous tours but here we had families with rucksackless teenagers, dogs, young bare chested men in their prime skinning too steeply with good looking girls to impress. There was a carefree, insouciant air to the outing.
The narrow summit is the roof of the church and a tight fit for all these folks. We were obliged to stop between the hard, slippery slope and the obvious cornice which was not to be approached. All sorts of stuff was going on and there was much to distract one’s attention.
Espen arrived warning us of the huge cornice and that people had been killed here. Seconds after his prescient warning I watched one of the young lads put his foot through it when descending from the summit. There was a rifle crack and the snow in front of us vanished into the abyss. The youth’s rapid reaction was a lifesaving lurch to safety rather than a fall of hundreds of metres down the north face. A call can be no closer. Footprints and ski tracks led to the new void and skis were left sitting on delicately balanced blocks of seemingly unsupported cornice.
This was a poignant reminder that a sunny day with smiles can turn tragic in the blink of an eye.
We had some super ski days, enjoying the mountains of Romsdalen pretty much on our own with the exception of Kirketaket. Quite a contrast to the ski crowds on the mountains further north. The Romsdalen IPA is another very good reason to visit!