Immediately after this event King Sverre met his antagonist, Magnus Erlingson, at the mouth of the Sogndal's Fjord, at a place called Fimreite. Here it was that the rival fleets came into contact. The king gained the decisive victory, and thus secured to himself the crown of Norway. This engagement was fought in the year 1184.
On the left bank of the Sogne Fjord is Slinde. At this place, near the close of the thirteenth century, lived Audun Slinde, one of the powerful chiefs whom King Erick dispatched to Scotland to fetch his bride, the Princess Margaret.
Outside the churchyard at Sogndal stands a "bauta sten," an upright column of stone, on which is the runic inscription: "King Olav shot among these stones."
As we proceed along the main Sogne Fjord we obtain glimpses down branch fjords, and beautiful vistas open out. Mountain torrents and waterfalls are seen on every side threading their steep descent among the crags, now gliding over smooth glaciated rocks, now wriggling in tortuous, snake-like fashion, then a sudden leap over a steep precipice, ending with a final splash into the waters of the fjord.
A steamer's cargo
At sunset the new-fledged moon peeped over snow-topped mountains, which are ruddy with the sun's last rays. The fjord water around is dashed with purple and pale gold, rose, and emerald. A large, cumbersome boat, laden to its utmost capacity with sheep and lambs, puts out from shore to meet the awaiting steamer. The boat is roped to the steamer's side; the sheep, handled tenderly, are transferred from it to improvised pens on the steamer's foredeck, the sheep in one compartment and the lambs in another. There is also a large open packing-case, which contains the youngest lambs.
A chorus of deep bass and thinnest treble continues spasmodically. The shepherd is among his flock, his whole time taken up in keeping watch and ward over them, especially over the lambs, whose feats of jumping tax to the utmost his patient watchfulness.
As the steamer ploughs along, a pleasant breeze plays on the surface of the now steely grey water.
The snow on the high mountains changes colour to a pale lilac, and the moon brightens as twilight advances, while over in the west the first faint star of evening glimmers in a sky of palest amber.
As we proceed the fjord contracts, the mountains are higher and steeper, in places almost perpendicular, and the waterfalls rush down with greater impetuosity into the dark fjord.