Hiking Preikestolen at sunrise
What the dark changes
Not the route. The trail is marked with the red painted T of the Norwegian Trekking Association with posts roughly every 500 metres, and you will not get lost on it in summer. What the dark changes is the ground. Boulder fields at night are slow because every foot placement needs to be seen, and the same walk that takes two hours up in daylight takes noticeably longer by headlamp, especially in a group where somebody is not used to it. Budget generously and start earlier than the arithmetic says.
The other change is the arrival. You come out onto the plateau in the dark with 604 metres of nothing beside you and no railing anywhere, which is a different proposition from arriving in daylight: the fence page. Stay well back until you can see the edge properly. This is the one situation where I would not walk up alone.
Rogaland has no midnight sun
Worth saying plainly, because people arrive expecting it. We are well south of the Arctic Circle, so there is no midnight sun here. What there is in late June is very long light: people set off at eight in the evening and come down near midnight with usable light the whole way. That is the local version of the phenomenon and it is genuinely good.
Sunrise or evening
What works
- Evening in late June: long light, no headlamp gamble, and the day-trip traffic gone
- Sunrise: the emptiest the plateau ever is, and the car park to yourself
- Either way you avoid the mid-morning crush entirely: the crowds page
- Both reward a slow descent rather than a fast one
Worth knowing
- Sunrise means the rough ground in the dark, in both directions if you are early enough
- The car park is staffed from roughly 07:00 in summer, so an early start is unstaffed
- Cold on an exposed plateau before the sun is up, in any month
- Nobody can promise you a sunrise. Low cloud sits on this plateau regularly
If you are going to do it anyway
Go with somebody. Take a proper headlamp and a spare set of batteries, not a phone torch. Tell someone your plan, which is the standard official advice and matters more at four in the morning than at ten. Carry more warm layers than the daytime version of the same walk, because you will be standing still at the top in the coldest hour. And accept the possibility of a grey dawn and no view at all, because that happens and the walk still works. The kit is on what to bring and the hour-by-hour case on the best time of day.
In winter this stops being a nice idea. Short daylight, ice on the rock, snow over the cracks and streams, and the official advice to go with a guide or at least not alone: the winter hike.
Walk up in the dark, come down in daylight. Starting so that the last twenty minutes of the climb are in growing light gives you the empty plateau without doing the boulder fields by headlamp twice, and the descent is the part where tired legs and darkness combine badly.
What there is to book
Not the trail. Nobody sells a ticket to Preikestolen and nobody can, so anything you pay for is something else: the ride out of Stavanger, the guide who walks it with you, or the boat that shows you the cliff from the water. Which of the three you actually need is set out on the bookings page and in the comparison.
Frequently asked questions
Can you hike Preikestolen at night?
Yes. The trail is open at all hours and well marked, but the ground is rough and a proper headlamp is needed.
Is there midnight sun at Preikestolen?
No. Rogaland is well south of the Arctic Circle. Late June evenings stay light very late, which is not the same thing.
Is sunrise or sunset better?
In late June the evening gives you the same emptiness with better light on the way down.