Where to stay in Moen
Moen splits its lodging between the inland village and the ski heights above it. The center of Moen holds the everyday rooms, gathered near Målselv Church and the kommune offices, and it suits you if you want to be in the seat of Målselv Municipality within reach of its shops and the locality of Heggelia. Beds in the village are few.
Most are guesthouses and rooms let by farms, and a traveller arriving without a booking in a busy week may find the village booked out, with little spare lodging nearby. Målselv fjellandsby offers the alpine alternative, a mountain resort of cabins and apartments above the village that fills through the ski season and suits skiers wanting lifts from the door. The slopes empty when the snow goes.
Moen stays a quiet base near Målselv Church and the chapel at Heggelia, chosen by visitors who want an inland Troms village rather than a coastal town, with the resort beds above for the winter weeks.
About Moen
What is Moen known for?
Moen is known as the seat of Målselv Municipality, the village where the kommune keeps its offices in the western part of Troms. It is a small inland settlement. Målselv Church stands among the houses, while the mountain resort of Målselv fjellandsby draws skiers to the heights above, and the listed Heggelia kapell serves the neighbouring locality of Heggelia.
Church, chapel, and ski hill mark the three poles of the place.
What are the main landmarks in Moen?
Målselv Church anchors Moen, a listed timber church serving the parish from the floor of the settlement. It carries the kommune's name. Up on the heights stands Målselv fjellandsby, the mountain resort whose pistes and cabins draw winter visitors above the village.
The small Heggelia kapell, a second listed building, serves the nearby locality of Heggelia, and between the three the seat of Målselv Municipality keeps its parish church, its chapel, and its ski slopes within a short reach of one another.
What is the history of Moen?
Moen grew as an inland farming settlement in the western part of Troms, where families could work the land away from the coast. The far north drew settlers slowly. They cleared the forest and the terraces of Målselv, and as the scattered holdings of the district needed a common point, Moen gathered the church, the shops, and in time the offices of the kommune to itself.
Målselv Church served the parish. Its timber walls, and the small chapel that followed at Heggelia, mark the religious life of a farming district that answered for centuries to the parishes and the crown of northern Norway. The two listed buildings still stand.
Through the twentieth century Moen became the recognised seat of Målselv Municipality, the village where the kommune's business is done, the largest of its inland settlements. Skiing arrived with the resort at Målselv fjellandsby, built on the mountain above the village for winter guests, and the old farm parish found itself serving travellers as well as its own people. Moen keeps both inheritances, the listed church and chapel below and the lit ski slopes above, as the administrative center of Målselv Municipality.
Where is Moen?
Moen lies inland in the western part of Troms, in northern Norway, where the forested ground of Målselv flattens into farm land. The village is small. Its houses and farms spread over barely more than a square kilometre, with the mountain resort of Målselv fjellandsby on the heights above and the locality of Heggelia close at hand.
The land runs back from the coast here, away from the fjords and islands of the seaboard, and Moen sits as the inland seat of Målselv Municipality among the slopes of the far north.
What is the climate of Moen?
The inland setting shapes Moen's weather. Lying well back from the open coast in the western part of Troms, the village runs colder and stiller in winter than the islands of the seaboard, with snow holding long on the ground and the slopes above from autumn into spring. Polar nights close in.
The dark weeks of midwinter give way to a midnight sun that lights the settlement through the short, cool northern summer, when the forest around Moen and the heights at Målselv fjellandsby lose their snow. Frost can touch the ground late.
How do you get to Moen?
Moen is reached by road through the inland country of Troms. Most travellers drive in from the regional routes that thread northern Norway, following the road to the seat of Målselv Municipality, with buses on the same route serving Moen and the locality of Heggelia. No railway runs here.
The regional airfields of inner Troms handle the flights, and from them the road bends inland to Moen and Målselv Church. Winter driving needs studded tyres on these roads.