Trollveggen: The First Free Ascent of the Rimmon Route1979

Trollveggen. Troll Wall. A dramatic mountain massif that stretches 1,700 meters into the sky from the valley floor of Romsdalen in western Norway, where the river Rauma winds its way down towards the town of Åndalsnes. A thousand meters of the mountain wall is a sheer drop. Europe's highest vertical rock face.

On this vertical kilometer, climbing history is written on a June day (and night) in 1979.

For the very first time, the Trollveggen is free climbed.

“I don't recall free climbing it being any sort of goal in itself. I really think it just turned out okay.”

Ragnhild Amundsen (62) looks back at the active days of her youth in Åndalsnes in the ’70s. And to the ground-breaking climbing trip in Trollveggen. Which, to her, wasn’t anything all that special.

At just age 15, Ragnhild already found herself drawn to steep rock walls, and ended up with a crew of boys who spent all their spare time on the rock walls in Romsdalen valley.

“We climbed most days. We spent a lot of time on Steinen (a 10-15 meter tall boulder outside Åndalsnes with 10-15 routes of differing degree, right by Mjelvahammeren).”

One of the boys in the gang was a broad shouldered, dark blond who was obsessed with mountain climbing. That was Hans Christian Doseth, who later became one of Norway's biggest climbing legends and died on the Great Trango Tower in Pakistan in 1984. Back in the 1970s, he lived just across the road from Ragnhild. In their mid-teens, the two became a couple. They had a close bond, based on love and climbing.

No climbing courses were available in Åndalsnes in the ’70s. A secondary school teacher climbed on a huge local boulder called "Steinen" (the Rock) and introduced students to the sport.

“And then we had Adolf Grüner who was a giant in the climbing community. He had a fruit and tobacco shop in Åndalsnes, which was a meeting point”, Ragnhild recalls.

Climbers came to the shop to learn about conditions in the mountains. It became a sort of information center. The shop was in Arne Randers Heen’s house, directly below what is now Sødahlhuset café.

“Adolf Grüner was like a mentor to us. He led the way on steeper climbs and taught us the most basic things about safety in the mountains.”

Ranghild and her climbing buddies continued to develop their skills in the mountains by being active and learning from each other.

Trollveggen was climbed for the first time in 1965. A Norwegian and a British climbing team climbed at the same time. Ole Daniel Enersen, Leif Normann Petterson, Odd Eliassen and Jon Teigland did the Norwegian route and reached the summit the day before the British foursome Tony Howard, John Amatt, Tony Nicholls and Bill Tweedale. The English route, also called the Rimmon Route, was thus established. Back then, climbing was done in a technical style, by actively pulling and standing on gear they would place in cracks while climbing.

When free climbing, gear is only used for protection in the event of a fall. You are left with your hands and feet to gain height. The noblest form of mountaineering.

Fourteen years after the first ascent, the couple Ragnhild and Hans Christian set off towards the start of the route. It was the day before Sankthansaften (St. John’s Eve, June 24th) and nice weather meant everything was ready for the attempt.

“I don’t remember anything other than that it went quite well. There was the difficult passage on the Narrow Slab, as some say. I don't recall many details. It's been a while,” she says with a laugh.

Hans Christian led the whole climb free. Ragnhild followed, also free climbing.

They slept a few hours in the middle of the wall.

“We were lying comfortably on a shelf. There might have been a down jacket, but we didn't have a sleeping bag or anything like that.”

The next morning, it was all about moving on. Toward the top, a rock fall hit and cracked Ragnhild's helmet.

At eight o'clock in the evening, 30 hours after they set off, they reached the top of the route.

–Was there a big uproar afterwards?

“No, I can't remember anything like that. Hans Christian free climbing the route was probably noted in Norway’s climbing magazine, but you’d have to be pretty well informed about climbing to know about it.”

Fortunately for the rest of us, their friend Kjetil Svanemyr was on the wall at the same time. He climbed the same route, in a technical style, with three Swedes. He is the one who took the photos from the historic climb, and he remembers the experience a little differently. According to him, they had stated a goal of free climbing the whole route.

"As I remember it, Ragnhild and Hans Christian started on the Rimmon Route a few hours before us in the afternoon on a summer's day in 1979," he tells Norrøna Magazine.

"I climbed with three Swedes divided into two rope teams, and we caught up with Ragnhild and Hans Christian on the spacious shelf called the Central Basin about halfway up the wall, at 4 or 5 at night, with just enough sun to light up the wall.

I don't remember much of the conversation when we met, but one of the questions that came up was, naturally enough, whether the two had managed to free climb all the pitches, which had been a stated goal before the climbing started. I seem to remember that Hans Christian said that he had had no particular problem with doing so.”

“There was also no doubt that Hans Christian was satisfied and proud. From there and up to the top of the wall, we were three rope teams who climbed in a group and followed up the rest of Exit Chimney and Summit Gully without encountering any notable problems”, Kjetil Svanemyr states.

The Rimmon Route was around 900m long and was considered to have a free climbing grade of around N6+ / 5.10. The route is no longer in the state it once was, following a tremendous rockfall in 1998 that removed at least five of the original pitches. Other rockfalls before and after have also affected the route.