Where to stay in Prestfoss
Beds in Prestfoss are few, the way of a small valley centre, and most rooms gather in and around the village core near Holmen kirke where guesthouses and rooms stand within reach of the shops and the road through Sigdal. The centre suits those who want the museum and the parish church close at hand. It is the practical base.
Out along the valley road toward Lauvlia, cabins and holiday houses sit among the farms and the wooded slopes, handy for travellers who come for the Theodor Kittelsen home and the quiet country of the southern part of Buskerud. These fill in the warm months. Further off, scattered rooms and farm stays spread through the parishes around Vatnås kirke and the side valleys, a thin and quiet stock for visitors touring Sigdal by car.
Reserve ahead in summer, when the cabins of this rural municipality in Buskerud draw walkers and museum visitors to the valley.
About Prestfoss
What is Prestfoss known for?
Prestfoss serves as the administrative centre of Sigdal, gathering the offices and shops of the valley around its small core. Lauvlia draws the visitors. The home and studio of the painter Theodor Kittelsen stands a short way from the village as a museum to his work, the chief sight of this corner of Buskerud.
Nearby the old wooden Holmen kirke marks the parish, and Vatnås kirke stands among the farms to the side, two churches that fix Prestfoss as the meeting point of a scattered rural municipality in the southern part of Buskerud.
What are the main landmarks in Prestfoss?
Lauvlia is the landmark of Prestfoss. The painter Theodor Kittelsen built his home and studio here, and the house now stands as a museum to the artist who drew Norway's folk tales, the chief draw of the valley. The parish keeps old churches too.
Holmen kirke, a protected wooden church, marks the centre of Sigdal, while Vatnås kirke and the smaller Solumsmoen kapell stand among the farms and side valleys of this rural municipality in the southern part of Buskerud.
What is the history of Prestfoss?
Prestfoss grew where the valley road and the church drew the farms of Sigdal together. The old wooden Holmen kirke fixed the parish at the heart of the valley, and the scattered farms looked to it and to the smaller Vatnås kirke for their worship, the village taking shape slowly as the meeting point and market of this rural reach of Buskerud. Farming carried the place.
Timber and the land made the living of Sigdal through the long centuries before the roads improved. The painter Theodor Kittelsen brought the valley its wider name. He built his home Lauvlia near Prestfoss and worked there on the drawings of trolls and folk tales that fixed his picture of Norway, and the house was later opened as a museum that carries his memory.
Prestfoss settled into its role as the administrative centre of Sigdal, the seat of the municipality where the offices, the shops and the church of the valley gathered in the southern part of Buskerud.
Where is Prestfoss?
Prestfoss lies in the Sigdal valley in the southern part of Buskerud, in south-eastern Norway. The village sits among wooded slopes and farmland where the valley road gathers the scattered settlements, the small core set near Holmen kirke and the river that runs through the valley floor. Forest closes in around it.
The municipality of Sigdal reaches up the side valleys and over the ridges, taking in the farms and the churches of Vatnås kirke and the country toward Lauvlia, a thinly settled land of woods and water in this corner of Buskerud.
What is the climate of Prestfoss?
Prestfoss has the cold, clear-aired inland climate of the valleys of eastern Norway. Winters run long and snowy, the frost settling hard in the Sigdal valley and the snow lying deep over the wooded slopes and the farms through the dark months. Summers are short and green.
The valley warms quickly under the long northern daylight, the woods around Lauvlia and the river drawing walkers in the brief warm season, while the high ground keeps the air cool and the nights fresh across this corner of Buskerud.
How do you get to Prestfoss?
Prestfoss is reached by road through the Sigdal valley. The main valley road carries the traffic up from the larger towns of Buskerud to the south, passing the farms and bringing travellers to the village core near Holmen kirke. Most arrive by car.
There is no railway in the valley, and visitors drive in to reach the museum at Lauvlia and the country of Sigdal, while the wider airports and rail of eastern Norway lie well to the south for those coming from further off to this part of Buskerud.