Vinjebua at Eidsbugarden

Here is a bit of the exciting story:

All historical information is taken from "Pioneers in Jotunheimen" by Birger Løvland, which is on sale at the Norwegian Mountain Museum and at Fondsbu.

Boeck and Keilhau discover Jotunfjelde

In 1820, Peter Christian Bianco Boeck and Baltazar Mathias Keilhau "discover" Jotunheimen. Before this time, the tract was only known to hunters and trappers. In 1896 it is stated in "Jotunheimen's History of Discovery" by Professor O.A. Øverland:

It sounds somewhat unbelievable, but it is true. There was still, when it was written the year of the Lord 1820, in the Southern Norway, only a few miles from the sea, and from the great communications with the West and North Mountains, a piece of land of 100 to 150 square miles, of which the civilized world had little more acquaintance than, for example, New Holland. Patagonia and the interior of Africa, that is, the least known stretches of land on Earth. The region was certainly no stranger to Gudbrandsdal, Valderian and Søgn hunters, fishermen and faeces. But the ideas of the educated, the scientist, about this region were in the highest degree obscure.

After their journey through this unknown mountain area in the summer of 1820, Boeck and Keilhau named the area Jotunfjelde. It was not until Aasmund Olavsson Vinje that the name Jotunheimen arose. But before this time, the area was well known and widely used by local hunters, fishermen and hunters. And around Bygdin, for example, you will find a number of old felæger and stone arches such as Eidsbue, Brandbue, Tolormbue, Nybue, Hestevøllen and Synsbekk. Likewise at Tyin, where you will also find a number of old arches.

The story continues below the pictures.

Boeck and Keilhau came on their journey through Jotunfjelde to Eidsbugarden along the north side of Bygdin during the Torfinn periods, up through Langedalen and past Galdebergtjørni and then came down to the beach of Bygdin again under Galdeberg. When they arrived at Eidsbue the next day, they wrote the following:

On the 13th we passed Felægret at Bramboden and crossed a river, which because of its glacial water (=brevann) is called Melkedøla. Not far from there you leave the village at Eidsbod, a wretched earthen hut, which reindeer herders have built about the middle of their best hunts. Around Rustetjernet and in the castle's high valley (= Sløtafjellet) the animals roam in hundreds, also in the near Koldedal.

From Bygdin, Boeck and Keilhau went on over Eidet to Tyin, and from here they climbed Falketind with great effort on their journey to the top and back. The journey then continued west towards Hurrungane and Jostedalen.

Aasmund Olavsson Vinje and Eidsbugarden

Aasmund Olavsson Vinje was born on 6 April 1818 in Vinje in Telemark and died on 31 July 1870 in Gran in Hadeland. And even though he only got to experience two summers at Eidsbugarden, his name and legacy are strongly linked to this place, which he "chose according to the view of many at Bygdin's western end on ein Tange".

In the 1860s, a circle of friends forms around Vinje - Døleringen it was often called - and from 1863 they go several of them to the mountains for three to six weeks every summer. They crept into miserable hunting huts and were very happy with it. 

In 1868, Aasmund Olavsson Vinje's Eidsbugarden was completed. It was built by Engebret Beito from Beito. The timber was transported by boat across Bygdin from the east, and this was also the usual access to Bygdin's western end.

The mortgage deed is a pledge to Consul Thomas Heftye - in rhyme. Vinje was not a rich man and he had to borrow money from Consul Heftye to erect his Eidsbugarden. This is how it happened that Heftye took over Vinje's estate after his death in 1870. On his deathbed, he dreams of Eidsbugarden:

"Can you remember the view from Skineggi (Utsikten) that morning, you, when the white shutter turned away among the Skagastølstindane, and the Koldedalsbreane glacier shone like gold in the sunshine. Aajei, aajei, that I shall come there this summer!"

"But when I am laid in a coffin, my spirit will open its world up there among the mountains. And then I will sit there on Falketind, and look out over Norway, and the mountain radii will come forth."

But he spent two summers here; the first with their three good friends Berner, Boll and Sars - they roamed happily around in the mountain area around Eidsbugarden. And Skineggen was Vinje's favorite place. The following summer, he was on a honeymoon with his newlywed wife Rosa Constance Sophien Kjeldseth to Eidsbugarden. It was his last summer. And hers too. She died in childbirth on 5 April 1870 - the day before Vinje's 52nd birthday. And on July 31 of the same year, stomach cancer took Vinje - he never got further towards Jotunheimen than to the Sister Churches at Gran in Hadeland, where he is buried.

Tourists are coming

From 1870 onwards, tourist traffic accelerated. 
The Norwegian Trekking Association was founded in 1868 and already in 1870 the first DNT cabin Tvindehaugen was completed at Tyin. It received tourists until 1901, but was then demolished. The timber from the cabin at Tvindehaugen was moved and is today part of Torfinnsbu Turisthytte, which was opened in 1905, and which this year celebrates its 100th anniversary.

After Vinje's death, Eidsbugarden also becomes an accommodation, and is the origin of Eidsbugarden Hotel. Eidsbugarden Hotel was one of the most fashionable mountain hotels in the country. The hotel is currently not in operation, but has been in operation until the 2003 season. In the hotel's great heyday with the gentlemen in tuxedos, or in distress in dark suits, and the ladies in evening dresses and ostrich feathers, "The Happy Wanderer" was built to house the "pøsafant" or backpacker. Today, this cabin is called Fondsbu and has been a DNT cabin since 1993.

Vinjebua has been moved out of the hotel and today stands on an isthmus a little west of the hotel.
And the mountain tourists come as they have done since the late 1800s.

Welcome to the mountains!