Secret Cabins

We are two guys who brought our surfboards, turned off our cellphones, and walked out here in September 2019.


A secret cabin is a shelter that at some point in its history has been kept hidden from someone. These hidden shelters can be found across the deep forests and vast mountains all over the country. Wanderers, hunters, gatherers, fishermen, refugees, tramps, and resistance fighters, have all built in places where none else walks. Some of them have become known to the public, like the one in Northern Norway we visited this summer, but others are so hidden that almost none knows about them, and probably never will. 



Inge Wegge and Jørn Nyseth Ranum spent nine months in an unhabitable and isolated bay above the arctic circle to surf some of the greatest waves in the world. They built their cabin out of driftwood and other cast-off materials that washed up on the secluded shore, while they ate expired food the stores would otherwise throw away.

While their primary goal was to catch amazing surf, they experienced one of the most mystical and secretive traits about Norwegian culture. The following words can be found hanging in their abandoned shelter in Lofoten: 


«We are two guys who brought our surfboards, turned off our cellphones and walked out here in September 2010. We lived here one winter to follow a dream: surfing, and live a simple simple. We gathered drift wood, bottles for insulation and rocks, -everything from this beach, and made an environmentally friendly home. It was a cold winter with lots of storms, but the fireplace made out of an oil barrel kept us warm. We truly lived by the saying: «Rich life – simple means»! You are welcome to use everything here, and we hope you enjoy and respect it. Want to do your share? Pick up some garbage, chop som wood, enjoy the silence.»

Inge Wegge and Jørn Nyseth Ranum


“We lived here one winter to follow a dream:
surf, and live a simple life.”

Inge Wegge and Jørn Nyseth Ranum made a film about their experience.

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