Skånevik- the trading post

There are only two buildings left of the old trading and guesthouse settlement in Skånevik. They are in the centre, close to the main road passing through the settlement. The other buildings that belonged to the place, the lodging house (“Holteriet”), the bakery, the courthouse, the boathouse and the sea house with the store, were pulled down in the last century.

Skånevik- Norwegian engine museum

Støle

High above the sea and the beach flats, on one of the wide terraces shaped by the sea and the ice, lies the farm Støle (Stødle). The Old Norse name of Studla is derived from studill “support, shelf”. As far back as Viking times Støle has been a chieftain’s farm, a good farm on the plains formed by the moraine masses.

Støle church

The stone church at Støle may have been built around 1160 probably as a private chapel for the mighty Stødle clan. It is likely that it was Erling Skakke, the king’s representative and father of king Magnus Erlingsson, who built the church.

Stordalen

When the Etne water system was protected in 1994, preservation of the cultural landscape in Stordalen Valley was a a main objective. This is a valley with an exceptional abundance of Different types of plants and animals. In the grey alder forest in Stordalen there are more bird species than in most other places, in fact, denser than one tends to find in a tropical rainforest.

Åkrafjorden

Skånevik- moraine

In Skånevik there are marks left from the ice edge that advanced during the thousand-year cold spell (Younger Dryas) that marked the end of the Ice Age roughly 11 500 years ago. The glacier first proceeded out into Åkra Fjordand and around Vannes and thereafter sent an arm in toward Skånevik. Here, the glacier lay down an end moraine up against the mountainside.

Krokavatnet

On Sunday the 29th of January, 1989, at 17:38 o'clock, Etna shook. The earthquake, with its epicentre ca. 9 kilometres south of Etne centre, had a strength of 4.2 on the Richters scale. This could be felt over large parts of West Land, especially in the areas around Åkra, Etne, Hardanger Fjord and Sauda Fjord. The earthquake was the largest that has ever been measured in Hordaland.

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