In November of 2015, me and my girlfriend Renate visited my maternal grandmother in Ålesund, Norway.
Renate had only been in Ålesund briefly one time before, but I had been there plenty of times.
When I was really young, my grandma lived in the little municipality of Vestnes. That’s just a short ferry-ride from Molde, where my grandpa lived, so we would often visit both of them on the same trip.
But later my grandma would move in with her new husband in Ålesund, so we would start spending many summers there too. He later had some health complications, so we visited her there by herself in 2015.
Hiking Up Aksla
Every time we visit my grandma, we end up going on a hike up some mountain. This time was no different.
Aksla is the Town Mountain of Ålesund, located in the middle of the town, with a cozy overpriced café at the top. It’s a nice conveniently close hike, so we went on a trip.
Ålesund is such a beautiful mountainous harbor town, much like our Bergen. And when you’re on top of Aksla, there are beautiful sights in all directions.
There were a few viewpoints I did not dare myself out on, but Renate is much braver than me.
On top of Aksla there is a watchtower-like viewpoint called Rundskue, from which you can see most of the city. There’s a compass here which points to all the points of interest in the area.
The watchtower was a 100th anniversary gift to the city, given by people who immigrated from Ålesund to Seattle and Vancouver.
Hiking is an integral part of the Norwegian experience, at least to me. Bringing a thermos of hot coffee, a bit of chocolate and some fruit to the top of a mountain is one of the nicest things you can experience.
But the sun was going down, so we decided to call it a day.
Related article: Glacier Hike
Leave a Reply