If you google “most beautiful valley in Norway” the search machine comes up with Innerdalen: A mountain valley with several “hanging valleys”, a distinctive mountain tower (Innerdalstårnet) as well a romantic seter (summer mountain pasture) environment complete with a river and a lake.
The DNT cabin in Innerdalen was just voted second-best self-service DNT cabin in Norway (Rabothytta came first). The problem with these votings are, of course, that only relatively well-known/well-visited DNT cabins come into consideration in such as public vote: If people do not know (of) the cabin, obviously they do not vote for it. By the way, in my opinion the two best self-service DNT cabins I passed were Pauro (Narvik mountains) and Argalad (Junkerdalen), but they are visited by so few people, that they´d never get enough votes to place them in the top. That said, Innerdalen DNT cabin is a most excellent, historic cabin with a great location in the middle of Innerdalen.
I would have loved to climb Innerdalstårnet, but bearing in mind my left knee and the potential troubles ahead, including the upcoming 900 m descent into Sunndalen, I decided not to. In fact, it turned out that the descent was quite reasonable and well-engineered causing almost no trouble to my knees.
The 700 m descent from Bjøråskaret down to Innerdalen on a scree slope was The Steepest descent of Norge på Langs. And the camp spot just below Bjøråskaret was arguably The most beautiful campsite of Norge på Langs (with Fiskedalstinden a runner-up). Having been offline for the past two days I had to stop on the way up to Bjøråskaret when I suddenly got a connection and saw that Manchester City had lost 0-3 to Lyon in Champions League. Do not say that Norge på Langs does not come with sacrifices! So many games, I won´t be able to watch..
Finally, the important question: Is Innerdalen really is the most beautiful valley in Norway, as a google search will make you believe? Does it matter? Not really, but these rankings are always fun to make as well as to read. The answer: It could be. It is spectacular. However Romsdalen (the breathtaking section with Trollveggen and Romsdalshornet) or Reisadalen also could be.
