Wow! Antarctica has truly lived up to the great expectations that I had heard over the years. We sailed down on a 75ft boat from Ushuaia called the Australis and crossed the Drake passage with not too many major problems only a few sea sick crew. The seas were very similar to what they normally experience on the crossing which I would say was very rough! We made the crossing it in 3 days which is a record time for our boat.
Once we got down to the Antarctic Peninsula we got straight onto land and into some ski touring, as the weather looked good once we arrived. We had planned for a fairly mellow first day but it seemed that we ended up getting ourselves onto a fairly steep approach to the top of Jabet peak and then we had a 45-50 degree descent down on nice buffed snow. The next summit was Mt Demaria. This was a mountain we tried to get on the day before but it was too warm by midday and needed to be on it early in the morning. It was such a great summit, and a really nice corn ski down to the waters edge. It is great to be out in the mountains with Stian and Chris Davenport, they are both are very experienced mountaineers, and am really enjoying being out in the mountains with them both.
This place is truly amazing, have seen so many whales, and penguins and lots of ice bergs! The terrain to ski is unlimited and with 2 more weeks of skiing here, I am sure that we are just scratching the surface of what we expect to ski over the next week.
First day climbing Mt. Jabet. Stian Hagen in the lead.
On the Summit of Mt. Jabet
Our zodiac ride from the boat
Our ski descent down Mt Demaria
Crossing the Drake Passage!
On the Australis boat crossing the Drake Passage
Andrea Binning
Once we got down to the Antarctic Peninsula we got straight onto land and into some ski touring, as the weather looked good once we arrived. We had planned for a fairly mellow first day but it seemed that we ended up getting ourselves onto a fairly steep approach to the top of Jabet peak and then we had a 45-50 degree descent down on nice buffed snow. The next summit was Mt Demaria. This was a mountain we tried to get on the day before but it was too warm by midday and needed to be on it early in the morning. It was such a great summit, and a really nice corn ski down to the waters edge. It is great to be out in the mountains with Stian and Chris Davenport, they are both are very experienced mountaineers, and am really enjoying being out in the mountains with them both.
This place is truly amazing, have seen so many whales, and penguins and lots of ice bergs! The terrain to ski is unlimited and with 2 more weeks of skiing here, I am sure that we are just scratching the surface of what we expect to ski over the next week.
First day climbing Mt. Jabet. Stian Hagen in the lead.
On the Summit of Mt. Jabet
Our zodiac ride from the boat
Our ski descent down Mt Demaria
Crossing the Drake Passage!
On the Australis boat crossing the Drake Passage
Andrea Binning
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