Summer trip 2011 to Rondane National Park

As every year some weekend in summer our office in Oslo organises the office summer trip.

This year it took Trude and Lisa (Authentic Scandinavia), Michelle, Jana and trainee Lisanne (Haman Scandinavia) and Franck, Stéphanie and me plus our trainees Clément, Anaïs, Sonia and Clém (Terra Nova) + Franck's dog Bonnie to the Rondane National Park.

Here the programme and pictures :-)

Friday 08/07 :

At lunch time, the trainees did the necessary groceries shopping for this weekend, drinks and all for a nice BBQ included.

Stéphanie and I picked up 2 cars from the Avis rental station down town at around 15:00.

Distributed on three cars, we all departed shortly after from Oslo in direction Gjøvik: 123 km/2 hours.

Stop for dinner at McDonald's Gjøvik around 18:00. Franck has a friend living there, so he always uses the occasion of a burger stop to meet him when we are in the area.

From Gjøvik, drive towards Lillehammer and from there along the E6 in direction Otta: 158 km / around 2:15 hours.

In Otta, we took the little road on the right in direction of the Rondane National Park.

We have 2 cabins at the Rondane Spa Hotel in Mysuseter for the overnight accommodation for this weekend.

Each cabin, 72 square meters, consists of 2 double rooms in the ground floor plus 4 beds in the loft-room. In each cabin has 2 toilets, a shower, a cozy living room with a fully equipped kitchen with oven, coffee percolator, dishwasher and refrigerator/freezer.

 

The evening itself - since we arrived pretty late - nothing big was going on anymore. We all settled in the cabins, made our beds, some went discovering the pool at the hotel and some just stayed a while on the terrace outside chatting.

After a common good night, everyone went back into its own cabin, 8 of the girls in one cabin, and Jana and I (sharing a room) in the cabin with the guys Clément & Clément and Franck & his dog :-)

Kind of on the way to bed we stopped for one last drink with the guys in our cabin. We actually were in posession of a full bottle of "pastis" (French spirits)... which I  L-O-O-O-O-O-V-E!!!  I was too tired, though, to have more than a small glass of it this night. I was just looking forward to fully enjoying it the next evening and so I went to bed. Jana as well.

The guys kept on talking for a while. Well, for "a while" is a little understatement. The next morning we were to figure out that they had been awake talking until... 4.30 a.m. ...finishing in the meantime the entire bottle of pastis!!! ... and they were the first ones up, straight!

Saturday 09/07 :

The morning was a bit clowdy and humid, but with sunrays coming through. Pretty well acceptable for a walking tour. Not to warm and not to cold. Let's see how the day went and turned out to be...

As said, Clément and Clément were even up before Jana and me!
At around 9 a.m. we went over to the hotel for breakfast. We also prepared our typical Norwegian "matpakke" (lunch package) from the buffet.

After that, still being a bit tired, we had to patiently endure the pretty boring presentation around the hotel. Well, the hotel and its facilities weren't actually boring, it was the guy who was talking with the speed of a snail!

 

But we eventually made it somewhat before noon to leave for a walking tour in the Rondane National Park, Norway's oldest national park with several peaks over 2,000m.

We actually walked from the hotel in Mysuseter via Spranget to Rondvassbu and back, a lovely and beautiful hike of 20 km.

 

Arrival at Rondvassbu fjellstua after approx. 2,5 hours of walking.

Time for our "matpakke".

It became a bit chilly outside so we moved inside the lodge to warm up with some coffee or hot chocolate...

...and for a little nap! Seems the pastis made itself felt :-)

This one hour break was perfect, just right for getting some energy back and warming up, before taking the path back towards Mysuseter.

But of course, we still needed some proof that we have all been there. It's group picture time!

Terra Nova team (f.l.t.r.): Clément and Sonia (the trainees working with me in the FIT department), me, Stéphanie, Franck, Anaïs and Clément (trainees in the group department)

Haman Scandinavia team (f.l.t.r.): Jana, Michelle and their trainee Lisanne

All together (f.l.t.r.): Clément, Lisa (Authentic Scandinavia), Sonia, me, Trude (Authentic Scandinavia), Stéphanie, Anaïs, Clément, Jana, Michelle, Lisanne

After another 2,5 hours and 20km marching, we finally arrived back at our cabins.

While Bonnie, Franck's dog - who was so good in walking all the 20km with us today - recoverd in the sun from today's strains...

...some of us just relaxed and some went for a short nap, but the majority made use of the hotel's swimming pool, jacuzzi and sauna. I think we stayed there for a couple of hours before returning to the cabins.

All together we then prepared the BBQ at our cabins, with the typical Norwegian "pølse" (=hot dog sausage) and "lømpe" (limp and round and flat piece of "bread", pretty tasteless rag out of flour and water) to be wrapped around the pølse.

After dinner it was time for games. And so we had fun describing and/or playing famous characters to be guessed by the others.

Which famous person does Franck try to play?

Sunday 10/07 :

Breakfast buffet again at the hotel. We had to leave the cabins at noon at the latest. So the morning was actually pretty relaxed.

At 11:00, though, we already started our way back to Oslo through the Gudbrandsdalen valley...

This is Norway! This is Norwegians!

...via the famous Peer Gynt road, named after the legendary character of Henrik Ibsen’s novel.

 

For lunch and a little site inspection we stof at the Fefor Hotel in Vinstra in the Gudbrandsdalen. It's a nice and cozy hotel that we use pretty much for both, groups and FIT.

 

After some good food, we continued our journey towards the Olympic town of Lillehammer. We stopped at the Hafjell Hotel & Aparments for a coffee and of course a visit of the hotel as we also use this place for our clients.

Exactly 2 years ago, I went on tour with a group and stayed in exactly this suite :-)

After this break we drove up to the top of the ski jumps and the trainees walked all the 940 steps along the Olympic ski jump down to the bottom. All others who have already seen the jumps stayed and returned in the cars, as it was raining cats and dogs.

After Lillehammer it was still a 3 hours drive back to Oslo.
We dropped everyone off at home; I delivered the rental car back to Avis.
Home by around 6 p.m., home from yet another great weekend exploring Norway!