Rødstenen EN | Turkick.no

In Marit Bjørgen's home turf – “Rødstenen” – the Red Stone at Rognes

Text: Martin Fossen

Photos: Martin Fossen & Vibeke C Strømmen

Rødstenen in Rognes

14. November 2021

We have passed this peak countless times by car on the way up to the cabin in Røros. Finally we took the trip up!

Dear child, "many" names.

A Norwegian saying goes like this: “dear children have many names”. We do not know if this peak has more names than its official "Red Stone"”Rødstenen”. However, we have always chosen to call it the "Sugar Top" as it has a perfect shape of a pile of sugar poured out on a table and is similar to the top with the same name in Rio de Janeiro. We have often wondered what it is like to haik up to this summit, but it looks terribly steep from county road 30, so we have not thought so seriously about it. Earlier this autumn we were on a trip up to Gråskarven in Melhus municipality and met a couple we started talking with. They recommended "Rødstenen", and that it should be at Rognes by the river Gaula. We found the summit in Norgeskart, but no path. Anyway, now it was just a matter of finding a suitable day for this hike. We tried to find some descriptions of this, but the only one we found (after we had been at the summit) was a Facebook post from 2014. Therefore it fits perfectly that we describe this location and trip on Turkick.no.

Arrival and starting point.

We arrived from Røros and took off county road 30 over the suspension bridge (only space for one car at a time) and followed Marit Bjørgens vei (yes, it is actually named after the famous cross-country athlete), past Rognes school and onwards. This is about 8 km before Støren. After a few hundred meters, we drove under the railway bridge and continued on the road upwards. It is about 500 meters to drive to a small pocket by the road on the right side just before another bridge. And this is where the trip begins, a sign show the way.

Sign where the path goes.

Pocket where you can park, space for 2 cars at least.

Old house in connection with a power station.

Blue dot: Støren

Yellow dot: Rognes

Red arrow indicates the suspension bridge you drive across before you enter the Marit Bjørgens Road.

Yellow dot indicates a pocket at the side of the road where you can park the car.

Marit Bjørgen has probably had many a training session here

The famous female cross country athlete, Marit Bjørgen, grew up here and has walked and run in these hilly areas her whole childhood. If you don`t know who Marit Bjørgen is, look her up at Google and be amazed over what she has accomplished in her career.

We start uphill and it is quite steep from the very beginning, and the path is quite narrow. Luckily it has been a few days with colder weather, so the muddy trail has solidified. Moreover, the trail is well used and we think that it`s strange if Marit Bjørgen has not used this hill for her training sessions.

A little messy nature in the beginning and a very narrow and steep path with.

Karkbu and a drastic biotope change

The first part of the trail goes in a bit "messy" terrain with a lot of deciduous trees, alder and birch, which have fallen and lie a little all over the place in the hillside, with beautiful green moss on. It's not very aesthetic, but that's the way nature is somethimes. The small creek that flows down the valley gets further and further away as we ascend. We take a short break after 15-20 minutes as we have not eaten since we drove from the cottage. We feel the burning in the legs from the steep ascent. After the break, it starts to get a little more coniferous and a little tidier around us. More in Vibeke's taste with such a forest. Suddenly we come to a nice old log cabin with a turf roof and a sign that says Karkbu. The moss is green, birch twigs protrude from the roof and there are icicles flashing in the sunlight, sending rays of sun everywhere. At the same time, one wall has collapsed and we see that a self-made bunk bed, table and chairs as well as a rusty wood stove. Sad that it is not taken care of. We spend some time here and also find a Geocache. After Karkbu, the surroundings become more characterized by coniferous forest and gets very pretty. The trees are very tall, straight spruce trees that we fantasize about having been perfect ship masts. We become more and more euphoric about the surroundings and hardly notice that it goes steeply upwards.

Karkbu was a very nice log building buildt in the laft method. To bad nobody takes care of it.

The land of mushrooms

We spend a lot of time looking around and there are many very large fungi on the trees, and burls. Khaleesi goes high up on a branch from a fallen tree to "inspect". We photograph many of the mushrooms and are fascinated by the size and variety. There is also a lot of nice green moss and lichen on the trees.

Mushrooms and burls came in all shapes and sizes here.

Adventure - feeling de luxe

Eventually it starts to flatten out more and we think that there will now be a straight gentle path to the "summit" where we can enjoy the view. We've already got a lot of cool impressions, but it's not over yet. After the "plain" comes a final "challenge" with a steep path and a risk of falling and injuring oneself if one is unlucky. The side of the mountain descends very steeply down in an easterly direction, ie towards Støren and Gaula, and there is actually a vertical red rock wall below that you see when you drive from Støren towards Røros. We therefore take the dog on a leash at this part of the path as you never know if she will do anything stupid. It is a magical feeling to climb these parts with varied vegetation and a new view and experience around every turn and peak.

It was an adventurelike feeling up here.

The summit without a view.

Finally, we realize that we are now at the top and are walking along the path to locate the next Geochache, which we we do. Then we continue to see if we find any good vantage point, but it turns out to be almost futile. We walk along the ridge of the top until the trail starts going downwards again. We see no point in continuing on the path, as we are supposed to return the same path we came. We try to go up to the highest point, but there are just too many trees to get a panoramic view. Of course, we see the river Gaula through the trees and get a real feeling of steepness up here, but the view is not spectacular, which is almost as fascinating as if it had been a panorama. We got the best view on the steepest part just before the summit so we stop there on the way back and take some pictures.

Very steep and rugged terrain met us just before the top. We got a small glipse of the vies between the trees.

The return was an upturn.

Despite the lack of views, we were very happy to finally have ascended this summit, so we were ecstatic when we went down. We took it easy to avoid falls as it could be a bit slippery and our legs were a little jell-o. When we got down to the car, Martin had to photograph Rogga. Wide angle lense was used on his Pentax camera with a ND filter to get long enough shutter speeds, which gives the effects on the images below.

Rogga is a small river that ones gave power from the power station to Rognes back in the day.

Despite the fact that the trip is a bit off the beaten track, and maybe not the one you first think of, it is definitely a memorable trip that we recommend to anyone who is not afraid of a little bit of steep ascending. The vertical distance was 320 meters as the parking was at around 130 moh and the peak at around 447 meters.

Enjoy the Trip!