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Halti massif |
These mountains are located in Lappland, where Finland and Norway share border. Raisduottarhaldi is a Norwegian mountain, being the highest in this area. Halti - highest in Finland - is a spur of Raisduottarhaldi, on the country border. Ridnitsohkka is the Finland's 2nd highest mountain, and the highest mountain fully inside Finland.
Halti attracts a lot of hikers, being the highest in Finland, and the main hiking trail runs from Kilpisjarvi in Finland. This hike normally takes several days with overnight stays on huts along the way. A much shorter alternative, is to reach Halti from the Norwegian side, and this is the trail described in this document.
This mountain area is a tremendously large boulder/small rock area, without a single trail. Only the main trail from Kilpisjarvi has cairns showing the way. You will not see reindeer up here. The mountains have for the most very rounded and gentle shapes, with some occasional steeper faces.
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Halti (incl. Ridnitsohkka) from Kåfjordbotn, Norway (summer/autumn)
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Click for detail map |
From highway E6, north of Skibotn and south of Sørkjosbotn in Troms fylke, exit towards Kåfjorddalen from Kåfjordbotn. The road is paved all the way to Holmen, a small community just after Kåfjordbotn, but then the road turns into a small nightmare. The road turns into a gravel road, full of holes. Soon, the road ascends upwards, and resembles a 4WD road at places. High on the plateau, you see a "Halti 6km" sign, and you exit left. Drive the remaining 6km and find parking at the end of the road. The distance from Kåfjordbotn to the parking is 27km.
Raisduottarhaldi
You have the Halti massif just ahead of you, with a steep face in the middle. Follow the fence that leads towards the middle of the face, cross it, seek to the left and ascend at a point where you see fit. Once above the steepest section, maintain SE direction and head for a natural view point on the massif (1326). From this point, you see Raisduottarhaldi summit not too far in the east. The Raisduottarhaldi summit is littered and is not a pretty sight.
Ridnitsohkka
Across the valley in SE direction, you see Ridnitsohkka with two high points. The one to the left is a cabin, while the one to the right is a cairn. Aim for the valley and when you get a closer view, aim for the upper lake before ascending onto Ridnitsohkka. The cairn probably marks the high point, but visit the cabin also as this is where the 1316 point on the map is.
Halti
Your return route will be almost parallel to your ascent route. Head down the same direction you came, but move gradually towards the left. You need to find the marked trail from Kilpisjarvi that runs towards Halti between you and the Halti hut down by the lake. In any case, Halti is the grey/black top on the left hand side of the Halti massif (Raisduottarhaldi is on the right), so you might just as well determine the best route to get there. The Halti summit is marked by a large cairn painted yellow. Next to the summit is the register. Make sure you sign in.
Descent
From Halti, take a NW direction and aim for the pass between points 1176 and 1188. Then head north towards the trailhead.
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After the successful Kebnekaise trip, Bjørn Gillholm and I sat out to do the highest mountain in Finland. From Nikkaluokta (Kebnekaise trailhead), we drove back to Kiruna and then to Karesuando before entering Finland. We drove along the finnish border to Kilpisjarvi before we entered Norway through Skibotndalen valley. Good accomodation was hard to come by, and we had to drive 120km north to Sørkjosbotn before we could enjoy the luxury of showers, dinner and beer. The next morning, aug 10, we drove from Sørkjosbotn to Kåfjordbotn, and exited towards Kåfjorddalen. Thick clouds were hanging down in the valley, and it didn't look promising. We had some vague hopes that we would be able to climb over the fog, though. The road was really bad. I would state that to get to Halti summit from Norway, the road is the crux. After the "Halti, 6km" sign, the road got slightly better, but some dry creek crossings required "stop-listen-drive" type driving. The road crosses a bridge which provides some excellent canyon views. Celebration was in order when we saw the fog burning off by lake Guolasjavri, although the Halti massif was still hidden in fog. We had no proper map of the Norwegian terrain, only a rough screendump from a interactive map on the web. However, I had purchased a map of Finland, being the most expensive map I've ever bought (176 SEK). This map would come in handy later on. We chose to ascend the massif and see where fortune would lead us. The nearest face of Halti massif is steep, and we went towards the left-hand side to gain easier access. The access gets easier the further left you go, but it was fun to get involved with some light scrambling. Above 900m, we went above the fog and had clear view upwards. Soon, we got Raisduottarhaldi in view and adjusted the course eastbound. On the summit, we tried to figure out where Halti was. Bjørn suggested an insignificant knob further south, but we didn't see any cairn there. I didn't agree and pointed towards a large cairn on the other side of the valley, in the SE direction. Bjørn was a little demotivated by the long distance, but accepted to give it a shot. After the 5km hike over to the cabin on the mountain, we still didn't feel quite confident about being on the right mountain. A greeting from some '99 hikers indicated that this was Halti. After studying the finnish map, we quickly found Halti, excactly where Bjørn had indicated. We were on Ridnitsohkka, 1316m (I later discovered this was the 2nd highest mountain in Finland). Another 5km hike back across the valley and we could sign in at Halti as visitors 71466 and 71467. After a long, long boulder walk we arrived the car, 7 hours after departure. On boulder/rock all the way. Next stop - Tromsdalstind |
Move cursor to read notes, and click on the images to see full version.
Some of the thumbnails may have been cropped to fit the format
Some shots are out of focus, as I dropped my camera on a recent hike
Other hordaland mountains
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