WELCOME TO THE PLAHTE ESTATE TABLE OF CONTENTS WELCOME • Environmental profile • Media • The area • The story of the Plahte Estate BEFORE ARRIVAL • Booking, payment and cancellation • What is found at the cabin? • Things you need to bring yourself • Tips for preparation • Satellite phone ON ARRIVAL • Meeting place and time • What happens on arrival • Additional guidance DURING THE STAY • Safety • Outboard engines • Activities beyond hunting and fishing • Activities mainly for youth/children ON DEPARTURE • Washing the cabin • Handling of rubbish • Reporting of catches, and the cabin book AFTER RETURNING HOME • Feedback • Booking for next year? • Photographs FOOD FROM NATURE CULTURE AND HISTORY BACK TO SCHOOL: SOME BIOLOGY LESSONS 1 WELCOME We would like to welcome you to the Plahte Estate. We hope that your visit here in ‘our kingdom’ will give you good memories that you will carry with you for a long time, whether they are about hunting, fishing, hiking in the mountains, or being on the fjord. We want your stay to be as good as possible and we therefore offer complete packages that include everything you need in terms of gasoline, electricity, propane, etc. Environmental profile We have a clear objective: to manage all natural resources in a long-term and sustainable manner. We keep the stain on the nature resources at a low level, primarily by limiting the number of people that are allowed into the area. Our philosophy is that one should be able to experience large areas and use the countryside in a traditional way without damaging the natural environment as often happens elsewhere. Most of the cabins are primarily built of local raw materials and we try to be environmentally conscious in all our purchases in the day-to-day running of the business. In the forest there is little final felling, but there are some thinning operations in large plantations that will be mature in 10–20 years. The biodiversity and appearance of grouse habitats are taken into account during felling. There are many large areas of mature forest that are situated such that they could have been exposed to closed logging, or where forest has been left untouched since time immemorial. On the property there can be found one of the largest coniferous forest reserves in the country, and a number of other protected areas. We believe it is possible to use nature without destroying it. We therefore allow reasonable use of the nature around us, such as lighting a camp fire and camping out under the open sky. On the other hand, throwing away rubbish in the countryside is a definite way to cut off any possibility to be allowed to come back. Media On our website there are several thousand pictures of our locations. Most of the pictures are taken by our guests. In addition, some TV recordings can be found on our YouTube channel. • National television TV2: Moose hunt with Vebjørn Rodahl and Ådne Søndral https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bfrGsnP6lTw • National televison TV2: Grouse hunt with Vebjørn Rodahl and Gerhard Heiberg. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45O0CJHFA_U • Discovery Channel has recently made a programme for the TV series ‘Marooned with Ed Stafford’. The programme will be broadcast on TV in autumn 2016. Link coming soon. Anders Lamberg has made a film from one of our watercourses, Urvold. Lamberg is one of Norway’s most capable underwater photographers. Parts of this film have been used in nature programmes for NRK, the BBC and Japanese television. You can see it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8oE4VyakmJI 2 The area The Plahte Estate is situated in the far south of Nordland, on the border with North Trøndelag. The Plahte Estate is one of the largest privately owned properties in Norway. The total area is approx. 685 km2, and it is thus approx. 40% larger than Oslo county. Although the area is large, the area of productive forest is no more than approx. 50 km2. This, combined with low lumber prices and difficult terrain, means that the main business is arranging hunting, fishing and nature experiences. On the estate there are four different watercourses and a range of habitats from coastal to high mountain. There are several areas that are protected due to their unique biology. 3 The story of the Plahte Estate The story began when Julius Jakhelln from Bodø bought up large forests in Bindal in the 1870s. He started a sawmill at Risøya at the end of Bindalsfjorden to obtain timber for his Spanish timber company. Frithjof Plahte had established himself as a timber merchant in England but moved to Høvik when he, in 1877, went into partnership with his childhood friend Jakhelln. Together they became pioneers for several major Norwegian industrial enterprises. The Spanish timber company changed its name to ‘La Compania de Maderas’ and sailing ships from both Spain and England sourced much of their timber from Risøya. In 1885 the forests of Bindal were thinned out and Risøybruket was closed, at the same time as the Norwegian Parliament adopted a ban on the export of timber from northern Norway. Sawmills and buildings were sold and Frithjof Plahte took over sole responsibility for the estate, which had now become more of an expense than something that generated income. Frithjof Plahte died in 1899 and his widow, Marie Plahte, was left with the estate. She was very attached to Bindal, spent her summers in Terråk and had an unusually large concern for everything and everyone in Bindal right until her death in 1937. In 1908 she handed over the Plahte Estate to her sons Viktor and Herbert Frithjof. They were both bankers and without forestry education, but timber export from Northern Norway was allowed again and the forests had grown well since Risøybruket’s time. They therefore employed a forest manager and had a small sawmill built in Terråk that was named Bindalsbruket. Herbert Frithjof died in 1914 and his son, Frithjof Möinichen, was the sole beneficiary of Herbert’s half of the estate. In connection with the major economic crash in the 1920s, Viktor Plahte mortgaged and later lost his half of the Bindal estate. In 1931 it was bought back by Frithjof Möinichen who in the same year married Asta Poulsson. They moved to Terråk and began construction of the new Bindalsbruket with electricity plants, sawmills, planing mill, carpentry factory, docks, etc. Plahte was a trained forester and became a pioneer in northern Norwegian cultural forestry. Asta and Frithjof M Plahte’s son, Frithjof Herbert, took over in 1964 and further developed the business and the estate. Expansion and modernization measures resulted in the company becoming as efficient as others in the industry. Economic conditions nevertheless meant that the industry encountered difficulties in the 1970s. That in addition to central political industrial decisions made it necessary to refinance the business in 1976. The industry was spun off as a separate company, Bindalsbruket AS, which unfortunately went bankrupt in 2013. Simone and Frithjof H Plahte’s son, Frithjof Möinichen Plahte, and his wife, Linda Arlén Flåten Plahte, are the fifth generation to manage the Plahte Estate. They are the third generation to live permanently in Terråk. In 2004 Frithjof took over the estate, and operate it today with the same long-term management as the generations before them. Linda and Frithjof M have three children: Asta Marie, Inger Arlén and Frithjof Erik. Here you can see a couple of old films from the 1930s that show old Terråk and the start of Bindalsbruket: Bindalsbruket in its infancy, part 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vT4w-btIADU Bindalsbruket in its infancy, part 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGytAnJlTkg 4 5 BEFORE ARRIVAL Booking, payment and cancellation Once you have decided on your destination and cabin, you will receive an order confirmation, an invoice and a product description that provides practical information about the place you are going to. Within the first 7 days after booking you have the right to cancel the agreement and receive a full refund. After this period you are bound by the agreement and must pay the rental amount, regardless of whether you use your rights to hunt/fish under the agreement or not. You still have the right to terminate the agreement if illness or other circumstances beyond your control make it impossible to make use of the agreement. In that case the Plahte Estate will retain a cancellation fee equivalent to 10% of the rental fee providing that there is more than 8 weeks left until the agreed arrival date. For cancellations less than 8 weeks before the agreed arrival, the entire rental sum is payable. If the Plahte Estate is able to obtain other tenants for the agreed period, you are entitled to a refund of an amount equal to the rental price that the Plahte Estate obtained from the new tenant, minus the deposit. The refund must not exceed the amount you originally paid. What is found at the cabin? For detailed information: see product sheet for that cabin. Duvets and pillows: With the exception of Glømmen and Kalvvatn, these are found in all cabins, but in many of the cabins an additional mountain shelter is included, so it can be sensible to bring a sleeping bag. Bedclothes: Included for Sagmestereidet, Kalbekkvika and Fra Granbostad Urvold. For many of the other cabins you can rent bedclothes if you wish. Bring your own towel/s. Candles, paraffin lamps, paraffin, propane gas, firewood: Available in all cabins. Kitchen equipment, cutlery, utensils, detergents, toilet paper, matches: Available in all cabins. Solar panel with USB charger and 230 V converter: Available in most cabins.