Romsdal

Romsdal is a traditional district in the Norwegian county Møre og Romsdal, located between Nordmøre and Sunnmøre. The district of Romsdal comprises Aukra, Fræna, Midsund, Molde, Nesset, Rauma, Sandøy, and Vestnes. It is named after the valley of Romsdalen, which covers part of Rauma. The largest town is Molde, which is also the seat of Møre og Romsdal County Municipality. Åndalsnes is a town located near the mouth of the river Rauma in the municipality of Rauma. The Rauma Line comes from Dombås and terminates at Åndalsnes. The Old Norse form of the name was Raumsdalr. The first element is the genitive case of a name *Raumr, probably the old (uncompounded) name of Romsdal Fjord, again derived from the name of the river Rauma, i.e. "The Dale of Rauma". The name Rauma is itself a mystery, but a tantalizing clue may be found in the works of the Gothic historian Jordanes. He mentions a tribe called "Raumii", which might be the origin of both the landscape Romerike (o.no raumariki) and the river Rauma. The Norwegian comedy group KLM (named after the surnames of the three comedians Trond Kirkvaag, Knut Lystad and Lars Mjøen), in their feuilleton series Brødrene Dal (The Brothers Dale – as in ‘valley’), named their three protagonists after the valleys Gausdal, Romsdal and Brumunddal. The valley of Romsdalen, through which the Rauma river passes to the Romsdalfjord. It is surrounded by the Romsdalsalpene mountain range. The 1,550 meter tall Romsdalhorn has been compared to the Matterhorn. Trolltindane peaks stands opposite across the Rauma. The North Face of Trollryggen peak (1,740 m), Trollveggen (Troll Wall), is the tallest vertical cliff in Europe. Norway's most famous hair-pin road is Trollstigen, or "Troll's Trail", which leads to the south out of Åndalsnes to the Geirangerfjord. The Rauma river originates in Lesjaskogsvatnet, a lake with outlets at both ends, in the adjacent mountain municipality of Lesja. A dam was constructed by the Lesja Iron Works in the 1660s to improve transportation obstructed the Rauma and caused the water to flow both west to the Rauma and eastward into the river Lågen.