We have gradually learned (it is possible that we are a little slow), that when a large river flows down a valley, it is not necessarily easy to find great waterfalls to explore. The river Namsen, for example, flows steadily down the Namdalen for miles without producing waterfalls. Of course, there are large quantities of water (and salmon), but kind of tedious, to be honest. The tributaries, however!
Of the tributaries to Namsen, Sanddøla delivers very well on the waterfall front.
Sanddøla is a tributary of Namsen, having its source in Lierne, close to the Swedish border. The river is 64 km long and joins the Namsen by Grong church. Sanddøla holds salmon up to Tømmeråsfossen waterfall, and unlike Namsen, it is protected from power development.
Exciting bathing opportunities in Tømmeråsfossen.
Namsen and its tributaries for many years had an important role in forestry, as a basis for timber floating. All timber from ‘Indre Namdalen’ was sent via Grong on it’s way to Namsos (and the sea). Tømmeråsfossen, together with Fiskumfoss and Formofoss, are Grong municipality’s millennium sites. There was a mill here until 1948. The name Grong comes from Norse ‘Granungar’, meaning spruce. Three green triangles in the Grong municipal’s coat of arms also symbolize the importance of spruce and forestry in the region.
The ancestor of all bathing pools.
The pool below Tømmeråsfossen is fabulously large and beautiful, it is almost like an inland sea, and has a reputation for being one of Norway’s most exotic bathing spots. Badebadadede agrees. It’s just great to have a bath at Tømmeråsfossen!
Idun forgot to watch her feet on the way down the last rapid stream, and hit a rock. But fun anyway!
A brand new bathing beach in Trondheim, imagine that!
The new beach at Grilstad Marina is located on the east side of the artificial ‘Fullriggerøya‘ .
After 12 years of construction, Grilstad Marina is approaching completion (2024). The entire project consists of approximately 800 apartments, 110,000 m2 of commercial space, a marina and recreational areas, all made possible by the stone masses from the road tunnels between Stjørdal and Trondheim. There are swimming opportunities here! So much so, that the residents for a long time have complained about happy, load, youths jumping from piers and bridges, ref our bath ‘Grilstad Marina‘. But this time, the new Fullriggerøya (The Sailship’s Island) was to be visited.
Tobatheornottobathe visited the Sailship’s Beach in new, (old) bathing inspired attire. Photo: Une Hunstad Løwø
The cross-rigged sailing ships must be considered to be the summit of the sailing ship era. These were large, beautiful ships with square sails on all masts, which required a large crew. They did best on long-distance sailing, where speed was crucial, and in the navy. Competition in the merchant fleet was fierce, those who arrived first were paid better for the goods. Tobatheornottobathe has not found the name of any fully square rigged ships built in Trøndelag, but we would like to attach a drawing of one of H.J. Sommer’s beautiful ships, cleared from Trondhjem in 1915.
Mathilde Henriette, cross-rigged in 3 masts. Photo from ‘Norske Seilskuter‘, 6th volume, National Library of Norway.
It is actually a good idea to call the new, artificial, island Fullriggerøya. Why not, when the whole project is built at sea? Apart from the canals, however, there is not much of a maritime feeling in the new buildings at Grilstad. These are apartment buildings, with sometimes large terraces, but they do not resemble piers. And the titles? Bryggetun, what is it? And pier villas? A villa is a house with a garden for one or a few families, inspired by the country estates that the Roman upper class built 2000 years ago, for example by Lake Albano (ref our bath ‘Lago di Albano‘). The villas at Grilstad do not have gardens, and there are 10-15 apartments in each apartment building. A completely wrong use of words! We understand that some estate agents want to ’embellish’ the concepts, but with the architects’ acceptance? We simply do not understand it.
The ‘pier villas’ on Fullriggerøya (left) look neither like piers nor villas.
Interestingly enough, a forest has also been developed on the island, by the name Fullriggerskogen (forest). And yes, 20-30 trees have been planted between the houses, in between childrens playgrounds, paths and lawns. Why not call it all a park? Isn’t a parc good enough?
Very nice parc-to-be at Fullriggerøya. But it’s not a forest!
What we really like about this project is of course the swimming facilities! From the first floor you can throw yourself into the water, but there will be some climbing back up. For us, a dream scenario for retirement, apart from the fact that most of the apartments with direct bathing actually have no view of the fjord other than the canal. But the beach is nice!
Mayor Kent Ranum opened the beach – and Tobatheornottobathe opened the swimming. Photo from Grilstadmarina Instagram.
The Grilstad Beach is the first beach in Trondheim that faces south. Trondheim struggles with having its back facing the sun. 75 lorry loads of fine white sand have been brought here from Denmark, and the beach is relatively steep so that you don’t have to wade very long to swim. However, we were a little surprised by the stone embankment 10 meters from the water’s edge, where it was very shallow, before entering the fjord. We do assume that the stones are supposed to hold the sand in place, and that is fine, just a little surprising during this first bath.
Tobatheornottobathe rushing towards a new bath. Photo: Une Hunstad Løwø
The new beach gets top score from Tobatheornottobathe! A special plus for the sauna (we hope to visit it sometime), along with benches and children’s playground. So now we hope that the beach will reduce the jumping from the canal bridges, so that the poor, irritated residents can have peace on their terraces.
Thank you for the beach!
A new beach is hereby inaugurated. Photo: Une Hunstad Løwø
From time to time some of us start wondering about simple questions such as: ‘What is the direction of a valley?‘ The direction of a river is easier to determine, since it flows a certain way. But the valley? It turns out that the early Norwegians set the direction of a valley as the natural way to enter it. As the glaciers retreated after the last ice age and Norway reappeared, the land (and the valleys) were conquered from the sea, and the direction was from the lowest point upwards. This explains the name of the river Vinstra (The Left River), after which the Vinstradalen in Oppdal municipality is named. When you walk up the valley, you have the river on your left side, plain and simple as that.
View north towards Drivdalen and Oppdal.
Vinstradalen runs southwards from Drivdalen, south of Oppdal center. Standing at the bottom of the valley looking north, you will be able to see the farm ‘Lo’ (meaning lowland fields close to water and forests) on the right side of Drivdalen, where king Håkon Håkonsson built a church and a royal farm around 1250. Nearby is also the farm ‘Rise’ (meaning bushland), where a number of archaeological finds have been made. It is assumed that the permanent settlement in Drivdalen has lasted 2000 years. The large burial ground at Rise (some of the tombs date from the 3rd century A.D.) was located by a track, as was the custom at the time. A bronze angel has been found here, which may have been attached to a reliquary shrine. This figure represents the archangel St. Michael, and was probably made in Ireland in the 6th-7th centuries. A wooden version is to be found in St. Michael’s Chapel in Vinstradalen.
St. Michael from Ireland, wood version.
Vinstradalen is lush, and the soil is rich in nutrients. There are several summer farms in the valley. When you park your car at the Trengen farm, you quickly see that sheep are a source of income here, with sheep sorting facilities (in Icelandic called ‘réttir’), and a cattle grid. But one can wonder how stupid the sheep really are, when you see this one:
Useless cattle grid, it seems.
The summer road up Vinstradalen is an excellent skiing track during winter, which can certainly be recommended (even if we didn’t have skis with us this time). However, at Easter 2024 the snow was hard and quite fine for shoes as well
On the way upwards (direction south) Vinstradalen. And yes, the river was to the left.
A short kilometer into the valley you will find St. Mikael’s Chapel, named after the ‘Rise Angel’. The chapel was inaugurated in 2012 as part of the ‘Pilgrimsleden’. The road through Vinstradalen is one of three old traffic routes northwards from Oslo.
St. Michael’s chapel – exterior.
St. Michael’s Chapel is a gem, built like an amphitheatre, with the Oppdal nature itself as an altarpiece. It was designed by Yngvild Norigard from Drivdalen. Awesome!
St. Michael’s chapel – the interior is characterized by Oppdal slate and wood.
… and if you need some extra help from above, there is a charming Jesus figure in the chapel as well.
We had read in the newspaper ‘Opp‘ about some ladies taking winter baths in Vinstradalen, and our aim for this trip was to find the waterfall where they had their Christmas bath. In the article, the walk from Trengen is described as ‘long and steep’, and we must say that it was quite a good description. Especially the word ‘steep’! Starting from the chapel, we slid down on last year’s half-rotten birch leaves. It was so steep that Idun occasionally sat on her bum and let the back of her trousers take the brunt.
Idun really felt that it was steep enough in the Vinstra riverdale. There were bruises, too.
Despite all difficulties (or maybe even because of?) it turned out to be a really nice visit. Vinstradalen is a canyon, i.e. a steep valley dug out of the river. Here (in the summer, if you’re lucky) you can enjoy the sight of the endangered species Black Curlew (don’t pick it!). In winter, there are other beautiful phenomena to see – made of ice. The sides of the canyon were decorated with an impressive amount of icy waterfalls – both impressive and beautiful!
Cool and gorgious ‘icefalls’ in Vinstradalen canyon.
We’re guessing that these are tiny streams in the summer, not sure if you even notice them at all. But in the winter, when the ice builds up, it’s a magnificent sight!
Rough nature in Vinstradalen. Knut is checking the occurrence of puddles.
Once at the bottom of the valley, we wondered whether we should go up or down to find the bathing pool, but as the valley seemed to be more steep upwards, the choice fell to the right, and it was indeed the correct idea. A bath in Vinstradalen is just right!
After many great experiences with swimming in Iceland, we have suddenly begun to understand that we never ever sought such places around us in the same way. And we didn’t have to look far! Suddenly we saw a post from a friend on Facebook about Storfossen (The Big Waterfall) in Malvik municipality. We took the trip the next day.
It was late before we left home, after a rainy day in Malvik. That gave us the advantage of being alone in the forest , if you don’t count the sheep… We saw one car only in the car park when we arrived, but the owner came walking towards us early in the trip, and thereafter we didn’t see a single person. It was a special feeling to walk alone in a Norwegian ‘rainforest’, the entire forest floor was green and the trees very tall.
Storfossen is located in a narrow gorge caused by a fault in the earth’s crust a long, long time ago. It is very steep close to the river, but there is a path all the way from Hommelvik by the Trondheimsfjord and up to Storfossen (about 6 km to walk from Hommelvik to Storfossen). By parking at the Kringelmyra car park, you enter the path directly above Storfossen and then it is only 0.6 km to walk.
There is a small detour from the main path to a platform where you can see the waterfall in all its glory.
Then it’s just a matter of taking the stairs down to the river itself and rigging the camera.
Before jumping into the fresh water…
Storfossen, here we come!
Fantastic, it was probably 15-16 degrees. It was a bit slippery to get in because of big rocks where we got out. But then there was a nice gravel bottom further out and more than deep enough to swim properly. If you wanted a training session, there is natural swimming against the current when you approach the waterfall.
We had visited both Molovika and Storvika, and were wondering what more fun we could come up with in Stjørdal, since it had already been proven that the beaches in this municipality are top swimming spots. After searching here and there, we noticed that by Gråbrekk there should be both a waterfall and a pond, both excellent targets for swimming adventures. We thought.
The river Gråelva is running fast, but it is both too shallow and too narrow for swimming in our taste.
Gråbrekk has been inhabited since the Stone Age. There is a burial mound on the farm, and stone tools have also been found. In recent times, the place is known for industry, including a mill. The name Gråelva does not come from the colour grå (grey), but from Norse ‘groðr’ = to grow, i.e. a river that sometimes floods, in combination with the word ‘brekka’ for hill.
The first known user of Gråbrekk was Nils Graderbrek in 1520. A modern mill was set up in 1860, and eventually a dam for a water reservoir, called Gråbrekkdammen. In addition to the mill, various industries were started: bone meal and guano factory, machine production, bicycle production and indeed – a puffery! The puffery produced puffed rice (Ping) and puffed wheat (Pang). The puffing took place with a ‘cannon’ that could shoot out 6-8 kilos of rice or wheat every 15 minutes. That explains the brand name ‘Ping and Pang’, which some of us remember from the 70’s. The silos at Gråbrek and Hegra are currently operated by ‘Felleskjøpet’.
Gråbrekk.
There was no bath this afternoon. Gråbrekkdammen is a private area, so we cannot recommend swimming there, even though there is a floating jetty and otherwise fine conditions.
Almost 2 years went before aiming for the next bathing adventure in Stjørdal. What to come up with this time? It is very steep many places in the Trondheimsfjorden area – ‘Perhaps we should try to find a waterfall?‘
So we checked the map for the word ‘waterfall’ (foss), and one of the first to appear was Skuldbørstadfoss.
Skuldbørstadfoss was piped as early as in 1910.
Skuldbørstadfoss power plant utilizes a drop of 23 meters in the river Mælaselva. It is so steep there that it is a bit scary to drive a normal car all the way. The power plant came into operation in 1910, but burnt down in 1972. Operation resumed with a new power plant in 1985.
Skuldbørstadfoss is now a power plant, not a waterfall (quote smaakraft.no).
It’s no good to bathe without neither water or waterfall, so this bath was a definite a ‘not‘.
The day was still not ended, and Tobatheornottbathe had several more names on the list. The trip continued – not too far – to Mælafossen waterfall. This time, aware of possible trouble, Knut checked first, to see if there was a power plant in the waterfall, and yes, Mælafossen has also been developed. But – due to maintenance – the Mælaselva river was supposed to run the overflow channel this summer (2023). It was an exciting project to see how that looked!
Mælafossen power plant.
The Mælafossen hydroelectric power plant utilizes a drop of 38 meters in the Mælaselva. The plant was commissioned in 1918, but shut down in 1979, after a (generator) fire. Following reconstructions, new operation began in 1985.
In the beginning it looked OK, a little magic, like a rainforest.
It turned ut to be a long and difficult wade up the Mælaselva river. Walking in half-rotten matter, over and under fallen trees, wading in mud, surrounded by a strong H2S stench. What a day!
More impractical and muddy further up.
Idun became more and more skeptical, while Knut tried to keep our spirits up: ‘Around the next bend there’s probably a waterfall…‘, ‘…just a little further…‘, etc. We found no waterfall, and finally Idun decided this was it and turned around. That was certainly a good decision, but unfortunately Knut, on the way back, stepped on a rusty tool and had to go to the doctor for a tetanus shot.
The closest we got to a waterfall bath on this trip.
Half a year later, a new Stjørdal trip was under way. We had got hold on tickets for the ‘Skatvalsrevyen’ (local revue in Skatval), and of course it had to be combined with a bath! Holsfossen sounded as an interesting place for us, and this time we couldn’t find any power plant mentioned by that name in Stjørdal. Maybe we could have our waterfall bath this time?
Can you imagine – there is a dam in Holselva too?
Holselva river is located below Forbordfjellet mountain. We found a (fenced) dam there too, but it was empty and we saw water in the river below, so we made an attempt to find a pool below the dam. It was a bit steep, but not too difficult. And we experienced the fun trick of having to climb over a partially demobilized fence to get out of a fenced area (without climbing any fence to get in).
Knut climbs over a fence to get out of the forbidden area.
We didn’t find no pool. No waterfall either. This concluded our attempts for waterfall bathing in Stjørdal this time. But we have received a tip about Strukhauet/Strukfossen, so we will be back!
The waterfalls are somewhat nicer when they are not piped.
When there is no swimming, why not go to a revue instead? We can really recommend the Skatvalsrevy. Great fun even for outsiders! In Norwegian of course.
Stjørdal is Trøndelag’s most densely populated municipality after Trondheim. The name comes from Old Norse ‘Stjórn’ = steering, from the name of the river. The municipal center (Stjørdals-) Halsen is located between the two rivers Gråelva and Stjørdalselva, hence the name (“The neck of Stjørdal”).
Lindworm (Norse name for dragonlike creature) of ice in Stjørdalselva river. Stjørdal’s municipal’s coat of arms is a yellow lindworm on a red background. The motif is found in a letter of praise from 1344, where Saint Margaret of Antioch defeats the devil in the form of a lindworm.
We were on our way north to the ‘Skatvals revue‘ when we saw something fabulous in Stjørdalselva: A number of larger and smaller icebergs/iceflakes were floating in the river. It reminded us of a somewhat problematic bath in Iceland, in Jökulsárlón. This is a lake in front of a glacier where the icebergs are caught and drift around for years before they melt so much that they are able to reach the sea and it is one of Icelands biggest tourist attractions. Check out the post ‘Jökulsárlón‘, Iceland -> Austurland for more info.
And talking about bridges in the area: the old Hell railroad bridge is now a research project, where they are trying to make it brake down over 10 years to find out how much old bridges can handle!
Stjørdalselva with Hell bridge from 1959 in the background.
Stjørdalselva is one of the 10 best salmon rivers in Norway, with a catch of 1,590 salmons in 2023. It is a large and wide river, but it is a river and not a lake, and the mentioned icebergs are made of river water and not glaciers, but anyway. We just had to swim there, in Trøndelags own version of ‘Jökulsárlón‘!
‘Someone’ has fenced off the river bank at Sandfærhus.
We drove past the Sandfærhus car park and walked back along the river bank. Is it ok to fence the river bank, and exclude the access to the river because you have a parking business within? Tobatheornottobathe aren’t completely sure about that.
Varied paths during a walk along the Stjørdalselva river bank.
It was a somehow tedious walk down the river, over ice flakes and between bushes and trees at the river bank. A lot of alder (or ‘ørder‘ as you can hear it pronounced in Trøndelag), with the result that Idun sneezed days afterwards. It turned out to become a kickstart of the pollen season. Alder thrives by streams and rivers and blooms in March. Big mistake!
Always fun to be allergic at springtime!
Small shoes instead of (mountain) boots and bags instead of rucksacks, impractical, to be honest. Our learning is slow, Tobatheornottobathe continues as before.
There might have been some nice pictures from the camera used during the bath, if the photographer had used a setting that made it actually take pictures!
We had a really nice bath in Stjørdalselva. Quite chilly (not unexpected, considering all the ice). The river was shallow, perhaps you should take the tide into account, this close to the Trondheimsfjord outlet, as we didn’t do for this spontaneous swim. The sand was perfect (not so fine that it sticks everywhere), and there was no bad taste in the water. A bath in Stjørdalselva can certainly be recommended.
Alder cones everywhere. We can’t say we weren’t warned….
On the way back we found a route between 2 rows of fences. We were also filmed by CCTV, suddenly feeling simular to Valborg and Kjell (in the ‘Olsenbanden‘ movies), even without trespassing forbidden territory. Maybe, that is.
Parts of Olsenbanden on a bathing trip. More breaking out than breaking in.
However, as always, time was just right for a bath!
In search of new and exciting experiences, we had checked a couple of times in Verdal, whether there could be anything spectacular in the mountains near the Swedish border. And yes, there are lots of things to discover! In Verdal, the ground is made of limestone, making up a typical ‘karst‘ landscape.
Knut hunting for a new bathing adventure.
At Ramstad, there are several gorges, waterfalls and caves, and we were aiming for Svartfossen (The Black Waterfall).
What’s hided in the gill?
It is only a few hundred meters from the car park to the waterfall, and the path is nice. What could go wrong this time? Not much, it turned out – except for lack of water! It was winter and everything was frozen. Correction: Everything was not frozen solid, we heard the water beneath us as we walked on the ice into the gill. But bathing? The conclusion is that Svartfossen does not provide a bathing environment during winter time.
Svartfossen is marvellous in winter clothing. However, it wasn’t possible to have a bath there!
We were disappointed, but tried again six months later.
The entrance looked more promising this time.
Summertime is just the right time for a bath in Svartfossen!
You don’t need a large river to have an impressive waterfall. Ramsåa river is big enough. In summer time, that is!
After a refreshing bath, time was just perfect for an excursion. Knut wanted to see if there was anything to explore upstream the waterfall, and a beautiful path has been made to get there.
Well done, Verdal!
There were several nice pools in the river above Svartfossen. But Idun thought it looked dangerous, so no more bathing this time.
Knut is checking the conditions upstream Svartfossen.
And that was it, you think? Both yes and no. We were a bit curious about the caves, if we could find one of them. A short distance below Svartfossen, after the Ramsåa has split, you will find a small cave entrance to the left of the river, by a 20-year-old logging field.
We did find the entrance to Svartfossgrotta!
No cave exploration was done, even though we found one of the two entrances. We weren’t equipped for that. Wrong clothes, wrong shoes, no light, and no rope. But the Svartfoss bath was so nice, that our mood was still high.
In the innermost part of Øvervatnet (the Upper Lake), approximately midway between Fauske and Sulitjelma, by the estuary of the river Sjønståa, lies an old settlement. A farm (actually 2) with such a beautiful (skjønn-) name must be absolutely splendid, you might think, and yes, this is as being in a fairytale; with a meandering river, steep mountain sides and beautiful old buildings. The name is not explained with full certainty, but may come from ‘skinstøde-å’, i.e. the river at a place where the cows seek shelter from insects in the summer heat. No beauty explanation, actually.
Sjønstå. The ‘Øvergården’ yard: Stove house from the 17th century, stables with room for one horse, barn in the background and sheep barn to the back right.
Sjønstå is mentioned for the first time in a tax census from 1665, under the name Süinstad. Øvervatnet is directly connected to the sea via Hermogsundet (Nervatnet) and Finneidstraumen, to Skjerstadfjorden. Fishing was therefore an important supplementary income to agriculture. The tax to be paid in 1666 was 9 kg dry fish in military tax (leidang), 3/4 barrel of grain and 4 kg of cheese to the church, and also 18 kg of dry fish in land debt.
More of Øvergården’s yard: The barn to the left is from around 1780, built in the norse ‘sjelter‘ technique.
The farms at Sjønstå had little opportunity for expansion, since the place is surrounded by steep mountains. At the census in 1865, there were 21 people living in Sjønstå, divided into three households.
Nergården. Øvervatnet in the background.
With the establishment of the Sulitjelma mines, Sjønstå became a hub in the transportation between Sulitjelma and Finneid/Fauske. Transport of ore from the mines took place by boat on Langvatnet. From Langvatnet to Sjønstå, they initially went by horse and sledge 10 km over the mountain. This was a slow and expensive transport, and construction of the railway started almost immediately, opening in 1892. Transshipment took place on the east side of the river, and in 1920 a bridge was built across it so that the farm’s people could easily get to the steamship quay and railway station. Between 1890 and 1956, Sjønstå had 300 inhabitants.
The bridge over the Sjønstå river, newly restored and chique (2023).
Transport of ore from the mines only took place in the summer, when the waters were ice-free. There was a strong desire for a railway all the way from Sulitjelma to Finneid, and finally, in 1956, the line was complete from Fagerli to Finneid, including 3 long tunnels. The last stretch of the Sulitjelma Railway was opened by King Olav V in 1956, and closed down again in 1972, when the track was turned into a road within just 3 weeks (county road 830). This was the end of Sjønstå’s function as a transport hub. The place was quickly vacated, except the old farm, which continued until the bachelor Andor Karolius Hansen died in 1973 (Øvergården).
Øvervatnet. The old storage hall for ore can be seen in the background.
At Sjønstå there are good swimming opportunities from the beach on the east side of the river. You just have to throw yourself into it!
Idyllic!
After a refreshing swim at Sjønstå, time is just right to get new energy into the body. Today, almost all newer houses (from the 20th century) have been demolished, but on Sundays there is a cafe in ‘Folkets hus‘ in Sjønstå. ‘Møsbrømlefse‘ is made by heating a thin ‘lefse‘ filled with ‘duppe‘ (brown cheese sauce). This is a signature dish from the Salten region in Nordland, which we will strongly recommend. Buon appetite!
Møssbrømlefse. If it is too far for you to go to Sjønstå, there is an option in Oslo, at the cafè ‘Spor av Nord‘. Møssbrømlefse is heavy stuff, but very good.
The Swede Nils Persson founded Sulitjelma Aktiebolag 10/2-1891, after 4 years of trial operations. Sulitjelma had a permanent settlement of 50 in 1880, which increased to almost 3,000 within 30 years. The immigrants came from all over the northern hemisphere, and the community became a conglomerate of Sami, Kven, Norwegians, Swedes, Finns, Germans and Russians. Here you could make money, but the work was hard and the living conditions miserable, especially in the early days.
The Mining Company ‘Sulitjelma Gruber’ consisted of 18 different mines.
Sulitjelma’s nickname for many years was ‘The Hell of Lapland‘, which says something about the poor conditions. The term was first used by the agitator Kata Dalström, the writer August Strindberg’s niece. It was strictly forbidden to agitate for trade unions. All agitators were chased from the village as soon as they were discovered. As was said in Sulis: ‘Norway’s laws stop at Finneid‘. A female agitator who managed to speak in the Sulitjelma mines before the spies discovered her, was Helene Ugland from Froland near Arendal:
“Aren’t you worth as much as the foremen and leaders? No, you are worth more. Do you understand that? It is you and your dirty, powerful fists that have value to the exploiters. You are the ones who raise money for the foremen, the managers, the clerks or whatever they are called, the ones who squander it. And what do you get in return? Pay for the work… yes, but you get something else, too. You get mocked and fired if the managers don’t like you.“
Old Sulis. A large flow of water in the Giken river. The lake ‘Langvatnet’ in the background, with two cable cars.
Like many other mining communities, there was a clear distinction of class in Sulis. Clerks and engineers had good living conditions, high wages and access to hunting and fishing. Workers who tried to do some hunting, however, were dismissed. In the beginning, only the mining company had a shop (sometimes very poor products), so they got the money back from the workers. For a long time they also had their own money system in Sulitjelma. Hence, the Company could save all salaries in the bank, and earn interest on it.
Christmas lights on a new home (2023) at Charlotta in Sulitjelma.
A strategic ploy to keep wages down was to sell work assignments at auction once a month, a kind of auction called ‘lisitation‘. To get the job, the worker teams had to underbid each other, and the result was mistrust between the teams. The ‘Mining Act‘ of 1848 gave the mining companies the burden of support for the personnel when they had lived on the mine’s premises for two consecutive years. According to the law, sick or injured workers were therefore supposed to receive support from the Company, but this could be avoided by dismissing workers after 23 months of service at the latest. In this way, the Company could evict workers who were injured or fired, and also the families of workers who died. Later, the same (living) worker could easily get a new job – at Sulitjelma Gruber. Martin Tranmæl has said that Sulitjelma was “a small tsardom, where the capitalists ruled unrestrained“.
Langvatnet (the Long Lake). View inwards, Sandnes and Fagerli in the background.
Towards the end of 1906, the management got an idea to introduce use of something they called ‘control marks‘. The point was to know exactly how many hours the individual miner worked. This was to happen by each worker being handed a lead chip in the morning. The chip was ment to be worn at the chest, and when the mark was returned at the end of the day, the working hours were clear. The chips were immediately named the ‘Sulis Medal‘, or the ‘Slave Mark‘, and were deeply hated. The scheme with the control marks was first introduced in the Charlotta mine, which the management knew had the largest proportion of workers with family responsibilities. It was thought that this would go under the radar in the other mines , but that did not happen.
The slave marks. “We are not slaves!“, the miners shouted, knocking over the chip box. The following night, the marks disappeared after a break-in at the mining office.
At the Hanken and Charlotta mines, 200 men were dismissed when they refused to wear control marks, and a rebellion, the ‘Mark War‘, spread from mine to mine. The workers wanted to start a trade union, but how was that to happen when the Company had banned all kinds of meeting activities? The Company owned all houses, roads and all the land in the valley. They also had a private police force. Where could they meet? The solution was lake ‘Langvatnet’. Nobody owns the water, and the 13th of January 1907; 1,300 people met on the ice at Langvatnet. Ole Kristoffer Sundt spoke standing on a margarine box: ‘Everyone who wants to join the trade union goes to the left!‘ No one stepped to the right. This happened during church time, and the comment from the priest was as follows: ‘The old Sulitjelma is falling now!‘
The Hanken miners represented by computer-worker Knut.
After the meeting at Langvatnet, 13 trade unions were established: 7 for miners and 6 workers’ unions. Sulitjelma had scattered settlements and difficult transport conditions, therefore this many departments.
The film ‘Sulis 1907‘ was directed by Nils Gaup and presents some of the prelude to the miners’ uprising. Knut (to the right) was a featured extra in the movie. Here in Olavsgruva at Røros.
After living with the Sulis movie for many weeks in 2022, Tobatheornottobathe just had to take the trip to Sulitjelma and experience the place for ourselves. We wanted to have a bath in lake Langvatnet! Ideally it should have been done through a hole in the ice, but as the premiere was set to October, this was relatively impossible. And where to swim? Langvatnet (Spoiler alert!) is actually quite long, almost 11 km (under a kilometer wide), so the possibilities are many. We chose the new housing estate Charlotta, built on the slag heap of the Charlotta mine.
A bit difficult to walk on the water this time.
A bath here was fine for us, but as previously mentioned: The locals hesitate, because of polluted water!
Ref: – Frifagbevelse.no – https://frifagbevegelse.no/magasinet-for-fagorganiserte/slavemerket-som-reiste-arbeiderkampen-pa-norges-nest-storste-arbeidsplass-6.469.821411.e4bf5b2fa7 – Eyvind Viken: ‘Pioner og agitator – et portrett av Helene Ugland‘, Falken Forlag, 1991 – Wikipedia: Sulitjelma Gruber
