Viking Raid 2004
Parrot shows signs of life.
Jon Brooke / 10.09.2004
Over the last four days the participants have roller bladed, river boarded, mountain biked, sea kayaked, abseiled, canyoned, and trekked over a glacier, in an environment that is rugged, remote and beautiful. Travelling along the roads in the fjordlands is like a scene from Riverworld by Philip Jose Farmer, a book about a planet covered by an endless river, in a valley with sides so steep and high that the people living there could only move up or downstream. In fact it is possible to climb the steep valley sides here in places, though it is difficult to find less taxing tracks to provide a bit of relief from relentless ascending and descending without having to resort to the roads. Inevitably though some of the mountain biking does involve tarmac, but at least the views are good. Whilst many adventure races seem to feature at least one photogenic waterfall abseil, here the question is not “Can we?� but “Which one?� It seems that round every corner there is a huge waterfall, sometimes hundreds of meters high.
Once out of the valleys the terrain is rugged in the extreme, the paths we took seemed to take fairly arbitrary lines, marked by small cairns or sticks, through boulder fields that looked the same in every direction. Apparently though there are other areas on the plateaus between the fjords that are more fell-like and runnable. If, as seems likely, the race moves to June next year then many of these areas will still be snow covered, which should add to the interest. Most notable of all for most of the competitors was the glacier that we trekked over, which was absolutely stunning and quite exciting as we skirted crevasses that although narrow, were often very deep, disappearing down into the dark blue ice. This year we were on the Folgefonna glacier, but the Hardanger-Jokulen glacier is also within the bounds of the course and for those who haven’t experienced this sort of terrain before they are almost worth the trip in themselves.
Although most of the trekking was via marked routes, mist (and cloud at altitude) meant that visibility was not always good, and given the un-pathlike nature of many of the paths navigation was not totally straightforward. There is more scope though for travelling cross country and introducing a bit more route choice into any future course.
On the water the kayaking was in stable but still quite fast plastic sea-kayaks with a double and a single for each team, which was just as well given that the distances to be covered on the water are fairly serious and because many stretches of Fjord have no obvious landing places for kilometres at a time, with shear cliffs dropping straight into the water. Luckily this year the waters were calm but at other times they could potentially become quite testing due to wind and waves though there did not appear to be too much tidal flow in the sections used this year.
As regards the organisation of the event, many things were done well. In particular the safety cover for the river boarding and ropes sections, staffed by Voss Rafting, was excellent with plenty of competent people on the ground (or water) and attention to detail that is not always provided during an adventure race, such as a second belay rope available on the abseil for those of a nervous disposition. There should have been more attention shown when it came to skills testing and/or certification for kayaking and the lack of mandatory kit lists for each section was an oversight, but in the event the weather was good and there were no major problems, however the first-time organisers seem to have taken these criticisms on board and should be more rigorous next time.
As we made our way around the course the logistics seemed to hold together well with marshals everywhere we expected to find them and suitable facilities for teams to park and camp during a couple of mandatory dark zones. Staying at a fabulously well-equipped mountain hut prior to the glacier was a real treat and although expensive (you pay by an honesty system) these are widespread in Norway and provisioned each month by helicopter.
Although the lack of teams taking part probably indicates something about the organisers marketing of the event, in many ways it seems inexplicable. The scenery is great, the organisation and facilities good and all of the competitors seemed to have a good time despite the problem of numbers. Maybe the cost of après-race beer at £4.60 for less than a pint might be a bit off-putting but competing in the race itself would not have been too expensive (entry was free this time!). On the whole I think the Viking Raid deserves a B+ for its intentions, maybe a B- for execution, but an A for potential – worth watching for next year.
SleepMonsters
