Atacama Desert

After 2 months in New Zealand it was time for me to head off again. Heading South for another Antarctic season. However, I wanted a little adventure on the way. For some time I wanted to see the Atacama Desert. Some places have a special ring to it and for me the Atacama was always such a place, distant and full of mystery. So I took the opportunity and spent 6 days there. , Photographing, sweating and exploring the area. The landscape is truly stunning. Already when arriving in San Pedro de Atacama from the nearest airport in Calama I was blown away. You enter through the Valley of Dinosaurs and pass the Valley of Deaths, red rock formation that look like sleeping stego sauruses. The Moon valley for sunset was my next destination. Piedras Rochas, the red rocks close to a salt lagoon on the high Plateau at 4200m was my favourite. Mainly because I only had o share this scenery with 7 others. All other places around San Pedro are crowded with tourists.  In the salt water lagoon which is apparently saltier than the dead sea I floated, feet up in the air. At Laguna Chaxa I aw my first flamingos. I explored the nigh sky with telescopes, its a dark sky reserve and one of the biggest radio telescope stations, ALMA, is just being build there. In town I met a meteorite collector who spent 25 years trawling the desert for meteorites and who now exhibits them in a funky museum that looks like a giant golf ball. The Rainbow Valley was impressive because of all the different colours in the rocks, caused by different minerals. 

Two months in New Zealand

The time between the end of the Arctic and the beginning of the Antarctic season is always very short and for it meant that I would be just 7 weeks in New Zealand. During that I time I needed to catch up with friends and work at home and squeeze in as many adventures with Stuart as I could. On our first proper weekend we went to Te Anau in the South Island, visiting Luxmore Hut and ploughing through knee-deep snow up to Mt Luxmore. The caves close to the hut were also worth a visit. We crawled and walked in for 30 minutes and still didn’t reach the end.

Another weekend was spent going up to the Central Plateau of the North Island. Snow had got quite thin by then but undeterred we lugged our touring skis up Mt Ngauruhoe. This was my first ski run of the season and I was a bit nervous about that not having been on skis for nearly two years but conditions were great. We had a few runs down into the crater before skiing down all the way from the top of Mt Ngauruhoe. My leg muscles were burning by the time I reached the bottom, but there was more to be done and so we skinned across the plateau und up Mt Tongariro. Unfortunately the clouds came in the start of our ski run was more feeling than seeing the slope. This was to be my last ski run of this season because summer was on its way and already next day we swapped skis against paddles and kayaked across Wellington harbour. On ward Island then had my swim in the season. Oh, I love New Zealand in spring, when in one weekend you can be skiing and kayaking.

More kayaking trips followed. An evening trips with a picnic out on Ward Island and a 70km kayaking tour at Labour weekend at the Coromandel Peninsula. We kayaked from Kuaotunu to Opoutere in brilliant weather. A little bit of head wind on our first day but nice tailwind most of the time. On our paddle we were accompanied by gannets that darted into the water mere meters away, little blue penguins, shags and I even saw a Kingfisher. The coastline is extremely beautiful between Hahei and Hot Water Beach and we took time to poke in all the sea caves and even paddled through a tunnel that cuts under a rocky headland.

Back in Wellington and being kayaking fit we then circumnavigated Kapiti Island as a day trip, leaving from Paraparumu Beach. This is a ~30km trip. The catch is that you are not allowed to land on Kapiti Island so we were in our kayaks for five hours. We had fantastic conditions and took our time, eating a nice sushi lunch and exploring the coastline. The swell at the southern tip of the island was small and allowed us to kayak through a large rock arch. On the northern tip of the island ten or more Fur seals were lounging on the rocks. A few were also in the water and it was fantastic to watch the close from the kayak.

Another weekend was spent with Stuart’s family at Castle Point. I took my new 14mm wide angle lens for a walk and did some star photography. Up again for the sunrise and a nice run along the beach.

Switzerland – The Eiger Northwall

Sometimes a place can lodge itself into your mind. For me that was  the Northwall of the Eiger in Switzerland. I had read books about climbing the Eiger like “The White Spider” and “Eiger Obsession” and since then I wanted to visit this mountain and see for myself this amazing wall of rock.

So this year I took the opportunity when I was in Germany to make my way to Grindelwald to gaze at the Eiger. I only had 3 days there and I was graced with very changeable weather. On my first day it rained and only due to my super human effort to get out of bed early on that day I managed to glimpse the top of the Eiger in the morning light before the clouds rolled in.

The weather forecast for the second day promised for clouds clearing in the afternoon. So reason enough to take a cable car up the First mountain, climb Faulhorn (2686m) and carry on to the Busalp where they make yummy goat cheese. The views across Bachsee to Wetterhorn, Schreckhorn and Finteraarhorn should have been amazing alas it started to snow on me.

Luckily on my third day it was really clear and I took the famous cable car up to Kleine Scheidegg and the Jungfraujoch (3454m). From here I walked to the Mönchsjoch Hütte, really wishing for me skis to go Ski touring from here which looked very tempting.

The Jungfraujoch itself is a bit of a zoom being easily accessible and thousands of people each day visit. Tacky displays in an underground observatory are supposedly there to entertain people when the weather is foul. It soon got on my nerves and I took the train down, getting out at the Eiger Glacier station because here the Eigertrail starts. A great trail passing directly under the Eiger Northwall. Wow! I was quite moved when I finally go to stand under the wall where so many climbing dramas have enfolded.  Luck with the weather meant I great good views and also time to lie in the grass for a while and gaze up the wall before continuing to Alpiglen where a nice beer waited for me.

The Far North – Svalbard, East Greenland and Bjoern Oya

My work as a guide took me again to the Arctic for nine trips. Most of them were spent around Svalbard, but two took me to North-East Greenland and Iceland and one to the remote Bear Island in between Svalbard and Norway.

Early in the season the pack ice prevents trips to the East of Svalbard and this year was especially icy. So we stayed in the west, spending days in the pack ice to look for polar bears. And we were lucky, bears on kills, two male bears wrestling with each other, a male bear that was following a female bear with love on his mind and a super fat male bear who was happy to share the killed seal with a much smaller and skinnier young male. We saw a bear stalking a seal who got away in the very last moment.

In July/August the sea-ice retreats further north and circumnavigations become possible. The tundra is covered in flowers and temperatures are normally quite pleasant. However, many trips were very wet and often views were obscured by clouds, rain dripping down my face while I was trying to enthuse passengers. The weather luck changed with the second Greenland trip and we had day after day sunshine with clear nights to watch auroras.

Having travelled for 3 months on the ship I decided to have two days in Tromso to chase the Northern Lights. In my second night I got lucky and spending the night at Ersfjord 40km away from Tromso I had several hours of Northern Light magic.

Canadian Rocky Mountains – Banff and Jasper National Park

It has been a while since I updated the blog. In the meantime quite a bit happened. I fulfilled a long-time dream and went to visit Banff and Jasper National Park in Canada. On the way to the Arctic I made a stopover there for 3 weeks and went tramping with my friend Linda. Going there in late May early June is very early in the season, especially since they had an unusually late snowfall. So many of the lakes were still frozen, tracks closed due to avalanche danger and some tracks were difficult to walk due to thigh deep soft snow. On the other hand it meant that not many other people were around and that we had campgrounds and tracks to ourselves.

Linda and I started our trip in Canmore and then worked our way to Banff, Lake Loiuse and Jasper. From there a 3 day trip took us to Berg Lake in the shadow of Mt Robson. This was winter wonderland and hardly anybody else was around. Other highlights of our trip were the ascent of Parker Ridge (2550m), Wilcox Pass (2705m), and Paget Lookout (2135m). We soaked in Miette Hotsprings when the weather was bad and hired mountain bikes to ride the Overlander Trail to Beauvert Lake from Jasper.

Encounters with the wildlife there were exciting. At Jasper tramway car park with saw a Grizzly mother with her cub and on the Overland Trail we had to backtrack and throw ourselves in the bushes because a black bear was using the bridge we just intended to cross.

Mornings and evenings were spent chasing sunrise and sunset light. Laker Herbert proved to be a gem for that, easy accessible and nice reflections of the mountains in the calm water.