TR: Summer of sorts.

So while not the most epic skiingwise, I’ve had an eventful couple of months and figured I’d share. Forgive the high percentage of NSR content..

Music:

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Summer at home was pleasant enough.
It involved some wildlife,

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sleeping rough,
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some field work,
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And looking at light.
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While still trying to figure out how to arrange my quasi-annual South America pilgrimage, I happened on a chance to go to Nepal for three weeks working with some people doing research on a glacier in the Dhaulagiri region. I had a couple of days on either end in Kathmandu, the rest of the time was spent getting to and from the mountain and on the glacier.

I’d never been anywhere near the Himalayas and while not skiing or even generally personal entertainment related, it was a pretty cool experience.

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We had a full on, classic expedition style deal with luxuriously large sleeping tents, mess tents, a toilet tent, 2 or even three warm meals per day and lots of people. We had about 1 ton of gear that needed to be carried from 2500m to 5300m. This involved a total of 64 porters and sherpas, about 20 of which stayed with us the whole time. It was extremely weird having them constantly around trying to serve you in some way and carrying all our shit, but I suppose that’s just the way it works in this context.

The rest of our team was almost entirely Nepali and I shared a tent with a girl my age who works for an engineering company that makes climate stations. She had never seen a glacier or snow before.

Supposedly the deepest gorge in the world, between the Annapurna and Dhaulagiri ranges. A landslide had taken out a stretch of road and everyone took the scenic way for a little bit.
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Porters
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Our first camp
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Annapurna south behind Nilgiri
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Tukuche peak
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Our camp near the glacier at about 5300m
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First light on Dhaulagiri
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Moving up
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We had some disagreements about what sort of gear is appropriate (note rope around the waist instead of harness).

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some random mountain
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Just short of 6000m

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Find the person.
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My tent buddy and her first ever snow man.
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A horseload of chickens
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Roadside watcher
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Annapurna range from the road
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As for South America, the Nepal trip kind of cut things short a little bit. I would have preferred to go earlier in the season but whatever.

There is a place on the fringes of the Darwin range called Bahia Yendegaia, just across the border from Ushuaia, that I had been wanting to check out for a while. Getting there is kind of complicated because of border issues and general remoteness.

Freak and I would have liked to have at least one other person along but a third friend bailed out short notice and we didn’t manage to convince anyone else to spontaneously join us. We were initially planning on about 2 and a half weeks in the area but had to cut it down to 10 days, including getting to and from Yendegaia, because of communication issues with the ferry company we needed to get us there. It is basically a supply ferry with some space for passengers that runs from Punta Arenas to Puerto Williams once a week and will stop in Yendegaia on request.

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There is a small estancia in the bay. There is one guy that lives there year round catching and taming wild horses and hunting wild cows. There are one or two other people there at times doing I don’t know what and the occasional fishing boat comes to visit. Other than that it’s pretty much the end of the world.

José from the estancia took us inland about three hours by horse and dropped us off in a snowstorm at a nice and sheltered campsite. There are no real maps of the area and information in general is sparse, so we had only a vague plan that consisted mainly of “go and see”. We knew we might spend all our time there sitting out weather in the tent and that even with nice weather we wouldn’t be getting super rad because we had no way of communicating with the outside world and would be in deep shit if either of us so much as twisted a knee. So all in all we weren’t expecting much skiing and had to adjust our ambitions a little because of how things worked out with partners and schedule wise.

We spent 4 nights under this cliff sitting out snow, rain and very, very strong winds.

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Finally we had some ok weather and moved our camp higher and into a side valley going off near the snout of Stoppani glacier.

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The next day was also nice but our route finding attempts were not successful and we got turned around by dense forest, fucking up a chance to ski.

We walked around pant less quite a lot because there was a stream to cross every 100m.

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We did get in a few turns the following day, before having to hike back down to the lower camp to catch our rides out to then catch our boat back to civilisation. We know more now and I have some ideas on how to better pull off a trip to this zone, so perhaps we will get a chance to come back some day.

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Note ocean in the bg.
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Last look back at the elusive promised land (freak’s pic):

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Since we had a few extra days left and had not really skied yet we rented a car and drove from Punta Arenas to Chaltén for some comparatively easy touring. Maps and trails and a town to come back to do make things somewhat less complicated.

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We knew Vespignani from the year before, it is one of the most straight forward options around and sees lots of traffic. We significantly improved our “carrying our skis around to actually skiing” ratio.

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freak’s pics:

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For the last ski attempt of the trip we hiked in to Laguna Torre, camped there and then headed towards Cerro Solo. We got about 2/3rds of the way up and then turned around because of slabby conditions on steeper than we thought terrain above rather large exposure. A little frustrating but still more skiing than we had in Yendegaia and a day in spectacular scenery.

Freak enjoying life.

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Artsy pic by freak:

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That was about as miserable as it looks

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Finally on snow

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Solo on the left.

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Stop in Calafate to watch a rodeo:

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Unplanned extra day in Punta Arenas because of strikes in Spain that caused our flight to be cancelled:

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We took a tourist tour to see a penguin colony on a nearby island. On the boat we met a girl from Iceland, who, after some coaxing, told us she was waiting for flying weather to go to Antarctica, where she will spend 50 days xc skiing alone over 1000km from the tip of the peninsula to the south pole. Great, totally random encounter with a super nice, super humble lady that is a strong contender for ”most badass person I ever met”. Her blog is mostly in icelandic but I’m hoping some pictures will show up when she’s back: http://www.lifsspor.is/

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Plane view, Fitz Roy b-side:
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Perito Moreno glacier
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Hatsa la proxima, Patagonia. I hate you but I love you.


More on Nepal
More on Yendegaia
More on Chalten

Back home now. Sharky, sketchy conditions that can be made to look better than they are…

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But it’s a beginning.

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You just put the Awe in Awesome.

Thanks.

Nice work again Klar, thanks for posting. I spent some time in the that region running the Annapurna circuit back in 2001. Amazing country indeed, doesnt look like much has changed.

not half bad ;)

massive, very impressive

As my good friend Marco would say.... Amazing!

Stunning shots, thanks for sharing.

i heart Klar TR's...

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Yeah, well for my summer I...umm....FML

A-fucking-mazing trip and photos, thanks for sharing!

What an amazing adventure - thanks for posting up.

Great Living!

Awesome - love the pics from the Darwin range

Sometimes I think I'm cool because I live in Colorado and get to play in the mountains a lot. Then I see a stunning TR like this and realize I'm not. Great pics, amazing scenery. I need to travel a bit.

FKNA KLAR.

FKNA x2....

You are my hero!!!! I hope to have another opportunity to enjoy both of your company and epic adventures once again.

Most awesome Mlle Klar

Quote:

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Originally Posted by MotoBeak

I need to travel a bit.

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its basically always cool :D

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Kyle Miller

I hope to have another opportunity to enjoy both of your company and epic adventures once again.

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are you coming back to europe by any chance?

freak~[http://www.freeskiers.net/community/...ilies/fish.gif&http://www.freeskiers.net/community/...lies/ghost.gif]

FKNA x 100.

your job rocks my vacation.

Klar, just so you know, your money would be wasted on photography and writing classes.

Please never say it is time to settle down.

better than a plate of momos. thank you

Super awesome. What an adventure it looks like. Crazy country.

Thanks, Klar!

Fantastic.

That was so rad - thanks for sharing

Bump


are you coming back to europe by any chance?

Aiming for Scandinavia in May. If it happens I will send you more details

thanks for the nice comments all!

kyle: cool, do that. btw: i just got from snowboarding for 9 days straight. i think that will be about enough for the rest of my life :p