UKC

Hi I'm looking for suggested bases for a first time trip to norway. I want to stay in a full service hut where I can do day trips from. Ideally I would like a mix of easy tours, easy mountain trips and some track skiing. I'm new to ski mountaineering and relatively new to piste skiing ( ok on reds). Thanks

Touring in Norway tends to Nordic skiing not ski mountaineering, but somewhere like Finse or Geilo in the Hardanger area would fit.

Nope. There are 1000km of tracked skiing, some meccas like nordseter etc.. But also 1000s of hills you can plod up and off piste your way down. It's a vast wilderness of highland plateaus plus some amazing 1000-2000m high hills. Dozens of unmanned huts on a master key honesty system, when you can ski tour with just a modest bag, knowing (If you can navigate) you'll get to a hut with a bed and some form of light, firewood and a stocked pantry, where you pay for what you eat on an honesty basis.

Some are linked by tracks(parts of troll trail for example), but you can just as easy head off up hills on your own. And unless precisely stated I wouldn't presume the tracks are freshly machined. 

Leirvassbu in Jotunheimen is a great spot to base yourself in for skitouring, there's no tracked paths/pistes but there are plenty of great peaks and trips right on the doorstep. Plus it's a great hut (hotel really)!

http://uk.rondanevegen.no/spitsbergseter-resort-rondane/

It's very commercial but there are also more remote unmanned huts in the mountains there too. 

Have a look at Jotunheim. Spiterstulen and Leirvassbu are Hotels (of a sort) rather than alpine huts.

day tours from these are fine, not especially difficult, but days tend to be long: both distance and height.

that seems to be the case for Norway: day tours can be easily 1200-1500m ascent and you often need to cover long flat sections - which is why nordic skiing is much the thing.

although alpine-touring (top touring) seems to be becoming more common rather than the traditional Scandinavian pastime of beasting yourself on epic cross-country days before getting bladdered in an unmanned log cabin in the middle of nowhere.

We stayed at the Hovringen Fjellstue. Several other excellent Mountain hostels close by.

X-country skiing on prepared as well as offpiste undulating hillside. 

A stay in a fully service hut is very pricey. I would recommend you join an organised trip instead, like one of those ski and sail trips, eg in Sunnmøre. Or up oi Lyngen. Probably won't cost you much more, and you'll have a far better trip than trying to find worthwhile outings that are easy and safe enough for you yet still fun with decent snow.

I get seasick and the organised trips i have looked at want you to be an expert skier

I think that depends on where you go and what you want. I've only ever done ski mountaineering on quite a few week long trips to Norway over the last 20 years, although I've only ever gone north of the Arctic circle.

Lyngen though does seem very popular nowadays compared to when I first went - virtually everyone you see is on skimo or proper downhill tele gear.

Must be, when I go I still see most people on Nordic gear.

Ski touring is big in Norway and getting bigger. They've just started offering ski touring as a sports specialism in high school. If your ski tour has a long approach you've probably picked the wrong mountain, there's endless possibilities for tours going straight up from the car. Kilian Jornet just posted one for example

To the OP, do you have mountaineering skills? How much experience do you have in traveling safely in the mountains? Will you be on your own? 

Ok, and when do you plan to visit? Will you have a car? Your requirements are quite difficult to meet, because most of the catered huts are not in the best locations for ski touring, and even if they are, they generally don't open fully until Easter. Also, the huts locations are more suited to fjellski outings, i.e. flatter trips. I usually find a more convenient place on airbnb or finn.no, and the drive to a start point. But that gets a bit expensive on your own.

I think the Jotunheimen suggestions are good ones if you go in April or May. I'm mostly familiar with the Møre og Romsdal area, and I can only suggest places that require a car to get around.

We had a good few days in the DNT Rondvassbu hut (four hours north of Oslo). There's some nice tours and easy peaks in the area, and miles of groomed cross country tracks. Food is great and its a really nice place to stay. Only full service for certain periods of the year.  

I'd also recommend looking at Senja and the Lyngen peninsula – you can get full service at "Magic Mountain Lodge" (expensive) and "Lyngen Lodge" (very expensive). Full service in Norway is never going to be cheap.

If you would consider good quality self catering, I'd highly recommend "Senja Lodge & Mountain Guides". Senja is amazing for day touring. And also "Lyngen Mountain Holidays". I stayed at both last year and can't recommend them enough. 

If your going to be on your own & have little ski touring experience I'd suggest somewhere like Finse (easy access by train) or the eastern Jotunheim using the DNT huts (access by bus from Oslo). Alternatively you could join one of the DNT led trips - I've never done this but have friends who have & enjoyed them.

But think twice about going on your own