Jotunheimen National Park

Jotunheimen National Park lies across the Norwegian counties of Innlandet and Vestland and protects a mountain region regarded as one of Norway's premier areas for hiking and fishing, established in December 1980 over an area of about 1,151 square kilometers. It contains more than 250 peaks above 1,900 meters, including Galdhopiggen, Glittertind and Store Skagastolstind, the three tallest summits in northern Europe, in a landscape of Precambrian gabbro carved by glaciers into steep valleys and ridges. Evidence of human hunting in the area dates back to the Stone Age, and the mountains have long shaped Norwegian literature and national identity; the park remains largely without roads and supports lynx, moose, deer, wolverine and trout bearing lakes and rivers. Its name, meaning home of the giants, is drawn from the same Old Norse term for the giants' mythological realm, though this entity is the real Norwegian mountain range and national park rather than that mythological place.