It was a busy winter in the Australian Alps this year running Introductory Mountaineering and Ice Climbing courses.  Thanks to everyone who came along and enjoyed the beauty and exhilaration of the mountains with me.    

I’ve spent the last few months training for a return to the Brooks Range to reattempt a winter traverse of the length of the range.  My expedition partner will again be Neil Ward from Wales.

It’s been a fun year sourcing and designing equipment better suited to the extreme conditions of the Arctic Winter including partnering with Mont Adventure Equipment in Canberra to build the warmest sleeping bags and down clothing I’ve ever used on any expedition and testing a range of stoves in a -80C freezer at the Australian National University.

We’ll take different ski poles, tents, stoves, sleeping bags, insulated clothing and purpose built windsuits instead of jacket and pant shellwear.  I’ve changed my mittens and added a pair of insulated overboots from Spain to fit my -70C ski boots.  While nothing can be guaranteed in temperatures down to -60C and lower, plus windchill, we are feeling much more confident about our ability to cope with the conditions.

Once underway, our ability to upload pictures and information will be very limited due to the need to preserve battery power as much as possible in the dark of the Arctic Winter but we’ll post updates to my FACEBOOK PAGE   with links to Google Earth so you can see our progress.  Hopefully the sun will finally come up to a useful height about mid way through the expedition and we may then be able to recharge our devices using solar power.

Have a great Christmas and New Year.  I hope to be able to report success at the end of the adventure but in the mean time I’d like to pay particular thanks to the following organisations for their generous support: