The National park

The national park village of Vingelen forms a natural gateway to Forollhogna national park. Forollhogna national park is an unbroken and, in parts, untouched mountain landscape with gentle slopes and friendly rolling hills, famous as home to the largest wild reindeer population in Norway. In the park’s distinctive and attractive rural landscape, summer mountain farming is still practised.

Traces of early historical sites show that the mountain’s long valleys have been farmed right back to the Stone Age, while the remains of dwellings, sacrificial sites and reindeer traps provide evidence of early Sami settlement. A large number of pits and traps dating back to the Stone Age have been found.

Old pathways – medieval roads and so-called Pilgrims paths – show that most people travelling from valley to valley in bygone times used the mountain route. It was easier to walk through the mountains than down in the valley where there were rivers, streams and thick vegetation. The many remains of early meadow dwellings and grassy marshes indicate how people exploited every last straw to provide enough winter fodder for their animals.

Today the area is used mainly as fertile mountain pasture, primarily for sheep, but also for cattle. Hunting and fishing are still important to the residents in the valleys around Forollhogna though they are no longer necessary for survival.