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Fjord Land and Coast Land ofWestern NorwayTore SundPublished online: 15 Apr 2008.

To cite this article: Tore Sund (1959) Fjord Land and Coast Land of WesternNorway, Norsk Geografisk Tidsskrift - Norwegian Journal of Geography, 17:1-4,176-186

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Fjord Land and Coast Landof Western Norway

BY

%TORE SUND

THE VALLEY through which the Bergen-Oslo railway runs is cut into thenorthern part of Hardangervidda. This high plateau has a moderatelyrolling relief, 1100—1400 m above sea level. A remarkable feature is itsregenerated sub-Cambrian peneplane, which carries a partially preservedcover of soft phyllites ( = slightly metamorphic mica schists). In parts theseare again overlain by plutonic Caledonian rocks which were brought intothis position by overthrusting from the northwest.

At Finse the railroad follows a valley which separates a bastion-likemassif to the north (Hallingskarvet = about 1800 m above sea level) froma large monadnock (Hardangerj0kulen) to the south. The sides of thisvalley offer a cross-section of the sequence mentioned. The sub-Cambrianpeneplane is found at about 100 m and the thrust plane at about 300 mabove Finse railway station (1224 m above sea level).

The mountains seen from Finse rise to more than 1850 m, which iswell above the glaciation limit. An icefield on top of the monadnockplateau south of Finse gives it a dome-like appearance. Glaciers tonguesdescend from Hardangerj0kulen (j0kul = glacier); two of them have theirsnouts only a few kilometres from Finse. Moraines from successive stagesof ice retreat are discernible, and visitors to the area are thus confrontedwith both the glaciated land forms of the last Ice Age and with the tracesof recent and sub-recent local glaciation. Land forms and geological struc-tures are preferably to be studied north of Finse where glaciers are lessextensive.

Finse is only 100 m below the highest elevation reached by the railwaya few kilometres further west. Its climate is transitional between the

Abbreviations: a. s.l. — above sea level; C — Celsius, centigrade; c. — circa;ha — hectares; km — kilometres; km* — square kilometres; m — metres; mm —millimetres; m3 — cubic metres.

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easterly continental type and the westerly oceanic type; at this altitude,winterly conditions prevail for most of the year. The mean July tempera-ture is 7.8° C, and the January temperature —8.6° C. Skiing is fine as lateas in June, and frost and snow often return as early as in September. Theonly line of communication is the railway, and Finse station is speciallyequipped for snow clearing on the high mountain stretches.

Sogn.

The short branch that plunges from Myrdal down to sea level at Flam,is the only railway line of the large county of Sogn og Fjordane. The Flamvalley ends apruptly in two cirque-like heads, 300 m high, cut into themore moderate relief of two formerly confluent mountain valleys higherup. The vertical height of the slopes of Flam valley is more than 1,000 m,and in places the width of the valley is only 2,000 m. Both the old valleysabove the head of Flamsdalen, and Flamsdalen itself, are U-shaped.

From the station of Berekvam and some 10 km out to the sea, the valleyfloor consists of Cambro-Silurian sedimentary rocks into which the riverhas eroded a deep and narrow canyon, with vertical walls. A hill whichalmost blocks the valley 4 km from the sea is a good locality for studyingpotholes.

On the way down few farms are seen, but downstream from the hilljust mentioned the valley floor is well settled on marine terraces risingto 135 m a. s. 1.

Sognefjord penetrates about 170 km into the mainland. For a consider-able distance only a few short and blunt-headed tributary fjords occur. Butthe inner part, between high mountains, has a number of long branches.Its curving valleys and fjords suggest that the pleistocene glaciers foundtheir ways in channels pre-figurated by fluvial erosion. One of the innerbranches, Lusterfjord, follows the axis of the Caledonian fold-trough.

The main fjord has an over-deepened, flat-bottomed basin 75 km longand 1000—1300 m deep. The western termination of this basin is only20.km from the shallow mouth, a rock threshold at a depth of about,150 m, between the mainland to the south and the Solund islands northof the fjord.

Glaciers. The longest and deepest fjord of Europe and the largest glacierof the European mainland are "near neighbours". The Jostedalsbre (bre =glacier) covers an area of about 600 km2 to the north of Sognefjord. Intwo valleys that lead down to the head of Fjcerlandsfjord, a tributary of

12 — Norsk Geosr. Tidsskr. 1959—1960.

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Sognefjord, two of the 24 valley-glaciers that descend from the plateauglacier can be ensily reached at low altitude. Bfiyabre and Suppbellebreare both regenerated glaciers, isolated at the foot of precipitous and bareslopes, and fed by ice-falls from the glacier above. Since about 1750there has been a general shrinkage of the Norwegian glaciers. In the caseof B0yabre and Supphellebre the recession is about 2.4 km and 0.5 kmrespectively. A number of terminal and lateral moraines have been leftby the oscillations of B0yabre. A slight advance of the glaciers was notedin 1957 and 1959.

Climate and vegetation. The wide West-East extension of Sogn accountsfor marked differences in weather and climate. Near the outer coast themean temperature of January is 1°—2° C; windy and wet winters areoften accompanied by cool and humid summers. The mean temperatureof July does not exceed 14° C. Along the interior parts of Sognefjord thesummer gets warmer and the winter colder. 0° C in January is reached atLeikanger, and as a rule the sea freezes at the head of the innermosttributary fjords, where the water is also brackish.

Precipitation has a maximum zone around the central part of the fjord.At the mouth of the fjord the precipitation is 1500—2000 mm a year;at Balestrand in the maximum zone the annual precipitation amounts to1900 mm; at Leikanger it has already dropped to 900; and at Lasrdal isonly 450.

In West Jotunheimen there is a meteorological station at 2064 m abovesea level on the top of Fannaraki mountain. Here January has a meantemperature of —13° C, and July just above 2°C. Its precipitation ofnearly 1300 mm is less than half of that falling on the Jostedal glacier.Consequently, and also due to a higher summer temperature, the glaciationlimit of Jotunheimen is higher, more than 2000 m.

The barrensss of the outer coast has been partly caused by grazing, andby man's destruction of the forest and his digging of peat for fuel. On thisouter coast forest cannot, however, grow above 2—300 m. Towards theEast the timber line is on increasingly higher elevations, and reaches 1000m in inner Sogn. This district is one of the few parts of Vestlandet thathas considerable areas under coniferous forest. Pine is here a natural tree;so is also birch, which forms forests on better soil, as well as above thepine forest. But the promising part of Sogn, as far as forestry is concerned,is the central zone, where planted Norway spruce or West American treespecies like Sitka spruce and Hemlock thrive and give high yields. Thenearly frostless and humid climate in western Sogn favours the growth of

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Fig. 1. Excursion route.

particular "coast" plants, which in Vestlandet reach their northern limit.Agriculture and settlement. About 1.5 per cent of the area of Sogn is

arable land; this proportion is lower than for the country as a whole.Clusters of farms are mainly seen at the heads of tributary fjords and bays(like Vik). The upper marine limit is less than 25 m in outer Sogn, andrises to 150 at the head of Sognefjord. Inner Sogn, however, is occupiedby high and steep mountains, whereas outer Sogn has considerable areas

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of lowland with the result that the areas of former sea-bed are not muchlarger in inner Sogn than around the mouth of the fjord.

The most conspicuous concentration of agricultural settlement in innerSogn forms a narrow zone which runs from Leikanger along the north-western side of Sogndalsfjord and Lusterfjord. Here Cambro-Silurian se-dimentary rocks occur; in this zone, even morainic slopes above the uppermarine limit support many farms. By contrast, in the areas of Pre-cambriangneisses in outer and central Sogn, and in areas of Caledonian anorthositesand granites in inner Sogn, settlement is confined to the patches of formersea-bed.

The economy of outer Sogn is based on agriculture as well as on fishery;natural harbour facilities and occurrences of soil have both influenced thelocation of farms.

Agriculture is mainly based on milk production (cows and goats) andon sheep raising. Arable land is mostly under grass and potatoes, and aboutone third of the farmland consists of un-ploughed grassland offering hayand grazing. Cows and goats of inner Sogn are commonly kept on seters(mountain chalets) during the summer.

The warmer summers of inner Sogn allow a profitable fruit growingto be carried on, primarily apples, pears and plums. This fruit-growingregion extends from the district of Vik in the west and has its main centersin the Cambro-Silurian zone. Inner Sogn is the only part of Norway where,in peace-time, tobacco has been grown for sale.

With no urban market in Sogn og Fjordane county, and such a longdistance to Bergen city, agriculture in Sogn has been rather backward,with e. g. a low milk yield per cow. Until recently a large proportion ofthe milk had to be made into butter or cheese on the farms. Difficulttransport prevented a centralized handling of milk in dairies, as well as ofmeat in slaughter houses. Considerable improvement has followed upondevelopment of a better road system.

The economic situation of farming in Sogn is illustrated by the impactof the two manufacturing centres, H0yanger and Ardal, on the distributionof population. Practically in the whole of rural Sogn, population decreasedbetween 1915 and 1930, when H0yanger was growing fast. Since 1940—45 this story has been repeated in the case of Ardal, which has attractedpeople from all over Sogn. A large number of people have also movedto Bergen or emigrated to America.

Manufacturing industries. Sogn og Fjordane is one of the least industria-lized counties in Norway, and at the same time the only one where electro-industries account for a predominating share of the industrial population.

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Oddly enough the lack of manufacturing industries is partly due to lackof power. Until a few years ago large parts of the county had a ver^deficient electricity supply, although no other county has larger potentialresources of -hydro-electric power per capita. With less than 3 per cent ofNorway's population, Sogn og Fjordane has more than 10 per cent ofits power resources. The capital requirement of large hydroelectric plantsis heavy,.but their electricity.price is exceptionally low and, hence, veryattractive to power-demanding industries.

At H0yanger, the first plant was erected in 1915 by A/S Norsk Alu-minium Company, in which about one half of the capital is Canadian. Inthe interwar period, when the Norwegian production of aluminium formeda larger share of the world total than at present, H0yanger was a relativelyimportant aluminium plant. Its present production amounts to 14 000 tonsannually, which is only a few per cent of the Norwegian total. H0yangeris still exceptional in two ways: It is the oaly Norwegian plant sellingmost of its products on the Norwegian and Scandinavian markers, with asubsidiary rolling mill and factory for consumers' articles located on theOslofjord; and it is also the only one in Norway which works frombauxite (and not alumina) as a raw material. As a by-product, somethousand tons of pig iron are extracted from its imported bauxite, andH0yanger also sells some thousand tons of carbon paste. The plant islocated at the head of a short tributary fjord, with the factory and theresidential town on the flat valley floor.

The population of H0yanger depends entirely on the aluminium com-pany, and is nearly four times larger than the number of those actuallyemployed at the plant. This fairly high ratio is indicative of male labour;it also suggests that the higher age-groups are over-represented.

Compared with H0yanger the state-owned aluminium works at Ardalis still in its infancy. Ardal now has a population of 6,000 — i. e., twicethat of H0yanger, and its present production amounts to 64,000 tonsa year. In a few years' time Ardal will have an annual production of100,000 tons, which will then be about one half of the Norwegian total.

Constructions started before the first world war. A power plant wasnearly finished in 1940. The German occupants started work on an alu-minium plant, which, however, was not completed when the war ended.The present firm, A/S Ardal og Sunndal Verk, took over, and in the be-ginning of 1948 the first aluminium ingots were produced.

The valley floor at Ardal is nearly at sea level. Mountains 1,200—1,300m high tower behind the works. 20 km to the east is the mountain lakeTyin, l/)80 m above sea level, which, by comparatively small efforts, has

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been turned into a reservoir of more than 200 million m3. The net headis 976 m. The power plant produces 800 million kWh annually at verylow cost.

As every ton of aluminium represents a power input of about 20,000kWh, it is evident that additional power is required for further expansion.Construction of a new hydro-electric plant at Fortun, some 20 km northof Ardal, was started in 1956, and transmission from this new site to Ardalbegan in 1959.

Works for the damming up of more water in Lake Tyin and addingto its volume by capturing water from river Utla, north of Tyin, have alsobeen started. The same system of collecting water from several catchmentareas and rivers through long and nearly horizontal tunnels at high alti-tudes, has also been adopted for the power plant of Fortun, where the nethead is the same as at Tyin—Ardal. Together the two plants, and a thirdone above Fortun, will eventually be able to produce c. 2,000 million kWhannually, thus permitting 100,000 tons of aluminium to come out of thepot-rooms of Ardal.

The Ardal aluminium units are built on the same site at 0vre( = "upper") Ardal. They occupy the upper part of the delta at the headof Ardalsvatn (yatn = lake), on which residential Ardal has been built.But the aluminium works of Ardal actually makes use of two sites, 0vreArdal and Ardalstangen. The latter is located on the isthmus betweenArdalsvatn and the head of Ardalsfjord. Ardalstangen has a factory forthe making of carbon paste (until 1958 it also produced pig iron), andhere is the pier for landing and storing alumina, which arrives in bulk.Paste and alumina are transported to 0vre Ardal in lorries, which takedown the aluminium ingots for storing at and shipping from Ardalstangen.The road between the two centres, only 10 km apart, has many tunnels,which protect against rock and snow slides in the precipitous mountainside. Over the years slides have often blocked the road, and sometimesinconveniently forced traffic on to the lake.

In the community life of Ardal the dual centres play an important role.They are far enough apart for many social service buildings to be neededin both places. Ardalstangen serves as the administrative centre.

Compared with Ardal and H0yanger the electro-chemical factory at Vad-heim is a tiny unit. It mostly produces chemicals for the killing of weeds.Vadheim may claim more interest by having the first factory for the pro-cessing of wood derived from the forests of Vestlandet. These are mainly

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small birch forests, and the mill has to draw its annual supply of 70,000 m3

from all over Vestlandet. Eventually the timber may come from the thin-ning of the new-planted coniferous forest of Vestlandet, which in 60—100years hence may yield 3 million m3 annually. Vadheim is well situated inthe central part of Vestlandet and in the middle of the 2one which is themost promising as to afforestation; and Vadheim should be able to aidthis development by purchasing the deciduous wood that has to be felledbefore the planting. The mill started operations in I960. Its product isa semi-chemical pulp, which is mainly intended for processing into paperand cardboard in British mills.

Nordfjord.

Fjordane consists of Sunnfjord and Nordfjord, of which only the outerpart of Nordfjord will be seen during the excursion. A short visit will bepaid to the fjord Nordgulen, at the head of which lies the iron works ofSvelgen. It has recently doubled its production to 70,000 tons annually bytaking over pig iron production from Ardalstangen. The works also pro-duces ferro-silicon. The iron ore comes from 'a mine in M0re and Romsdalcounty. The fjord head is very blunt, and leaves little space along the sea-board for the installations. Its residential village has c. 600 inhabitants.

Svelgen is an isolated community, entirely dependent on sea-commu-nications. High mountains and lakes make it an ideal place for the har-nessing of water-power. These mountains — which carry the glacier Alfot-breen — are found to have the heaviest annual precipitation in Norway(5—6,000 mm).

Svelgen is situated in the midst of the largest Devonian (Old Red)massif of Norway, an elliptic area 64 km WSW—ENE and 24 km at thebroadest. The sandstones and conglomerates of this syncline are sharplyfolded W—E. By selective erosion the benches of conglomerate appearas ridges. The extreme barrenness of the landscape adds to its peculiarity.

Most of this Old Red area lies on the mainland, but its Norwegian nameis derived from the spectacular mountain Hornelen, 900 m high, on theeastern tip of the island of Bremangerland. Hornelen rises nearly verticallyfrom the fairway. Numerous fissures in the conglomerates make the moun-tain rather terrifying, and ships are forbidden to use their loud signals,for fear of starting rock slides.

Alalpy fishing village and Vagstfy. Mal0y on Vags0y benefits from good

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harbour facilities. Its rapid development is primarily due to active parti-cipation in local as well as distant fisheries. Mal0y has now about 2,500inhabitants.

Conveniently situated in the northern part of Vestlandet, where enorm-ous quantities of winter herring have been caught in the 1950's, Mal0ydeveloped into a leading centre for the landing of herring. On the main-land side of the sound there are two large factories for the processing ofherring meal and oil, and one floating factory is usually stationed here.Mal0y itself has canning factories and pack-houses for the salting andicing of herring.

Although herring is still important, the herring boom seems to havecome to an end. But Mal0y has found compensation in the increased fishingof dogfish, a small shark (Sqtialtts acanth'iatis L.), in which Mal0y Hasspecialized since about 1930. Fishing takes place off the Norwegian coastin the winter, and in distant waters near Shetland and. even further westin summer. The dogfish longliners bring their loads to Mal0y, where aconsiderable number of people are engaged in filleting the fish. The filletsare sent by special ship to Bergen, where they are trans-shipped and sentto the London fishmarket, to be distributed mainly to fish and chipsrestaurants. Dogfish-bellies are also cut and exported to Germany, wherethey are eaten smoked. At Mal0y the annual quantity of dogfish landed isup at 15,000 tons.

The calls of express steamers and of many other ships at Mal0y, andthe great number of telephone calls to and from foreign markets as wellas to and from vessels on the fishing grounds make the place a busy centre.Situated on the island, it has ambitious plans for bridging the sound inorder to be better connected with the rest of Nordfjord (and with 0st-landet and Oslo).

One would expect the remaining rural part of the island to have mainlya fishing population. Except for the southwestern corner of Vags0y this isnot the case. The northern and northwestern parts have fine examples ofcoastal agriculture, partly on valley floors leading inwards from openbays and partly on shelves well above the rocky, unprotected shore. Kval-heim is formed by such a cluster of farms, on a ledge that ends abruptly ina precipitous cliff-slope, c. 50 m high. In the winter the waves thunderagainst the slope, and the road leading across the mountains and furtheren to Mal0y, may happen to be blocked by snow. Lack of harbour facilitieshas forced the fisher-farmers of Kvalheim to keep only small boats ontheir home beach. Even so, the boathouses have to be safely placed high.up above sea level or behind a strong jetty of giant blocks.

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At Krakenes, on the extreme northern tip of the island, is a lighthouse,which, although situated nearly 40 m above sea level, is nevertheless pro-tected against wind and waves by walls of concrete. Vags0y is in one ofthe most stormy parts of the entire coast.

Archipelago off Bergen.

The archipelago northwest and west of Bergen is a typical "strandflat".Over wide areas this myriad of islands and islets have hardly a rockreaching an altitude of more than 50 m; and from a distance the landprofile looks nearly horizontal. But there are also higher hills surroundedby strandflat lowland.

Fishing is the dominant occupation in the outer archipelago. The greybarrenness of the islands, with their heather and desolate bogs, is an obvioussign that the people who live there must seek.their livelihood from thesea. So is also the clustering of houses around bays and other shelteredshores, sometimes in village-like agglomerations, with boathouses and shedsfor fishing gear. Many of the white, wooden dwellings are situated as to bevisible from the sea; but generally people seek sheltered sites for their

•houses: behind hills, in hollows or in one of the many narrow fissure-likevalleys. The patches of farm land are numerous, but small. As a rule thefishermen keep a cow or two, and have a plot of arable land underpotatoes. Their sheep may graze outdoors the whole year round.

Most of the fishermen take part in the winter herring fishery; but fora succession of years the herring has kept away from their own part ofthe coast so they have to go far away from their home ports. Other fisheries,like the fishing of small herring, Greenland cod, porbeagle, and even ofsprat, tuna and mackerel may take the fishermen far away to distantfishinggrounds.

In the pre-motor age, fishing was more restricted to nearby waters, andthe living standard of these islanders very modest. Rising output, in parti-cular from the herring fisheries, have brought substantial improvementsin the material well-being. The recent introduction of electricity by long-distance transmission for lighting, cooking and even heating has madelife much easier than before. On important consequence is that the destruc-tive digging of peat for fuel has come to an end.

In this era of land communications the archipelago is handicapped,especially as regards its communications with Bergen. But the islands lie soclose together that it is quite feasible to connect them with roads, bridges

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and ferries. In the future most of the islanders will be able to go to Bergenby road and car. An evolution of this kind has already started and isbringing life on the islands up to the standard of the mainland. Some ofthe smallest and outermost islands have been deserted by their few in-habitants, and are now "home" to grazing sheep only.

Better communications will also permit a greater number of townspeoplefrom Bergen to go out to the archipelago for week-ends or holidays. Onthe other hand, the city of Bergen, with its variegated labour market, exertsa definite attraction on the island dwellers.

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