March 2025

Like almost every single ambition of mine, I approached the task list as something relatively easy, that could be done in a matter of days and had this feeling that it was utterly foolish that I had to come this far to do “a few hours of flying.” Reality has a way of spiting one’s optimistic illusions, and it would turn out that I would need to spread 22 hours of flying over the exact days of our original lodging booking, barely able to squeeze the affair in.

The first flight was a quick hop to the east, to Blåmannsisen, a large glacier near the Swedish border. The visuals were astounding despite the haze and clouds, as the glacier was showing most of the surface, with incredible levels of detail in the ice below. Most of my experience with the large Scandinavian glaciers has been that the bulk of the big ones are covered in snow, and little detail can be seen, aside from the majesty of its size. This had both, though I would later learn that a flaming hot summer north of the Arctic Circle was partially the reason.

Svartisen is the second largest glacier in Continental Europe, and it was a short flight to the south. I went there next, enjoying stunning views of what I can now say is my favorite glacier in Norway and Sweden. Even though it is not the biggest, it for some reason is the best, perhaps because of its textured detail set against glorious fjords that adjoin the Atlantic. Toss in a sunset and maybe a rainbow, and I don’t think it gets better than that.

There were some errands to Lofoten and other places not too far, to get a handful of small, distant, and generally difficult glaciers, though the real work was over the border in Sweden.

Padjelanta and Sarek National Park are extremely rugged and desolate, while also featuring a flight restriction to 10,000 feet for noise abatement. I was able to get that requirement waived by the Swedish Civil Aviation Authority in 2023, owing to the glacier-related nature of the mission, though I wasn’t able to use it, as the Swedish Air Force was using the airspace (presumably making a laughable amount of noise doing it…but so be it). I filed all the paperwork again this year and received an approval. I also had the training officer’s contact information from the prior year and confirmed that no training was scheduled. Scandinavia does amaze in how practical and fast things work!

At any rate, the national parks are pure wilderness areas. No roads, no towns, no cell signal, no transponder radar coverage, no radio coverage with Sweden Control, no nothing. It was, at the center of the glacial area, 75 miles to the nearest airport, and at one point, 110 miles each way from Bodø, with no sensible fueling option on the Swedish side. Everything would have to be done with sorties to and from Bodø without landing, which meant good fuel management, and lots of provisions in the air for flights lasting about 4 hours at a time. There were three of them.

It was glorious. There is absolutely nothing like being in the middle of nowhere, out of range of everyone and everything. It is a “digital detox” par excellence, though ask me how I would feel if the engine quit at such a moment. Sometimes, the juice is worth the squeeze.

On one of those flights, some small thunderstorms started brewing in terrain. It was hard to tell exactly what was going on due to haze, though there were black clouds, some downpours, and then the crackles on the radio frequency, indicating lightning. Normally I would check my iPad radar or call flight service, though refer to my “digital detox” theory and one can understand how those ideas didn’t work. It remained VFR thankfully, and I avoided any trouble, while rinsing off any possible salt layers from the plane, as it was parked near the ocean in Bodø.

The weather was record breaking heat, with afternoon temperatures approaching 83F/28C, and plenty of raging crosswinds, which meant that I lost a few days waiting during sunny weather. The wind did odd things, starting the morning from the east, and ending from another direction or vice versa, an interesting combination of Föhn off the mainland mixing with sea breeze conditions. At one point, it was so windy I had to wheel out giant concrete blocks to hold the plane down (the airport has tires filled with concrete for this purpose). When I came the next morning, the wind had moved some of the blocks and the plane half a meter, despite three of them and wheel chocks!

We had plenty of chances to enjoy turquoise ocean water at the few good beaches that I could find on the satellite map. One of them was so pleasant and warm that it felt like Marbella in late winter, with prettier water. As one would expect north of the Arctic Circle, it could go from tropical to lashing rather quickly when the weather finally would change.

I had some additional spectacular flights over Svartisen, and then it was time to head south again. It was a scud run down the Atlantic, one for the ages, in Class G airspace, for 2 hours, before having things clear up by Trondheim. I wasn’t sure if I should aim for my spot for the night, or if I should take some time and swing by Jostedalsbreen, the largest glacier in Continental Europe. I texted a mechanic who is based out of Florø for helicopter rescue. I asked him if he had seen Jostedalsbreen more melted than normal like the north of the country and got some photos from the chopper a few hours later. The glacier looked far more revealed than in 2022, so why not? I am here…why not see it again?

It was another 4-hour leg, 2 of which was spent frolicking around the glacier, then Jotunheimen, then Fagernes for the night. The flying club was helpful with tiedowns and a ride into town. Despite the registration change, they took one look at the plane and knew it used to be LN-VYP, which means they either have a sharp eye, or the Norwegian GA community shares information quite efficiently. A Super Cub on floats at the dock in front of the hotel, with colors similar to mine, was a lovely accompaniment to dinner.

The rest of the wandering south was a bit slow owing to headwinds, taking the coastal route through Sweden, around Copenhagen, and an overnight in Lolland-Falster. The next morning was another thunderstorm apocalypse parked to the west, which caused no issues….just lots of hours and hot like usual in Germany, before finishing the flight into the Alps.

Blåmannsisen