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Introduction.
A short trip to the Dovrefjell National Park in Norway to see the Musk Ox, a little bit of birding and some touristy things, and go broke!
Saturday 30th June
After an almost empty flight from Gatwick (complete with onboard WIFI) to Bergen we picked up our hire car and headed into Bergen for a touristy day. In the evening we headed north for our long scenic drive. We encountered some super scenery and a couple of amazing waterfalls as we headed up to Sognefjorden (fjord). We encountered a few common birds but not much else, until my wife saw a possible seal, but it was some junk but there were three harbour porpoises feeding not far away from it. A couple of red deer were seen on the journey to Dombas.
Sunday 1st July
Here we had a few hours sleep in the car before heading to meet a musk ox safari, just avoiding a roe deer on the way. The small group assembled and we drove a short distance and parked up scanning the ridge for Musk ox, I quickly found one and we parked and headed up the hill. The wife was photographing some flowers at the back of the group and called me back, in the bushes was a Musk Ox 10m away, we got the group back to see it, but did not stay long as it was a grumpy bull! We carried on up the hill and after a short while located two more but these were a distance away so we searched for the one seen from the road and quickly located it and managed to get some nice views. We left it and searched further and located another two together, one possibly last year's calf. A fly over snipe was the only the common variety, we could see a small herd of reindeer in the distance but a torrential rainstorm had us heading back to the car totally soaked. After a cup of tea and a change into dry clothes we bid the guide farewell and headed to do some shopping / sightseeing and find our hotel, before getting an early night.
Temminck's Stint © Mark Hows.
Monday 2nd July
Our long walk day and fortunately the weather was excellent, we headed up a valley in search of some mountain birds which are elusive, and as we later discovered the spring was about 3 weeks late so many of the species were not around in any numbers and this made our day quite hard, as did the terrain and large amounts of snow still lying on the ground. It was warm enough for a few butterflies to be about, and we located some ring ouzels and a few of the commoner species. The flowers were just beginning to reach some sort of good state which was nice. The scenery was spectacular and we picnicked by a lake, dodging the only rain shower of the day, here a red breasted merganser was making its home. There were displaying redshank and golden plover on the moorland and 20 Musk Ox were encountered during our walk. The walk back was long and less rewarding wildlife wise until I located a falcon on some cliffs and yes it reappeared a Gyr falcon flashed by giving great views. A Norway lemming crossed the path at one point as did a bank vole. We made it back to the car after some 15 hours on the hills and headed back to town, we stopped for a short eared owl that gave great views sometimes very close to the car.
Tuesday 3rd July
A far more relaxing day with a late start, after a spot of lunch in glorious weather we headed to Orkelsjoen where we caught up with Pied and spotted flycatchers in the woods and some nice redshank, ringed plovers, artic terns and temminck's stints by the lake but little evidence of raptors in near perfect conditions, but there were a few butterflies around. We went to Slettesjonna lake where we had the only dragonflies of the trip on the boardwalk. We added a few nice birds, whooper swans and common cranes the highlights before a leisurely drive back to town for some tea.
Wednesday 4th July
Our last day and as it was raining we skipped visiting Fokstumyra so it was mainly driving back to Bergen with a few touristy stops, we did add a few birds to the list, golden eagle of note but little else.
Golden Plover © Mark Hows.