1872
Roald Amundsen born July 16
1893-1896
To the mountains and Arctic seas
Around new year 1894, Roald Amundsen made his first major mountain trip. With him on this ski tour were Laurentius Urdahl and Vilhelm Holst, and their route went from Krøderen to Kongsberg with several detours.
Three friends in the studio. Photo: Skimuseet i Holmenkollen
On tour in the studio in Kristiania. Photo: Daniel Georg Nyblin / Oslo Museum
A few months later Roald Amundsen was given the opportunity for a new adventure, when hired as a deck hand on the hunting ship Magdalena. The voyage went north into the Arctic Ocean, and according to letters that Amundsen sent home, they caught more than 2000 seals. After the voyage with Magdalena – in the spring of 1895 – Amundsen took the helmsman’s exam, 2nd class, at Kristiania Seamen’s School.
At new year 1896, Roald Amundsen goes to the mountains again, this time with his brother Leon. Roald later said that they had the “intention to try on skis to cross ‘Vidda’ from Mogen by Mjøsvatn in Telemark to Øifjord in Hardanger”. The trip was more dramatic than they had anticipated. They became weather-bound, lost track of where they were, and Roald even found himself buried by snow and ice through the night, escaping only with Leon’s help. As time went on, they were reported missing in the newspapers.
After almost 9 days – several of them without food – they finally reached safety. Roald later recounts that this trip “…involved dangers and hardships fully as severe as any I was destined to encounter in the polar regions”.
