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RiggerLee

Baffin pic's from last year

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Words cannot convey how impressive what you did is. I've done my share of mountaineering, but man, that is a whole new level of survival and existence. MAD props rigger Lee.

-- (N.DG) "If all else fails – at least try and look under control." --

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Where in the arctic wasteland did you pack your parachute?

How many jumps did you make?
Looks like a death sandwich without the bread - Steve Deadman Morrell, BASE 174

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You pack on the sea ice. Just throw a tarp out. For the most part it's not a problem. There are some areas where the snow is very soft. Where water has formed on top of the ice below the snow and eroaded it from below. Basicly quick sand. Even then if you can pack at "night" it's often cool enough for the crust to suport you so you don't sink in.
Totaly lost the weather gamble last year. About every six years they have a year like that where it just never seems to stop snowing. I don't know the mecanisem. Sounds like an El nino kind of thing. Basicly I'd have nice weather, get a jump then it would turn nasty. I'd pack up and head for another cliff along the way it would get nice but I'd just be out on the ice. I get to The Prow and the weather turns bad again and I'm stuck for a week waiting. Nice Day and I get a jump then the wind picks up So I start humping. Of course then the weather gets nice again. I get into the pass across Remote and I get stuck in this nasty ground fog. I could see up at the sky but not the mountians on eather side and only about thirty feet on the ground. So I was trying to navagate "IFR" by the angle of the sun. The whole time expecting to see a bear charge from out side the range of my vision. They love bad weather and hunt by sound and smell. It got bad enough that I was stuck there for a couple of days. Then just as I get to the end of the pass to Hangover Hill I get cought in a storm for about a week. Did I mention that a bear got into I cash I droped off on the way out? So for the last four weeks I was on 1/4 rations. Damn bears. Ate every thing but the hot chocolate. Thank god for Swiss Miss. Storm sucked then it was perfect, dead calm and blue skys. Pulled the rest of the way to the cliff took a knap and started climbing. There was a lot of snow droped by the last storm. Slow going.
I got to the top and the weather was still nice but you could see some wind in the clouds. Did some rock drops and geared up. As I did the wind started to pick up. Still not bad. I mean it's a big wall with a seven mile wide landing area. So I was playing the lul game for a while. Got I nice lul and decided to go. This is when I triped and fell right on my face on the edge. You got to see the video. Be advised the camera from which you can see the edge was on my hip not my head. Just about gave my self a heart attack. The wind is still not real bad maybe 15 but the landing area is huge and you can open high and fly well away from the wall. So I talked my self into going, did not want to walk dow. This is the Famous jump number three. Short delay. Flew away from the wall at about 1000ft I hit the shear layer. Bad turbulance. The wind was NOT blowing above me and comeing down. It was blowing down in the bottom and comeing up. The gust were pulling the canopy over side ways level with my body in flight. For the record that big Flick that Jimmy was kind enough to loan me for the trip never once folded up. That was a very nice canopy. There were a lot of things I liked about it but I will not degress on to that subject right now. I got just as far away from that cliff as that canopy would take me, nice glide by the way, before turning into the wind. Backing up faster then I normally fly forwards. Canopy touched down just fine then the ride began. I really really wish I'd taken the time to build three rings for that rig. I started hauling in on a break line till the cascade jammed in the ring. Wrapped the line around my boot and used it to pull the line down till it poped through and I could climb up and get ahold of the tail. It didn't stop dragging me till I was pulled ontop of the canopy. The canopy was so big, 265, and the lines so short that half the canopy was still at line stretch and that alone was enough to drag me. You got to see the Video. I was tempted to let it go for a while it was actually takeing me towards my camp. but the consiquences of hitting a stray jaggad peice of ice sticking up out of the snow were just two scary. I'm guessing the drag line was 150-200 yards as it was. When I looked back it went further then I could see. Best guess was stedy 50 mph with gust pushing 70mph.
I got back to my tent. I put it up where it was some what sheltered behind a point but there was also a glacier there and some times the wind would come down of that and try to flatten the tent. I spent the next couple of days in it as every thing melted around me. It was a warm wind blowing down off the land and all the snow was melting around me into a lake on the ice. I lost most of my ankers and had to pull the pole from the vestibule. In the end I was just tied into a couple of ice screws. Wish I had a few more with me. Never leave home with out them.
In the end all was fine. The north face Mountian tent held togather and came through with flying colors. A calm sunny day melted what little snow remained and between the sun and the wind most of the watter was cleared off the ice. It was a nice cool night and most of what remained refroze. Illko came by and picked me up around three AM and we headed back to Clyde. So ends the third great saga of northen exploreation.
Sorry didn't mean the answer to be so long.

Lee
Lee
[email protected]
www.velocitysportswear.com

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That's beautiful and terrifying. I could not imagine traversing the arctic solo for so long. My father used to say "patience comes to those who wait."

I once tripped on exit off a 350 foot cliff. Darn pebbles...

How did you jump down with extra gear?
Looks like a death sandwich without the bread - Steve Deadman Morrell, BASE 174

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"The Alpine Pack" Copy rite Lee Hardesty 2000

I've done diffrent things over the years but for the last trip I took the Alpine with me. Imagion a combanation internal frame back pack and base rig. It will cary tent small bag, stove, pot to melt watter and cook, foam pad, ice tools, poles, exter cloathing, food and some climbing gear. Yes it is just as scarry as it sounds. I ment to redesign it before I left but didn't get to it.

Lee
Lee
[email protected]
www.velocitysportswear.com

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if u take me lee ill bring mine and ill keep u warm at night
ill bring a wig and dress as well.
TOSS MY SALAD
I'm an invincible re-tarded ninja
derka derka bakala bakala muhammad jihad
1072

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I'm from Texas. My homophobea alarms will not even alow me to fully decifer your post. It's like Norton My mind just wont go there. If you want to come on this trip you can but you will not under any cercomstances be sleeping in my tent. And be advised that I do not have near enough rope to pull you off one of those faces.

Lee
Lee
[email protected]
www.velocitysportswear.com

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LOTS of respect for that. Are you going to be making a video or writing a trip report? (or book, for that matter...)

Baffin island is one of my goals... someday I hope to bring back pictures of my own :) Thanks for the inspiration :)
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"Hey, these cookies don't taste anything like girl scouts..."

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I didn't get as much video as I would have liked from the last trip. the battery charger had a melt down and I was left with only the batteries that I had with me. I was going to film every thing as it turns out I got more then I was expecting about six houres. Most of the stuff I filmed lacks a lot of the B roll kind of footage that would go in to makeing a film and you don't get the best shots when your alone.
I'll often keep a journal on my trips. Depending on the trip it may or may not be long and may or may not be very compleat. As you will note my spelling is not much better then Magots. I'm probable not the best person to write a book but the real problem is that I've never really had any thing bad happen on my trips so there isn't really a good dramatic story line to any of them. I'd like to get some more people up there this year and try to get enough footage for a real fim about the place.

Lee
Lee
[email protected]
www.velocitysportswear.com

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Hey Lee,
My name is Doug and my girl friend and I are interested in making a Baffin trip. We are currently in Houston right now but have been living in Norway (Elin is the instructor at Kjerag) We do a lot of 3-6000ft vertical climbing when we jump the mountains of central norway. I have to be honest, I have never done an artic expidition but we manage Norway in the winter and lots of climbing in the summer (no pussy's here) Most of our experience is big wall base (around 350-450 jumps for each of us) Let me know what your looking for. We will be going back to Norway for the summer to work at Kjerag again (june-august) if that helps. Other than that, we are free until that time.

Doug

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