StraightChuter.com - Backcountry Skiing & Beyond » baffin http://straightchuter.com Backcountry Skiing & Beyond by Andrew McLean Thu, 01 Jul 2010 05:04:27 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=abc Sunday Photo – Midnight Kiting in Sam Ford Fjord http://straightchuter.com/2008/08/sunday-photo-midnight-kiting-in-sam-ford-fjord/ http://straightchuter.com/2008/08/sunday-photo-midnight-kiting-in-sam-ford-fjord/#comments Sun, 31 Aug 2008 11:00:12 +0000 Andrew http://www.straightchuter.com/?p=859 Expeditions can be a ton of hard work and heavy hauling. A friend once described this as “the blue-collar” part of the sport, which I often think about when I’m crushed with a heavy load.

Full-speed ahead in the Sam Ford Fjord area of Baffin Island, right near Swiss Bay.
Full-speed ahead in the Sam Ford Fjord area of Baffin Island, right near Swiss Bay.

This photo was taken during one of the moments when we dumped all of our heavy gear, stripped down to nothing more than skis and a kite (well, and clothes, it was cold) and went out for a mega kiting session just for the fun of it. Baffin Island is way up north in the Arctic Circle where it stays light 24 hours a day at this time of year. This photo was taken after we had eaten dinner and were getting ready to sleep, but the wind and snow conditions were so perfect that we went out for a midnight kiting session I’ll never forget.

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]]> http://straightchuter.com/2008/08/sunday-photo-midnight-kiting-in-sam-ford-fjord/feed/ 0 Photo Gallery – 2002 Baffin Island http://straightchuter.com/2008/08/photo-gallery-2002-baffin-island/ http://straightchuter.com/2008/08/photo-gallery-2002-baffin-island/#comments Sat, 30 Aug 2008 11:00:30 +0000 Andrew http://www.straightchuter.com/?p=852 I’m slowly organizing my photo galleries and just got around to adding one of my all time favorite trips to StraightChuter.com – Baffin Island 2002. This was a great trip in a lot of ways. For one, we had no idea what to expect for skiing, and it turned out to be some of the best couloirs ever. We were also experiementing with kites (theme of the moment) and they worked out perfectly. Plus, I had a great time with Brad, the scenery blew me away and it was a special treat/honor to meet the Inuits, both in Clyde River and out on The Land.

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]]> http://straightchuter.com/2008/08/photo-gallery-2002-baffin-island/feed/ 5 Sunday Photo – Baffin Island Iceberg Camp http://straightchuter.com/2008/06/sunday-photo-baffin-island-iceberg-camp/ http://straightchuter.com/2008/06/sunday-photo-baffin-island-iceberg-camp/#comments Sun, 22 Jun 2008 11:00:17 +0000 Andrew http://www.straightchuter.com/?p=97 Editors Note: Sundays are meant for skiing, climbing, riding and almost anything but sitting in front of a computer.  Still, the Internet never sleeps and Sunday’s are a good time for ski mountaineering photos and the story behind them.

Baffin Island Iceberg Camp – 2002

Brad Barlage booting up the Model T couloir. Baffin Island

While watching a Mike Libecki slideshow on Big Wall climbing in Baffin Island, I kept catching glimpses of tasty looking couloirs in the background of scenic photos and wondered if they were skiable.  As it turned out, most of the descents off of the huge vertical walls were by walking/sliding down nearby couloirs.  When I asked another skier/climber who had been to Baffin how many of these couloirs there were in the area, he said “Oh God! Hundreds!”  That was all the info needed to start planning a trip to the area.

In 2002, Brad Barlage and I spent four weeks in the Sam Ford Fjord area of Baffin Island doing some of the best skiing of our lives.  In this photo, we had moved camp to an area with 3-4 chutes in it and found a melted out iceberg which had drifted over from Greenland.  It’s good to camp near icebergs as they are a source of clean water for melting, but in this case, we were worried about an avalanche coming down the couloir and nailing the berg like a perfect catcher’s mitt, burying us in the process.

In the end, it was just too cool a campsite to pass up and the snow was stable enough that we spent two nights camped there.  At one point, some of the berg itself calved off and almost hit Brad, but aside from that, it was excellent.

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