The Best-Laid Plans...
The rain turned to snow, and we made the crossing to Innerdalen in wind, cloud, and wet snow, route-finding and breaking trail in new snow the whole way. By the time we were ready to make the final descent there was about 50 cm of new snow. We lost the trail, spent a few hours floundering down through birch forests on the valley wall, and finally stumbled into the hut at 8 PM. Innerdalshytta is privately owned by -- you guessed it -- the Innerdalen family, and they recently built the brand new hut in the above photo. The old log hut stands nearby, and has no shortage of character, with nary a level floor nor plumb wall, but probably gets a bit drafty in the winter.
The last leg of our journey would have taken us up the spectacular Innerdalen (to the left of the mountains in the photo above) back to Bårdsgarden, but the snow just kept coming down in heavy squalls that night and the next day. Faced with the prospect of breaking trail in nearly a meter of new snow and appreciable avalanche risk higher up the valley, we made other arrangements. Rick got a ride with one of the other hut guests all the way back to Oppdal, then paid a hefty sum to take a taxi back to Bårdsgarden to pick up the car, drive back around, and ski back into the hut. He still had time to take a run in the mashed potatoes on the steep slopes below Innerdalstårnet. All in a day's work.
Innerdalstårnet is one of those charismatic mountains that are hard not to look at when you're in the vicinity-- so here's one more shot.