Nomad

Alacranes Blog 1

2009-11-06T17:07:00.004-07:00

It’s hard to imagine a place so beautiful and so bountiful can in reality be suffering
At first glance the reef is swarming with life but with a closer look, there is a lot missing. The swarms we see at first are missing some key species. Unlike the meats we eat that come from land, most of the fish we consume are predators. Think about it when you drop a line into the water in hopes of catching dinner you don’t bait your hook with algae or coral, you bait it with fish. The predators are missing I’ve yet to see a shark. Snapper are around but most of them are small specimens. I’ve seen but a few small grouper. This is the largest reef system in the Gulf of Mexico; it should be central breeding ground for these important species, yet they are either absent or very small. The reasons are obvious, fishing boats dot the horizon tourist season brings crowds of 500 or more people to the island at a time and all the while the reef struggles to maintain its ecosystem. On other photographic expeditions I have visited places that are better protected and places that are quite a bit more remote. The feeling that I’ve always had on those trips is that I was in a place where the scales were precariously balanced even leaning slightly more towards catastrophe. I’ve always fought for these places to maintain their ecosystems that are so vital to the entire oceans health. In the Alacranes we are seeing what happens when those scales are tipped drastically, there is little to no protection. It’s beautiful out here, and it’s not too far gone that it can’t be brought back. Without action now, this place will soon become an ocean desert, and there will be no choice but to stop fishing here because there will be nothing left.

Alacranes Blog 2

2009-11-06T17:05:00.004-07:00

We went in search of tiger sharks today. My guide, Ascan, said that he knew of a spot in deep water where they can be seen, so we spent about an hour motoring along the coral until we reached a channel that took us out to the open ocean on the far end of the reef. We dropped anchor in deep blue water. For the first time we were diving in a place too deep to see the bottom.
I was disappointed, I didn’t get to see or photograph any tiger sharks today but we did see a few of the largest grouper I have ever encountered as well as a lobster at least double the size of anything I’d ever seen before. As a kid growing up in Bermuda I can remember my dad donating a lobster to the aquarium that he caught because it was too big to fit in the oven. This monster I saw today was even bigger, big enough that it shared a cave with two grouper that easily weighed in at over 100 pounds. All of these giants were in 165ft of water, the deepest I will probably do on this trip.
It’s a well know fact that these oceanic species that humans have been consuming since we learned how to fish have been getting smaller and smaller in recent times. They cannot live long enough to grow to their full potential before being caught. It is at their full size that they can produce greater numbers of offspring as well, so we humans really don’t seem to be thinking this out too well.
On side note I also saw the largest moray eel I’ve seen, well . . .that I’ve ever seen, on a shallower dive later in the day. He wasn’t too interested in coming out for a photo but judging from what I saw I can say it was well over 10 feet long. Today marked the half-way point of my stay on Alacranes reef. It was a day to see giants. Tomorrow, I go to another even more remote island to do more research for Island Conservation on the invasive plant species that have made it out here.

Alacranes Blog 3

2009-11-06T17:00:00.004-07:00

Did you know that there is a link between sea birds and coral reefs? I didn’t know that until just before came on this photographic expedition. A friend of mine at UCSC put it plainly. Bird droppings, are a fertilizer for coral. I’d never put these things together, and always sort of looked at birds as takers, not givers in the ecological cycle of the ocean.
So, instead of just taking other peoples word for it, I did a little bit observing while I was on Alacranes. I dove well over a dozen different locations on the reef. Some of the dives were greatly separated from the islands which hold colonies of nesting gannets and frigate birds, and other dives where just down current from these islands.

The evidence startled me to say the least. It is hard to isolate the corals that are bleaching from rising ocean temperature, toxic pollutants from boats, or just plain human impact from fishermen and tourists alike. There was however an obvious vitality to the reefs that were just down current from the islands. They thrived, the coral suffered less bleaching, the fish were more numerous, and things seemed to be balanced.

Before I came to Alacranes I got in touch with Island Conservation, a group out of Santa Cruz, California. I offered to do a little bit of reconnaissance for them, as they are expanding their conservation efforts to include the gulf, and the Caribbean.

We know that sea birds are suffering, and that their numbers along with everything else are in decline. One of the problems is the invasive species, that - no surprise - humans have introduced, mostly without even knowing we’d done it. On an island that had few natural predators for these birds since they first came here, suddenly, rats have shown up, and are eating the eggs and the young birds that not too long ago had nothing to worry about.

So far, the problem isn’t completely out of hand here. The birds don’t nest year round, and the rats don’t have much to survive on when the birds aren’t nesting, save the trash left behind by tourists, and leftovers dumped out by the park rangers. So for now, the birds are okay. None the less, it is a problem that we will need to address at some point.

Alacranes Blog 4

2009-11-06T16:55:00.005-07:00

I’m sitting on the edge of an Island, watching the sun set over the ocean. The only thing that gives pause to the feeling that I’m completely alone out here is a distant lighthouse, on an Island that is itself far from any real sort of “civilization.” I’m alone as I watch the colors reflect in the perfectly formed little waves as they run up white sand forming perfect little barrels for imaginary miniature surfers. Sunsets will happen until the end of the world. Until the earth ceases to orbit the sun. Long after we have exhausted all of the oceans resources, the colors will still be there, but will they still hold the same power over us?

Looking out over the ocean, we see the unknown. We see a vastness. The inky black depths that hide unknown sea creatures, all implied by the deep ocean swells rolling across the horizon. We see a world that we know very little about, and fear.

It is because of that fear, that we’ve managed to ignore the fact that we’ve all but eliminated the creatures that live there. Most of us are not seeing this decline on a daily basis, so we find it hard to imagine, and since we don’t really understand the implications of a dead ocean, we don’t fear the consequences.

Phytoplankton, the microscopic plants that bloom in the ocean produce between 50-90 percent of the earths oxygen. All life on earth depends on oxygen at some point in it’s lifecycle. An ocean without phytoplankton is a world without sufficient oxygen.

It is only a matter of time until we have no choice but to make an effort to “save the ocean.” That effort will be born out of fear for ourselves, and not compassion for the creatures that live there.

Think for a moment, about what this planet would be like without humans. The sun would still set, with all of the same glory that it carries with it now. The plains of North America would be running rampant with vast herds of buffalo. Elephants would not be on the verge of extinction. In fact, all of the animals that suffered extinction at the hand of humanity would still be flourishing in the wild.

Imagine the ocean though, what would the ocean look like without human influence. It’s hard for us to imagine what that might look like, because most of us have never seen anything close to the natural state of things.

As perfect as this world would be, there would be nobody there to appreciate it. Who would sit and watch the sun set, and ponder the vast depths, and the magnificent creatures that lie just beyond the scope of our imagination? In the not to distant future when we look out over a dead ocean and watch a beautiful sunset we will be looking at a monument to our own greed, and our inability to change our course.

Countdown

2009-10-19T15:27:00.004-06:00

I leave for the Alacranes tomorrow morning. I'll be blogging to the National Geographic an ILCP websites at these links: NGS ILCP

I am also part of this cool new show/campaign called Expedition Granted, and to see what that's all about go to this link. Expedition Granted

I'll need as many votes as I can get to win the grant that National Geographic is promoting, so if you want to help the marine ecosystem of Rio Sirena, send the Expedition Granted link out to as many people as possible. I'll be on my Alacranes Expedition when voting starts on the 26th, so I won't be able to do too much self promotion!

Here's a cool little video I put together of me getting all packed up for the 2 weeks I'll be spending on a dessert island starting in only 2 days!

The Alacranes Reef Expedition

2009-10-11T13:54:00.002-06:00

As is the case with expeditions, as hard as I try not to procrastinate, still, it seems like all of the important stuff doesn’t get done till the last minute. I’m sitting here in an internet cafe feverishly writing e-mails, ordering items, and researching the destination that I’ll be leaving for in only 9 days. I’m going to the Alacranes reef in the Gulf of Mexico.

I’ve been asked to photograph the Alacranes reef by the “International League of Conservation Photographers.” A group that I’ve been peripherally involved with up until this expedition

They are sending me to this endangered reef 65 miles north of the Yucatan Peninsula to document the marine ecosystem. With the photos, we will be petitioning to create a greater level of protection for this still emerging reef platform.
 The Alacranes is the largest barrier reef system in the Gulf of Mexico, and is still growing. With the warming of the ocean, the virtually unheeded fishing, and believe it or not toxins from people cleaning their boats on the Island, the reef has been under steady attack. There is another connection I’ll be trying to make.

I’ve contacted the group “Island Conservation” that works out of the marine labs here in Santa Cruz, CA and have offered to gather data while I’m on the Island. Island Conservation has suggested that I research the magnitude of the effect invasive species like rats have had on the Island.
 There is a connection which will be very difficult to make photographically, between the rats with their diet of seabird eggs, and the fertilization of the reef by seabird droppings.
The rats eat the eggs and lessen the number of seabirds, and the reef gets less fertilization. Over time, the effects can be catastrophic.

This expedition is another example of using photography to back up the scientific data which in the end will create a greater conservation effort for an area that is mostly ignored.

I will be blogging from the Island, and hope to upload at least a few photographs every few days.

The Power of Photography

2009-06-15T14:39:00.004-06:00

This is a transcript of a lecture I gave at the National Geographic Society for their Explorers Symposium.

It certainly is an honor to be asked to speak about photography and the Image at National Geographic, especially while surrounded by people who I have considered mentors who are in the audience right as I speak.

There is a certain lineage in photography, all photographers have photographers that we look up to, or try to emulate, and understanding this lineage is also to understand the respect that those pioneers of photography deserve. They have broken a trail for the rest of us to follow.

Photographs are a way to break free of the barriers that we have in language, and we use them when words simply cannot convey our thoughts, Ideas, or the events which can define us.

Seeing the images that Nick Nichols took during Mike Fay’s mega transect not only stirs a somewhat jealous craving for adventure in me, it has also become the standard that I hope to achieve at some point in my own life and career. Seeing what they have accomplished with those images! Those photographs where used to persuade the president of Gabon to set aside 11% of the area of his country and to create 13 brand new National parks. This land could otherwise have been lost to logging and poaching.

In this instance however, photographs have captured more than just a moment in time, they have captured a part of our world and preserved it for future generations to admire, and someday visit for themselves.

Photography when used this way is no longer just a way to hold on to a memory, like the photos we take of friends and parties and children before they grow up, but a tool that we can use to accomplish our goals, goals like conservation, exploration, and education.

I can’t say that my photography has had the effect that Nick Nichols has yet, but in the expeditions that I have done for National Geographic, Just the potential that it could create change is constantly pushing me to find and capture that perfect moment that could sum up our cause in one image. One image that not just captures a single moment, but has compressed both the adventure and the cause into one definable image.

I’m sure we all have photographs that have been etched into our memories. Images that we’ll never forget. Either for tragic reasons, reasons of hope, or others because they changed our view of what is possible.

My first expedition for National Geographic was a huge learning experience for me. I was given a young explorers grant and sent on my way to document shark poaching on Cocos Island. Cocos is an Island 300 miles off of Costa Rica where the major oceanic conservation issues have all been condensed into one small marine reserve. I can’t say I wasn’t quite intimidated by the task at hand, which was to document and expose the Illegal poaching of sharks and other endangered species which on Cocos Island is a daily occurrence.
 Cocos Island is one of the densest shark populations on the planet. Schools consisting of hundreds of hammerhead shark congregate on the various seamounts that surround Cocos, and smaller fish abound because of the Nutrient rich deep-water currents which are forced upward along the steep sides of Cocos Island. It appears to be one of the last strongholds that nature has in the ocean, but many of the important species that you see in Cocos Island are pelagic species, so they use Cocos like a waypoint on their migrations through the pacific.
 The fishermen know this, and even though the waters are protected, they travel from all over the world to fill their holds with everything from tuna, to thousands of shark fins to be sold in Fish Markets like this one in Hong Kong. It’s easy to see why people will travel so far for shark fins, they sell for hundred of dollars a pound, and the more rare the shark, the higher the price. When you think of what a few thousand pounds of shark fins will sell for compared to the drastically cheaper meat, you can see why a fisherman will take their chances with the coast guard, and become poachers.

For every single poacher we caught in our patrols of the Island, at least 20 went unnoticed and unimpeded. Sometimes the boats were too big for us to run down in our little patrol boats, and other times the culprit happened to be the father in law of the captain of our patrol boat.

When the boats saw us coming, they would ditch their long lines which were miles long, with hooks placed every 50 feet or so, and we would return to pull the lines out by hand, freeing whatever was hooked. Every day, we would pull between 16 and 20 miles of line out of the water, more than enough to completely wrap around the island.

While I was out there, I was reminded of something that Wade Davis told me before I left. He said, “These things have a way of becoming much bigger than you originally planned.” He told me I was going to have to decide wether I would stick with the original focussed project, or if I would branch out and try to cover all of the issues which would inevitably come out of my research.

Thanks to Wade I didn’t lose my mind, and decided to focus on the issue of shark poaching and finning, using it as a metaphor for the rest of the ways we have been mistreating the ocean. I didn’t need photos of the massive Japanese tuna boats, which occasionally stop by Cocos Island, or the government officials that had been paid off to ignore certain boats, though I certainly tried. I just needed one picture that would show the inhumanity of it all. Just one picture to inspire those people who are actually in a position to make a difference. I know very well that I’m not going to sit down with the president of Costa Rica and discuss a plan I have to save the ocean, I’ll leave that to those more knowledgeable and better connected. But perhaps it will be my photography that will inspire them to do so.

The Cocos Island expedition led to my getting invited to join the legendary arctic explorer Will Steger on an expedition to document the effects of global warming in the high arctic. Another daunting task as far as photography goes. How do we make people care about global warming, or global weirding as I’ve heard it called, when the affects aren’t in our back yard yet? The Arctic seems like such an uninviting place, and people tend to have a difficult time visualizing it as a resource or even an heirloom worth preserving. What we need to change before we can change the world, is peoples perspective.

Will taught me a lot about how we can affect people’s perspective by bringing them with us to the arctic through our stories, and the photographs we posted along the way. While on the expedition we could only attach small images to our blog posts which we sent out via satellite uplink, like Toby is doing in this photo. Those pictures reached thousands of school children and unknown numbers of other people interested in following the teams adventures. On days when we saw wildlife, the followers got to see what we saw. When we finally had encounters with Wolves, after seeing tracks and keeping our eyes peeled for weeks, the followers got to share in our excitement.

This kind of use of photography while on an expedition isn’t new, but it is rare, and the
ability of a daily photograph to keep thousands of peoples interest tuned to our cause made it an invaluable part of our expedition, and something that I plan on implementing in my future expeditions. It humanizes the explorer, and gives people a personal experience. It allows people to imagine themselves as being a part of the expedition.

This is where I think photography really shines. A good photograph is not just one that shows a place, but something that can show people how we see the world, essentially it’s like looking through the eyes of the photographer, and seeing their vision. Really we all see things in our own way, with our culture, our experiences and our perspective shaping how we look at our surroundings. That’s why I love using it, it’s a way to show people what the world looks like to me.

There’s a drive inside of most of the people in this room to make a difference, and we each do it in our individual ways, some through scientific research, others through writing or film. My medium is photography. I can’t say that my photos have changed the world yet, but I can say that they have inspired some people to make changes in their own lives or to take up a new cause, and I consider this a good start. We’ve been educated our whole lives about global issues which need addressing, but to get people to stand up and take charge it takes inspiration.

Part 1 - Finding Joy in the Natural World

2009-03-10T03:35:00.001-06:00

There are tourists and then there are travelers, and travelers know the feeling that no mater what adventure we go on, when it’s over there is a void left inside, a void we don’t know how to fill because we don’t know what it is that we are missing. Travelers are searchers, and again, we aren’t even sure what it is were searching for. It could perhaps be described by some as finding oneself, but the problem with finding oneself in travel, is that some day, when the journey has ended the void returns.

Sitting in their office in the city, whatever that office may consist of be it an art studio, or a call center, the void doesn’t disappear, it just slowly starts to get lost, other more pressing issues begin to cover it, and our lives grow around it until it’s all but gone, until it is uncovered with the next journey that is.

My journeys have always been punctuated with moments of insight which seem to fill that void, they come with a certain silent knowledge, even trying to understand it or describe it just makes things more hazy. I have found though, that these moments come most when I am living closest with the land.

In my short 25 years on the earth I can truly look back with wonder at the many lives that I feel I’ve lived, and the many persons that I feel I’ve become. I’ve been privileged enough in my time to see the natural world in what is now its closest to it’s natural state on a few powerful occasions.

Swimming with a few hundred hammerhead sharks 300 miles off of the cost of the mainland of Costa Rica showed me the oceans power, paddling out into waves, far to big for me to surf at my skill level just to sit and feel the oceans motion and behold the power up close and entirely submerge my senses in it. As well as traveling through the arctic on a two month dogsledding expedition with other like minded explorers, seeing a place where with all of the fury of nature, the bitter cold, the long stretches with no life in site, man existed, and in that world, he led a comfortable and happy life. We can learn to survive anywhere, nomads ride on camel trains through the African Sahara, and Hadzabe bushmen have lived side by side with some of the most feared predators of the african planes for over 60,000 years.

When I’m in these places I always try to take a moment, and close my eyes. I sit and listen to every sound that I can hear, or if I’m lucky enough I listen to the silence. Then I take in every smell, and even the temperature of the air or water as it flows across my skin. Only when these are committed to memory will I open my eyes, and look at the world anew, as if it’s the first time. These places are so well committed to memory that I can recall them any time or any place. I can’t imagine doing that in a city.

These places make me happy. Not just in a passing curiosity sort of way, but truly happy. So I ask, why not stay? Why not see the joy of the Inuit or the Hadzabe Bushmen, and learn to become one with the land that our race has so terribly tried to get away from? I hope that in doing this, I can show the joy of a simple life, filled to the brim with just surviving, and that in doing so, I can inspire people to rediscover the natural world, the world that we were born for.

Potrero Chico

2008-12-05T07:35:00.001-07:00

Climbing is what brought me here to Potrero Chico, Mexico, but for me it only supplements the rich culture and dramatic landscape. This is not the "American" vision of Mexico, it's no "spring break Cabo San Lucas," or Puerto Vajarta couples resort though at the same time it is not the poor gunslinging Mexico fictionalized often enough in Movies. It is in fact one of Mexico's richest provinces and is home to many of the major corporations that have come out of Mexico. At the same time, there are still herb collectors that travel into the mountains by burro filling sacks with plants collected from high in the canyon. Finding those plants relies on knowledge passed down through generations and at the moment, the only practitioner in Hidalgo, the town nearest Potrero Chico is a 75 year old man, and he alone has the knowledge required to fill his bags with herbs, when his time comes, there will be nobody to take his place, and the art will be lost in this place. The divide in culture here extends beyond the Mexicans and foreigners, it's easy enough to see a generation gap in the local people on your average weekend, the Mexican Holidays and weekends bring an assortment of visitors. On weekends the quarter mile walk into the canyon from my campsite saw hardly a step because I was more often than not picked up by either techno thumping teenagers in nineties era sports cars, or a pickup truck with Jesus stickers and cowboy hats on the dash. The sounds from the canyon floor echo off the high walls and bring a constantly changing soundtrack to climbers a thousand feet up. From the ground sightseers look up to the peaks around them and though the climbers are nearly too small to see, the bright colors of Patagonia windbreakers and flashy helmets swing from hold to hold far above. The show goes on into the night, as the late summiters don headlamps, illuminating spots of the wall that seem to float in the dark. The thousands of feet of rock attracts different sorts of people but a mutual appreciation marks a commonality between everyone. Language is not a barrier as the sightseers ask to have their pictures taken with the rope and gear toting climbers.

My background in climbing is mostly traditional, setting my own protection in cracks and relying on my own abilities to get vertical. This has kept me modest as there is little room for error and climbing routes over ones head usually does just that, it gets you in over your head. Since that's not the best situation to be in when high on a rock wall, I've generally stayed in my grade and pushed my limits by learning how to be more efficient, and to place solid protection. In the soft limestone out here in Potrero Chico, traditional climbing placements are rarely "bomber" because of hidden air pockets hiding just below the surface of the rock, and weak rock that still can tumble from above on even the most frequented routes, as can be attested to by the new dent in my nose. Because of the brittle stone, the majority of the climbs here are by default all sport routes, and the hundreds of bolted routes stretching multiple pitches into the upper reaches of the walls offer a new sort of challenge for me. Now I can climb at my limit, 5 pitches off the ground or more, something usually reserved for the first hundred comfortable feet of rock. Here a 5.11 sport climber who's never trad climbed can feel the rush of a hanging belay, and he can put all that unused gear knowledge to good use. Most of the people I met in Potrero Chico's version of camp 4, a hotel and camping area called Pasada El Potrero Chico, had never been more than a single pitch off the ground before coming here.

Climbing at your limit 500 feet off the ground is actually more difficult than it is 50 feet off of the ground. The fall is the same, the rope is there, but as I experienced, even when the mind isn't afraid, the body's reactions are dulled by an instinctual fear of falling from a great hight. The rope seemingly gets thinner every pitch we climb.

Estarillo - 12 pitches

2008-11-15T09:58:00.009-07:00

Potrero Chico is known for it's classic multipitch sport routes. Climbs that would be relatively impossible for all but the best, or craziest climbers are open to just about anybody willing to take a lead fall onto a bolt. Looking into the canyon, you can see parties spread out all over the limestone, hundreds of feet off the canyon floor. Meanwhile, herb collectors ride past on their donkeys, and stray dogs who've befriended climbers sleep at the base of routes waiting for the climbers to return with some goodies. It's hard not to become a better climber once you've come here. The majority of the fear experienced when doing a multipitch trad route disappears when there is an anchor already there waiting for you, so limits are easy to push, and consequences are low. Rockfall is the most dangerous part of climbing out here, a few days ago I was staring up into the sun belaying a climber on a seldom climbed route, and as I watched him, ready to catch a fall, I was nearly knocked cold by a pebble that he'd kicked off from over a hundred feet up. I didn't see it coming until it was only inches from my face. I swear my brain didn't even register that I'd seen it until I already felt the pain. It hit me square between the eyes. An inch left or right and I would have lost an eye. I barely held on to consiousness and managed to switch belays with another climber before I walked over and sat down, my face reeling with pain. I have a dent in my nose now, it's not visible, but ask me some time and I'll let you feel it.
Yesterday, Sean and I decided to give Estarillo a shot, it's a 12 pitch climb with many pitches as hard as 5.10 b and c. The truth is that I was pretty nervous, I've never been that far in the air without wings, and dangling from a thin yellow rope attached to bolts hooked into the rock feels less and less strong the higher you go. That said, Estarillo is now one of my all time favorite routes, it ascends a prominent dihedral on the right side of the ridge line. And even though at times you're insanely high off the ground, it's easy to keep your wits about you with the well placed anchors, and ledges that afford great rest spots. Still though, pitch 11 was the hardest I was going to lead, and it was also the most exposed. Moving from a perfectly good rest ledge, and climbing out to an overhang which suddenly pushes you out over the full 1100 feet of nearly overhanging rock below you isn't something that the body always takes lightly. I've found that I'm in fact afraid of heights. Not so much in my head, but in my body. I feel fine mentally, I feel stable, able to think, and at times Sean and I were even joking around. But then when it comes time to tell my body, "ok, lets climb that overhang" suddenly I end up feeling a little week, and my feet only move in small, tentative steps. The view from the summit though was one of the most rewarding places I've ever been. A palm tree shades a roomy ledge, The canyon is laid out before you, and the dessert of Nuevo Leon stretches out to the right. It's a climb that I highly recommend to anyone. Just watch out for the rattlesnakes, they like this line too.

Climbing in Potrero Chico, Mexico - Day 1

2008-11-11T21:47:00.013-07:00

The moon was nearly full as I arrived in Potrero Chico, Mexico, but the rock walls were still only a shadow against the night sky. After a month of planning I knew little more about the place I was going than I did when I was first told about this place. Web searches yielded little information, and photos were scarce, but from the stories I was told the place was legendary. I pitched my tent, and a restless night left me dazed when I finally emerged from it in the late morning. Climbing out into the grass, my eyes where blurry, and I couldn't quite focus, the rock was still just a shape. As things came together and I rubbed my eyes to clear the night away, I was sure that I had still not seen correctly. But there it was, thousands of feet of Limestone stacked vertically, looming over us, a distinct skull shape peering out of the rock.

I am here to climb multipitch sport routes. I'm a trad climber, which is somone who climbs with the necessary equipment to create your own anchors and protection as you climb. Sport routes have been bolted already and all you need to do is clip in as you climb. On my first day, myself and my friend Sean joined two of the best climbers from Costa Rica, (aparently there are 10 of them) to ascend a route named, "Will the Wolf Survive." It was as I was leading the second pitch which was rated 5.9 that I realised that hights where scary regardless of wether or not you were placing your own gear or taking advantage of pre-placed anchors. Either way, falling is scary, but an easy grade like 5.9 allows for some relaxation since it's unlikely that you'll be falling anyways. We had climbed a few pitches to warm up before setting our teeth in to "Will the Wolf Survive" and already i'd climbed more on Day one than I'd climbed in a few weeks. By the top of pitch three, I was starting to feel "it" you know, that tired, I don't want to be 300 feet of the ground, feeling. Regardless of how I felt though I knew that I'd feel better once sumiting, so I swallowed my complaints and was the last of the four of us to start on the fourth pitch.
It would have been easy only two feet off the ground, but under no circumstances is it comfortable to move from a perfectly good ledge 320 feet off the ground out into an overhanging and technically demanding face, especially while wearing two backpacks.

As I stepped out onto the climb, I couldn't see the other three of my team sitting above me, but I could hear their laughter and joy that comes from having reached the summit. It was right about then that my hands cramped up so bad, that I couldn't even let go of the holds I was on. I yelped in pain, and warned them that I was about to fall, which I of course couldn't do because of my hands. Eventually I pushed myself off of the rock with my feet, and began biting at my fingers to try to pry them open, hopeing that it would stop the pain. Letting go of the rock 320 feet above the ground is never easy. Eventually I stretched my hands untill the pain left, but I was sure that nobody would believe me about the cramps. If I were them I would assume that I had simply had a tough time on the rock...
We made it down just in time to set our feet on the ground before dark, and walked back to town with dinner on our minds. I'm anxious to get on more of these climbs where you can climb higher and harder because of the extra security of bolts, hopefully the nervousness that comes with distrust of trad gear will go away, and I can get as comfortable as my friends who have already been here for a week. For now though, I'm just happy to have the option to spend 10 days in Potrero Chico, Mexico!

A Good Week

2008-10-25T14:19:00.006-06:00

This last week I've been in DC at the National Geographic Headquarters with some of my teammates from my Arctic Expedition to Ellesmere Island. We're here lecturing on the expedition and showing photos from the trip. I'll have a copy of the lecture uploaded soon.

While in DC I found out that my Wild Chronicles episode had aired already on PBS, and managed to grab a copy of it for myself.

The Crestones

2008-10-07T20:09:00.005-06:00

Only two and a half hours drive from my photography studio in Denver, are the Sangro de Christo range of mountains. When I showed people the photos most people assumed these peaks couldn't possibly be in United States, much less Colorado. Here are a few pictures from my solo hike in. I was there to do an outdoor lifestyle and adventure photoshoot for clients, but found working difficult while my eyes darted up and down potential climbs.

Stress

2008-09-24T19:11:00.003-06:00

Everybody deals with stress in their own way. Believe it or not, I have to deal with it too, I know everybody thinks I have the perfect job and all, but hey, there is a reason I get paid to do it, and it’s not because I’m just that cool. Stressed out, and overworked, I tend to lose my focus. I start trying to Multi-task, and I’m no good at multi-tasking. So what can I do that will force me to focus? I tried going bouldering, but there wasn’t nearly enough in the realm of consequences to push me into that focused attentive state. I’m looking for something that could almost be called meditation, when all external thoughts are flushed out, and the task at hand is all consuming.

I’ve always turned to adventure to get me through those scattered moments. Snowboarding a hidden couloir far into the mountains and hiking into the woods with no trail to guide me have always been friendly to me, but today I needed something new. I’ve been climbing a lot lately, and though I climbed a lot when I was younger, I took a 4 year break and have only started pulling down on rock again recently.

Today, to find my focus, I soloed Cob Rock. Cob Rock is a two hundred foot tall granite monolith attached on only one side to the mountain, and it’s fairly easy. Only rated at 5.8 plus or minus depending on the route that you take. I decided to try to rope solo the route, and began around 1:00. The trick with Rope soloing is that if you fall, you will be caught by the rope, but you are alone, and there is nobody there to share your fear with.
It’s exponentially more exciting. Soloing has it’s downfalls too. After you make it to the top of each pitch, you have to rappel back down and take all the pieces of protection that you used back out of the rock, and climb back up again, only this time with the rope above you.

I managed to do the route in three pitches, but time was running short and the shadows crept up the valley faster than I had expected. So I decided to free solo the middle pitch which is only 5.6 yet starts 100 feet off the ground. No Ropes, no protection, just my hands and feet. It’s times like these that the mind really has to focus. Even though the amount of work is far less than if I were placing Cams into the rock, or trying to communicate with a lazy belayer, the consequences are drastically higher, and when you’re really in the moment, you feel less like a climber and more like you are weaving in and out of the rock. This was the focus I came for. And for some reason now that I’m home again, safe, I can breathe so much deeper.

The Last Days of Ellesmere

2008-07-09T11:36:00.005-06:00

5/30/08
Tomorrow: Hot food, Drink, Warmth, buildings, showers... You get the Idea, and yet, life out here is by no means bad. Hard at worst. I do look forward to sleeping in the dark though. What will the City hold for me after this adventure? What Changes?
Today I took a few minutes to go for a ski by myself across the sound. I took my time and managed to cross in an hour or so, passage to land was barred by open water that had appeared overnight from the river. So I followed the coast for a bit before cutting back across the bay for camp. I eventually crossed my own tracks and there alongside them, two fresh sets of wolf tracks. They had followed me and must have snuck past while I was eating lunch. I followed the tracks as they went directly to camp, the prints of one of the wolves were quite large. I certainly wanted a to get a look at the beast but he never did show himself.

I’m both relieved to be out of here and quite sad, there will be more trips to come, of that I’m sure.

05/31/08
A bottle of red wine signifies the end. I drink to Howls and midnight sun for the last time. Perhaps there have been many lasts on this Journey and as well many firsts.

Wolves are circling me now as I write, should I fear? There are 4...5...Now 6! Perhaps I should stand up. Should I be afraid or should I stay still and possibly have the experience of a lifetime? The others are watching from camp which is quite far away. Now I see why sharks are called the wolves of the sea... Now I see 7 wolves! They are so much like sharks, their curiosity matched with their fear, though at once they could tear me apart. I want so bad to photograph them but my camera is in camp, to rise would scare them off. Perhaps I should keep this for myself?

They came quite close just then, 10 feet away perhaps, enough to look into their eyes and see that they were not here for violence but for simple curiosity.

Alone, on the Ice, In the land of wolves.

Patience, patience, another approaches. Even the Alternating rhythms of my breath scare it. So much fear and yet so much calm, it is only 5 feet from me. I do not turn to face it this time but allow it to approach from behind, always in the corner of my eye.. It certainly prefers my blind spot.

Wow, truly an experience of a lifetime. Who gets so close to such wild creatures, so magnificent they are, so powerful! A perfect way to say goodbye to the arctic. I’m anxious to say goodbye and hello to a lifestyle though, and New York will be welcome with all of it’s eccentricities.

After the Wolf Experience:
It sniffed the air from behind me. I force my muscles not to turn my neck, the slightest motion scares it away and each time our play of trust begins anew. I risk it all to simply be near, and the only reference I have to the approaching wolf is is it’s breath on my neck. This is enough, for my senses flood with the desire to run. I remind myself that the reputation of the wolf is made by men who fear and I take the body-language as a sign of it’s intentions instead of the stories. So I sit and when it is over I return to camp. Tobias watched it happen and waits with shared elation. As it turns out, there were people watching the whole time, the entire experience is on film, what Luck! My last night on Ellesmere...

June 3rd
Two days ago we stood on the wild Ice of Eureka Sound, and here we stand now, in New York City wearing fancy shirts, eating fancy dinners, and trying our best to act normal. It’s these contrasts that make life interesting, and at least for me, the sudden immersion into an entirely different culture just highlights the best memories of our adventure. As we left Eureka, our egos had been whittled down to the bone as we were transformed into a team of people with a common goal. The effect was amplified by the physical stresses that confronted us, and the little amount of time we had to actually reflect upon ourselves while faced with the wonders of the North, and the many tasks that faced us each day. We all find ourselves striving to make New York as much like the arctic as we can, Sam opens the windows to his hotel room trying to get fresh air, I turn up the AC to make it as cold as possible in my room, and all of us are faced with our various sleep issues, I can’t sleep because of the lack of exercise, and Toby cannot sleep enough. We are all adjusting though, and will soon be back into whatever life we have waiting for us. For me, I have many months of travel coming up, and a few conservation projects in the works, but the Arctic has left to strong an impression to be ignored. I plan on pursuing some of the stories that are common to the Arctic but unheard of in the bustling southern world, for now though, my priority list is short, to go home, see my family, my friends, and celebrate the opportunity that I have been given to inspire people to take action and make the world a better place.

Ellesmere Island Journal Days 15-17

2008-06-24T16:05:00.006-06:00

5/25/08
For days we’ve seen no sign of man. In the first weeks there was nothing but stories that showed man had ever traveled here. Then a single plane flew overhead at 30,000 feet, I assume full of dozing passengers, bad food, and crying babies. As they rocketed through the sky, probably barely noticing Ellesmere below them, we plodded along on the sea ice, watching it’s trailing ribbon. From then on, the occasional fuel barrel would pop into view where planes had landed and dropped the excess weight or refueled, thinking of course that these were parts where no man visited for fun. 6000 year old ruins dug through again and again by scientists were another sign of man, yet they seemed to fit into the land, because in truth, there was nothing about them that was not of the land. Stones piled high, discarded bones cut clean through. Now though we sit in Eureka Harbor and have left Axel Heigburg Island for good. Soon we will be setting foot on Ellesmere Island itself, the namesake of our expedition

Here in Eureka a few scientists have gathered under satellite dishes, radar, and the 24 hour sun, to us they are the furthest thing from normal.

5/26/08

They Would be shadows were they not snow white,
These wolves running through the arctic night.

Just as we were setting up camp, 11 wolves came out of nowhere and rushed into camp. Some were more than simply curious, and came right at the dogs. It was a strange balance between chasing them off and taking photos of them coming close.
It was a cool interaction, we didn’t have to be afraid of them except for our dogs.

I think the hardest part of the trip is leaving the dogs behind, K2 the loner, Pitarak the cocky teen, Denali the caring mother of most of the dogs here, Kapi the giant Teddy who would be top dog if he cared about anything but laying next to his brother Amurak. Augustus the friendly and playful... So many dogs with such personality, it’s hard not to think of them as people. They have far more intelligence than we generally attribute to them.

The Greatest comforts out here are these things that you have to conserve. If you don’t have to worry about running out and can indulge every day there is no sense being excited. Even toilet paper turns into a valuable item. 2 caramels a week are pure gold, and could sell at the same price, though not for cash perhaps for powdered milk.

I just realized that I’ve been Imagining the end of our expedition party taking place in the dark, as it’s al supposed to happen at night. Strange, I wonder what a Psych would say about that.

5/27/08
There is no better taste than the last of ones water

No sight nor sound betrays the pounding paws of the wolf pack. Once they’ve come, they’ve gone, leaving only melting prints in their place.

It is more than likely true that this will be the last time I’ll be alone on this expedition, sitting in the failing sun that will not ever fail entirely, the blue hue of this landscape rolls out before me. Even the slightest hint of man pulls me back to a world of cars, women, and selfishness. I’m sure I learned a great deal here, but I won’t be able to grasp it for some time. All I can do now is sit and take it all in. What continuation of this experience will I see next? How will I be able to make this time truly my own? Questions without answers are not ones that should be asked. When all of this is but a memory how will I feel upon reflection? Only time will tell, and time is not something I have enough of. All I know is that it stands still until it’s gone. I am still in the beginning of the expedition, landing on the ice of Axel Heigburg Island both afraid and determined.

...A memory
Crossing a great sound mountains rise on both sides. The old ice we cross was once jagged blocks crushed against each-other with glass sharp edges. Now it has melted into rolling mounds of blue and white, cloud-like yet firm, leaving the impression that we sled across the sky in low lying clouds that cover all but the highest peaks.

These are the things that bring me Joy:

Warmth in the Cold
Shelter in a Storm
Passion in the Moment
Moments in a second
Stillness in Violence
Stillness
Comfort in catastrophe

And here above the sea,
Alone I stand to take it in,
To my left and to my right,
No sign of man at hand for 14 days and a night,
And so I stand to take it in and lo,
There I stand,
The sign of man.

Ellesmere Island Journal Entries 10 - 14

2008-06-21T14:03:00.009-06:00

5/20/08
Yesterday was a rest day. I spent it skiing solo in the mountains tracking muskox. I went up alone and finally felt like I was truly out on my own. A good feeling when wolves and bear abound. I even saw wolf tracks that had followed my ski tracks. The strange thing is that we’ve switched our schedules around so much so we can travel in the cooler part of the day, getting to bed around 2:00 am and rising at 10:am. Our day now ends around 9:00pm. When I went for my solo hike I left at 7:30 pm and was out till late at night. I kept on observing the sun and the changing color temperature and fought the urge to return to camp before nightfall. I had to remind myself that there is no nightfall up here. I found a point where I could sit high above an alpine lake and look out over the exposed meadows. In the distance a herd of muskox roamed below a jagged mountain range. I left a cache on the peak with a note and my contact information so someone who might find it could send it back to me in the future. Hopefully the distant future, perhaps even with their own stories.

The distance we manage to cover day after day up here is incredible, sometimes 25-30k per day. It's not so big of a deal except that it’s a daily event, through rough ice, and over mt. Passes. The feeling is that you are constantly chasing the horizon, pushing into the distance with every horizon that you reach giving way to a new horizon and a new goal. I’ve never been much of a distance person but I’ve managed to get myself to travel along side the more practiced members of the team. My body has hardened and become lean, and I have the ability to set to climbing a mountain and not rest until I get to the summit. It’s hard to decide how to maintain this hard earned shape once I get home... (Mt. Biking in Santa Cruz?)

I’m listening to Metallica - Turn the Page... Good song for the moment.

5/21/08
As difficult as days can be there is always something that balances out the experience. The dogs and their antics can be both frustrating and at the same time entertaining. Today as we made camp, I saw a pack of animals moving through a mirage. Their white bodies contorted in the vibrating air. The way they circled camp made me immediately think ...Wolf! And a whole pack at that. Soon, we had cameras in Hand, and sam caught a few frames before they disappeared over a rise. We trudged up the hill to track them down but couldn’t even seem to find their tracks! Rabbit tracks abounded though. Good feeding grounds for the wolves I suppose. Tension was high when we heard a chuckle coming from Sam, camera in hand. He had zoomed in on a photo of the animals and, there stalking us in the photo, were some of the largest rabbits I’ve ever seen... They moved so much like I would imagine a pack of wolves moving, circling the camp, staying on ridge-lines, and stopping behind hills to peek over at us. They had even fooled Sigrid, our wolf expert who has raised wolves from pups. To our own credit, the arctic hare in this area are known to be excessively large, and it’s one of the only places they have been observed moving in Packs. Other single Hare I’ve seen here were easily three feel in length. The mirage most likely made them appear even larger.

5/22/08
It’s days like today that make me admire people who do this in the most real tough situations, when you just don’t want to continue, and you’re cold, wet, and hungry.
I felt no groove today whatsoever, the snow stuck to my skis in 10 pound clumps and the sun refused to let up until a cold wet system moved in to make things worse. I even fell through the snow into a river that had caused a nasty slush under the hard looking upper crust. Oh well, I search for Balance.

5/23/08
With the exciting portion of the trip drawing to a close, I find my energy levels have decreased. What do I have to worry about? I know we’ve made it. That and the fact that my portion of the trip was so ridiculously easy makes me hesitant to feel much in the way of Accomplishment. Though I have averaged 25k a day in the arctic, far from home, friends, and family. I guess I still have some claim to pride. Most people would never put themselves here in the first place. I need to let the ego do it’s thing, and just let me be me for a while as it squirms inside.

The sun here is so Strong you can walk around with no shirt on, warmed by its rays as they are bounced from every angle off of snow and ice. Yet the slightest wind will remind you that you are still in the arctic as it strips away the suns warmth. All that is left is the suns power to burn you.

5/24/08
Today was an awesome long day, I started out thoroughly demoralized, so I forced myself to push harder. We hiked up to the mummified forrest which was pretty much the same as what we’d already seen inland, but it was still amazing to think that we stood in a 45 million year old forrest and were dwarfed by the age of our surroundings. It gave me more appreciation even for the stones and sand that I stood on. We walked with a more delicate demeanor for a while. Once we reached camp again, we set off with the dogs for another day of travel. Almost immediately we were confronted with the challenge of crossing a a river which had opened up literally overnight. Spring has arrived all at once. Fording the river was more a mental obstacle than a physical one, and we were across in moments. Though some of us walked in the river all day due to our mukluks flooding. After the fording, we had a pleasant trip through fast snow that allowed for plenty of time to chat and more time to think, which has actually been hard to do. Mostly I find I end up in a near meditative state where the kicking forward on my skis, encouraging the dogs, and taking in the softly rolling hills fully captivates my mind.
It’s so pleasant to be separated from the world, yet when there is someone you care about and every moment can bring change, and every moment matters, it’s hard to think of what changes may have come about while I’ve been away.

A month of Firsts!

2008-06-19T12:30:00.002-06:00

Check out my first published writing on the National Geographic Adventure website!
http://ngadventure.typepad.com/blog/ellesmere-ben-horton.html

National Geographic Adventure Magazine

2008-06-10T12:55:00.002-06:00

Here's a cool double page spread that National Geographic Adventure published. It was a fast photo shoot, set up and done in about 10 minutes!

Ellesmere Island Journal Entries 7-9

2008-06-09T13:20:00.003-06:00

5/17/08
There is no lens that will ever be able to take this in. There is no means of recording or describing this place that will ever do it justice. I sit atop an iceberg facing Mt. White with Ellesmere Island stretching off to my left. Wolves howl in the distance spurring the dogs on into a great salutation to their wild cousins. Blinding white forces the eyes all but closed even with sunglasses on, and the deep black of the earth is beginning to show through, causing a contrast that makes distance impossible to understand. Even in the shade, sunglasses are a comfort. Unlike the Serengetti, I do not feel like I’ve been here before. I do not feel that I was made to survive here. This place of dirt, Ice, and stone. A place where darkness and light do not balance but swing wildly from one to the other. This is not a place for passion or romance, but a place for struggle.

5/18/08
Yesterday we climbed into the hills and came across a herd of muskox with 14 members. I managed to get within about 100 feet of them and they formed up in their circular ranks. They had a number of young, perhaps even newborn calves with them. Now we have another short day ahead of us and have been traveling mostly over land.

5/19/08
It’s strange, I’ve been here nine days now, and yet it feels like I’ve been here forever. Time stands still, here, you feel both it’s rapid passing and it’s molasses like oozing slowness.

Ellesmere Island Expedition Journal Days 4-6

2008-06-04T14:53:00.002-06:00

5/13/08
Today was travel day two for me. My body is tired, but my resolve is stronger, this time upon reaching camp I didn’t simply collapse into bed as I did yesterday. The number one thing that I notice out here is the power of light, the way it is so overbearing during the middle of the day, and how when the clouds roll in and the sunlight is scattered among the mountains, it softens to just the most pleasant hues, producing a million shades of blue. I would liken it to a moonlit night except that the sun shines with the same power for the full 24 hours.

My body is making the adjustments to a life of arctic travel, but much of the weight that I put on in order to combat the cold is superfluous and I anxiously await the day when I don’t have to carry it anymore. Still I’ve managed to ski over 50 k in two days so I’m not doing so bad.

(Note: After this point I realized nobody else was skiing the entire time and people were holding onto the sled getting pulled along a bit, still one pushed with the legs, but the sled helps carry your momentum)

Lets not watch our dreams drift by,
Clouds just rolling by,
Let’s not waste our time,
It’s all we have this time.

5/15/08
For two days we’ve been traveling along the coast of Nanson sound, the icebergs run aground here and massive chunks littler the shore. It’s a sight like I've never seen before. We cover perhaps 25K a day now and have sen wolf tracks littered with dripping blood, and caribou tracks, yet only a lemming has shown itself.

5/16/08
Although I currently feel more like bear bait than an author, photographer, or explorer, I could not pass up the opportunity to sit alone among the wind drifts and ice chunks we’ve set up camp in.
As we pulled up to one of the few flat spots on Nanson Sound, a crystalline haze descended on upon us, like the ceiling of clouds and sky decided to come down for a closer look at the beauties of the land. I would cal it a fog were it not for the fact that the clouds shine and glitter. Certainly not the gray and hollow fog that rolls off of an ocean. This is much different, tiny flecks of ice spin through the air reflecting by chance the midnight sun so that all things shimmer like the turning schools of fish you see in oceans. With camp barely visible, sound mostly muffled, I could very well be the most alone person on the planet right now, though I doubt it.

We made it a long way through the rough ice today, and along the way made a friend. Miles to sea we came across a confused lemming, obviously searching for a new land to populate, so we gave the little hitchhiker a ride, a meal and a warm water bottle cover to sleep in.

(Just now I turn to take another look into the fog and find instead a clear view of camp. I then turn back and see before me a mirage, stretching the horizon vertically so it looks like we face a massive wall of ice tomorrow. In seconds the vision passes.

We also heard the sweet chirp of a snow bunting today, a sparrow-like bird which ducked in to give us a closer look.

One of my favorite features of this land is the way the old icebergs stand above the new crumbling ice. At times, the way the fog covers the bottom of the bergs, and the tops stand alone, a peak above the clouds, or like it should look in a fog covered sea. It only takes a few minutes in this land to understand the sereneness of the inuit. Like the way visiting china left me more understanding of the chinese arts. Mirages come and go, yet never before your eyes, leaving the onlooker astounded and mystified

Ellesmere Island Journal days 1-3

2008-06-04T06:25:00.006-06:00

5/10/08
Yesterday I finally Joined the team, they’ve been pushing through the rough Ice now for 40 days and only just reached smooth traveling where the plane landed. On the the flight in I manned the controls for a couple of hours and flew the Twin Otter over sections of the Arctic Ocean. I brought plenty of gifts with me to try to get on everyones good side, but it seems I didn’t particularly have to worry about it as they were just happy to see a new face. It’s extremely warm right now, and with the sun shining as it does 24 hours a day, everything feels extremely comfortable. We celebrated a bit last night and drug the sled to the top of a nearby peak and 6 of us rode straight down the hill in a mad dash, I have to say, it was one of the most fun days I’ve had to date.

5/11/08
This may be my only chance to be alone. I’m sitting on top of a small mountain overlooking our camp, and the broken arctic ocean. From here I can see the shadows of clouds as they move across confused jumbles of Ice far out to sea. The shadows shimmer as they move. This place has not been conquered by man, we simply can make quick dashes in and out of it. As I sit here and take in a full 360 degree view the only elusion to man that I can see are my own tracks, and our tents. Not even a man made sound penetrates the stillness, such powerful stillness. Yet, it holds such violence. Only a mountain away the Cache of Otto Sverdrup sits, a treasure lost that has been found by Toby after many years.

5/12/08
It was our first day moving since I arrived. We packed up early and set about moving camp. The sleds are heavy because of the amount of food that we now cary, and as hard as I trained, it was not near enough. As we finally pulled into camp, my motivation collapsed and merely setting up the tent was an act not performed so much as automated. I stand now ready to collapse. We covered about 23 Kilometers and I sat down only once all day. The General Outline of our day is as follows. Wake at 6:00, eat breakfast by 7:00 pack gear by 7:30 load the sleds by 8:00. From here Will usually treks ahead to find a route and we travel at a jogging pace for 2 hours at a time taking 15 minute breaks in between. We continue like this for 8 hours or so until we set up camp again. This is a very loose schedule, on easy days, the breaks extend to almost 45 minutes, and some days we quit a few minutes early or late.

Muskox!

2008-05-23T11:26:00.002-06:00

Expedition Day: 49Position: N 80° 32' W 89° 35'

It seems impossible to really capture this place with a camera, or even with words for that matter. No matter how sophisticated the equipment we carry is, it cannot capture the feeling of sitting alone atop an iceberg in the frozen sea listening to the distant howls of wolves. The howls set our dogs into their own symphany and the silence of the sea ice is broken. We decided to make today a short travel day, not for lack of energy or difficulties, but simply because the region we just entered is by far the best environment to see wildlife. In the shadow of an iceberg we made camp, and set to getting ready for a day in the mountains. We abandoned the skis because the snow on the land is sparse, and we are soon satisfying our urge to explore this land in more detail. Until now I have seen little wildlife and I had no opportunities to get any worthwhile photos of what I did see. That far I've seen a few lemmings and a snow bunting, a sparrow sized arctic bird. Only 45 minutes of hiking into the steeper hills and we found a herd of muskox with 14 members, a number of those being calves. The muskox seem to have been transported straight from the ice age with their curled horns and powerfull bodies. It seems strange to me that they are close relatives of the common mountain goats I see often in the Colorado Rockies because their character is so foreign to me.A quick look around makes me really wonder about how these animals manage to survive here, as specialized as they are. Even lichens seem to have trouble growing on the rocks, and grass is nowhere to be found. The muskox prefer a type of willow that stays close to the ground, but I didn't even see this anywhere. This only deepened my respect for these animals, then i think of how they manage to survive through the dark arctic winters with -40°F temperatures and their past issues with over hunting and dwindling populations. How then will these creatures manage when global warming takes its toll? Just today Will who has been coming to the Arctic for years mentioned that he'd never seen the oncoming spring take hold so early. We are experiencing June weather in May! With the early snowmelt, the black cliffs of Ellesmere Island are exposed and reflect even more sun, speeding the thaw. All around us patches of black dust blown in by the wind have absorbed the sun's heat and sunk deep into the snow and ice. We are forced now to travel on the rough sea ice because the land holds so little snow. This cycle has continued to escalate over the years, and we now can hardly argue that we are not causing drastic changes to this environment, and to those majestic creatures that inhabit this harsh landscape and nowhere else.
Ben
Addition Info:
MuskoxThe Muskox (Ovibos moschatus) is an arctic mammal of the Bovidae family, noted for its thick coat and for the strong odor emitted by males, from which its name derives.
Muskoxen are more closely related to sheep and goats than to oxen, but are in their own genus, Ovibos. Both sexes have long curved horns. Muskoxen are usually around 2.5 m (8.2 ft) long and 1.4 m (4.6 feet) high at the shoulder. Adults usually weigh at least 200 kg (440 lb) and can exceed 400 kg (880 lb). Their coat, a mix of black, gray, and brown, includes long guard hairs that reach almost to the ground.
During the summer, musk oxen live in wet areas, such as river valleys, moving to higher elevations in the winter to avoid deep snow. They graze on grasses, reeds, sedges, and other ground plants, digging through snow in the winter to reach their food.
Muskoxen are social and live in herds, usually of around 10–20 animals, but sometimes over 400.
Muskoxen have a distinctive defensive behavior: when the herd is threatened, the bulls and cows will face outward to form a stationary ring around the calves. This is an effective defense against predators such as wolves, but makes them an easy target for human hunters.
View the Global Warming 101 Ellesmere Island Expedition map and follow their progress.
Map updated daily with new position.
View Map

Ben's Arrival - Trail Dispatch - 2008 Ellesmere Island Expedition

2008-05-16T07:29:00.000-06:00

Expedition Day: 42 Distance traveled: rest dayFlying into Axel Heiberg to join the rest of the team, I could finally grasp the difficulties that they had been through over the last forty days. From the sky the ocean below looked impossibly confused and cluttered. Even from 5000 feet, the eye could not find the end of the rough ice. It was only as I aproached the rendezvous point that the ice finally seemed to relax. Finally joining the team, my fear that I would be an outsider was quickly disspelled as everyone welcomed me to camp with open arms and enormous smiles. Stories of polar bear encounters and hellish fields of rough ice and pressure ridges poured out of everyone, all while they dug into the snacks and treats I had brought in. The reunion was magnificent and could not have come at a better time, ahead of us the terrain is smooth, and a renewed sense of vigor permeates the weathered team members that I've been following for so long on the website. While I followed their progress, I also have been training so I wouldn't be left exhausted in the wake of these now thin and efficient people that have been running for nine hours a day for so many days on end. Of course what training could I possibly do that could prepare me for arctic travel at this level. I imagine the next few days will be hard on my body and my ego, but I'm also excited to get into the swing of things and finally feel like a full team member.
Ben
View the Global Warming 101 Ellesmere Island Expedition map and follow their progress.
Map updated daily with new position.
View Map

My First time Published in National Geographic

2008-05-04T21:58:00.003-06:00

Only the soup image is mine, the Cover is put there to show which issue.

The Next Exploration

2008-04-14T23:32:00.003-06:00

In my previous expeditions to Cocos Island National Park I’ve seen the hardships and the obstacles that the park rangers have to overcome on a daily basis in order to protect the area. It seems an impossible task with what little resources they have available, and with such great numbers of illegal fishermen pitted against them. Day by day, the battle continues, and little by little the fishermen wear away at the parks fragile ecosystem. It won’t be long now until the fishermen have fished beyond the sustainable limit, and the marine sanctuary will collapse. This is not an endless pot of gold, and there is a limit to how much we can take out before it cannot refill itself. The species that the Marine Reserve was established to protect are mostly of the Pelagic kind, and their time on Cocos Island is limited to only brief visits. As soon as the great schools of hammerhead shark, bluefin and yellowfin tuna, and swordfish depart for their feeding grounds they can no longer be protected, and as you can imagine, fishermen descend on their schools like flocks of gulls on a forgotten lunch. There are a myriad of unknowns about the pelagic species and we still can’t follow their open ocean migrations because they travel to deep and too far, making protecting them next to impossible. No amount of money can solve this problem, because the technology simply doesn’t exist.

What we do have however is a few key pieces of knowledge that we can use until our habitation of the ocean improves. Recently it has come to light that there is a sea mount just 30 miles off the coast of Cocos Island that the pelagic species and fishermen alike use on a daily basis. This seamount has never before been seen by human eyes, and it’s depth is known only by the fishermen who drop their lines approximately 300 feet to hunt for the gigantic grouper that also call this place home. One of these fishermen has provided us with the approximate GPS coordinates to find the seamount.

As the location of the seamount is as yet only an approximation, and it’s existence only a rumor until recently, it was not included in the original boundaries of Cocos Island. It hasn’t been considered even by agencies such as the French Fund for the Environment and the UNDP when they have been researching on Cocos Island in an effort to expand the borders of Cocos Island National Park, this work has been led by Kifah Sasa, and Kifah is also going to be a part of this expedition so he can have a first hand view of the events as they unfold. Nobody has had the equipment, the knowhow, or the ability to pull together a team capable of exploring the seamount to make it’s vital role in the Cocos Island Ecosystem anything more than speculation. We now have the capability, we have the team, and we are readying to dive into a sea of unknowns with one inspiration, to gain ground on the illegal fishermen. The question is how.

How will visiting the seamount do all this? While exploring the seamount we will be placing a receiving unit that will ping every time a tagged animal passes through the region. With the Unit in place over the next year or so, information will be gathered from years of tagging work that scientist Randall Arauz has been doing on Cocos Island. Every tagged animal that passes will have come from Cocos Island at some point in the past, because every animal was tagged on Cocos Island. Once Randall processes the information, he will know what animal it was that has passed the seamount, how long it stayed, and wether or not the animal makes frequent visits. We can make a strong hypotheses that we will not be disappointed with our findings. That hard data will then be provided to the agencies that are making the petition to expand the park boundaries and will be used to show that the seamount is not separated from Cocos Island, but is a major portion of the Cocos Island ecosystem.

It won’t be a simple task to place the receiving unit on the Seamount, at a depth of 300 feet and 30 miles from Cocos Islands protected bays, a whole new realm of difficulties present themselves. The main reason that the seamount hasn’t already been dove by the Seahunter group, a dive company that operates a deep water submarine on Cocos Island is that until now they haven’t had the ability to launch the sub in the rough pacific swells that rhythmically crash into the rock walls of Cocos Island. A new boat, specially outfitted to launch the sub in the open ocean has been outfitted and this will be its maiden voyage. The depth of the seamount is easily reachable by the three person submarine once it has passed below the surface, but is beyond the normal limits of even an advanced deep water diver. The normal limits of a deep water diver are at 135 feet, I’ve dove to nearly 200, and very few people have passed 200 feet without very specialized equipment. It’s unlikely that we will attempt a subless dive to the seamount, but if the opportunity presents itself and all safety measures are taken, we are specially outfitted with Rebreather units that recycle the air that has already passed through our bodies, enabling us to breath our own air again. With these units, it may be possible to reach the seamount and install the Receiver unit ourselves. If not, we will rely on the arm of the submarine to do the work.

There are inherent difficulties when it comes to tagging a pelagic species as well. William Bebe was one of the first naturalists to visit cocos island, and in his book the Arcturus Adventure, he wrote of the difficulties of observing the fish. Hooked fish were found to die following their struggles, and even the great bluefin tuna are timid creatures. Bebe did however have plenty of encounters with shark while diving with his primitive compressor and helmet. The shark, though timid, can be curious. Species such as the hammerhead shark are frightened easily by the bubbles that the commonly used scuba regulator makes. The bubbles are thought to register as a impenetrable wall to the senses of a hammerhead. Marine biologist Peter Klimley writes in his book the Secret Lives of Sharks about suddenly realizing that the sharks all but ignored him while he freedove among the vast schools, sans tank and regulator. It was Peter Klimley who began tagging and tracking the sharks with great success, and scientists like Randall Arauz followed suit. The personality of the hammerhead shark has made it the most viable option for our expedition, and once the receiver has successfully been placed on the Seamount, we will move on to dive Cocos Island with the goal of tagging three more sharks. With three recently tagged sharks, and numerous sharks having been tagged over the last number of years, we will have an exceptionally detailed view of the role that the seamount plays on Cocos Island. The data will also be referenced to other receiver units that Randall already has stationed inside the park boundaries on known hammerhead cleaning stations and schooling areas. What’s more the tags are harmless to the shark, and will optimally be placed in the cartilaginous dorsal fin to minimize harm to the animal. Equal in difficulty to tagging the shark is covering the story.

I’ve teamed up with my brother Jesse Horton to capture the events as they take place, Jesse is a superb underwater videographer and has extensive experience on Cocos Island due to the fact that he has been working on Cocos as a the pilot of Deepsee, the submarine that we will be using. Jesse has also had footage included in a National Geographic special on Sharks along with the work of world renowned underwater videographers like Howard Hall.

For literary coverage, Kelly Hearn has agreed to join the expedition. Kelly is a National Geographic correspondent and has been working as an independent journalist in Latin America since 2004. Kelly wrote the National Geographic News Article for my first Cocos Island expedition and has done extensive research on the problem of Shark Poaching in Cocos Island.

Besides putting this expedition together, and aiding in gathering the scientific data, my role will be to gather the photographs that will be used to tell the story visually. Photography has been of great importance on other expeditions with goals such as ours like Micheal Fay’s legendary Mega Transect. It was the photography of Nick Nichols that put what science had found into perspective. Once the boat has left port, the photography will be my primary job, and I’ll be working to capture the value of the seamount through images.

The Urgency of the expedition cannot be stressed enough. Already over 90 percent of the pelagic species have been lost (appendix 1) and fisheries are advancing technology to make up for the difficulties of having less fish to catch. That they can maintain their quotas even with so few fish just goes to show that marine sanctuaries like Cocos Island are more precious than we think. Soon, they may be all that we have left.

Blog of Note

2008-04-12T14:16:00.000-06:00

Check out my good friend Bill Carrol's blog, at http://www.opensignals.com/

Protesting the Torch?

2008-04-08T21:17:00.004-06:00

We all know that China has been the center of much controversy over the last number of years, from the oppression of Tibet, to the Chinese involvement in Sudan. I have personally been guilty of pointing the finger with some of my shark finning research and journalism over the last few years. Although I'm not entirely sure that China was the best choice for the location of the upcoming Olympic Games there are a number of important factors that need to be considered before we stand in the way of the Olympic torch.

First and foremost, we should think about what the Olympics are, without the location that they are taking place being a factor. The Olympics are the only venue that the world currently has that can bring together nations from around the world and celebrate our individuality in the spirit of competition. Where else can so many cultures and nations come together under one figurative roof? This is not to say that all of the contestants and observers will abandon their prejudices. It is however an opportunity to bypass them, even if only for a short while.

Throwing the Javelin, running the fastest or the furthest, and wrestling are not just pointless exercises to determine the strongest contestant, but are designed to push people to develop their skills in arts applicable to warfare. In ancient Greece, these were more than just metaphorical challenges, they were highly specialized skill sets. Although the games now include sports that really don't apply to warfare, the basic tenants are the same. Even seemingly unrelated sports like the bobsled race still develop skills like teamwork, and communication.

When Beijing was chosen, it wasn't because China was the most logical place on the planet to hold the games. It also wasn't to bring China needed income that the games would doubtlessly bring from the attendees. It was an acknowledgment that China now stands as a key nation relative to the rest of the world. It was also a statement about the future of China, they stand now at a crossroads, and the choices that they make in the years leading up to 2012 will establish their world role in the near future. In my travels to China over the last year, I saw first hand the mass gentrification that was within eyesight of every major roadway and railway that foreigners regularly travel. As soon as we passed beyond the road well traveled, the long history of China seemed to unfold before our eyes. China isn't just the strict, industrial age competitor that most Westerners see it as. In the mountains of Guanzou, ancient peoples still live lives governed by tradition and necessity. The Yao peoples still only cut their hair 3 times in their lives, and will work in terraced rice paddies that have been susstaining them since before the United States was even a thought, and in Yuangshou people ride bamboo rafts down the Li river, just as they did thousands of years ago. Some have adapted their rafts to incorperate gas powered motors, but the lifestyle remains inherently the same.

At first glance, it seems like China has invested all it has in the social progress and status that it will gain from the hosting the Olympic Games, but a deeper assesment will reveal a Country that is thousands of years old, and has not merely survived civil wars, genocides, colapsed empires and social spurning. If all of Chinas efforts are in vain, they have 6000 years of experiance in surviving to fall back on. Were the world to abandon China, and the economy collapes, the Yao will still be working in their rice paddies.

To impede the progress of the olympic torch is not just showing our disaproval for the way that China has handled its domination of Tibet. It is to stand in the way of what progress China stands to make on the world scene. Would not China be easier to negotiate with once it stands to lose something it has already gained? Not only do those protesting stand against China, they stand before an ancient tradition that has recognized our differences and has allowed us to put them asside, although not in all cases, in many.

Even so, what better way to make a stand right now for the atrocity that is Chinas rule of Tibet. The whole world is watching and this may be one of the few instances where protesting can make a difference. I bring it up, because I just want to make sure that those who protest are doing it fully aware of what they are doing, and why. They will certainly hurt the pockets of the political figures, and perhaps Tibet will gain something from the world being made aware of its plight. We also need to consider the other people who are befitting from the gentrification of China. Perhaps the gentrification that is taking place in China, the empty office buildings that are being built in hopes that they will be filled as their country makes the necessary changes to host the Olympics, will soon hold people who not long ago were working in sweat shops making cigarettes or sneakers.

Mika

2008-03-29T14:56:00.000-06:00

“Unusual things are not meant to last.” Said Mika, a deceptively humble and sedate Inuit woman. She had said some form of the same statement many times over the last few weeks. This time she was referring to a team of dogs that she said could pull her Dogsled at a sustained speed of 17 kilometers per hour. Sadly most of those dogs had perished from the disease parvo, the year before. She sat across the room from me sowing a pair of beaver skin mitts speaking in a quiet monotone voice, occasionally punctuating words by raising her eyebrows. Inuit people are not all as quiet as Mika, but those who were raised mostly on the land understand the value of quiet. “We are taught to be quiet so as not to disturb the animals.” Mika said. I’m sure I had a quizzical look on my face. Who cares I thought. The more I learned from Mika about their traditions, the more I realized just how valuable their laws are. She remembers a time years ago when the Canadian Government tried to teach the Inuit to be herders, so they could make a living herding Caribou. The Inuit tried the techniques, but in the end the Caribou were just to hard to manage, so they went back to their old ways. What the Canadian Government didn’t understand, was that the Inuit had been managing the Caribou already for thousands of years. By our standards, the Inuit were a nomadic people, moving from place to place depending on the seasons. Nomads are roamers though, and they knew exactly where they were going, and it was the same as the year before. They didn’t move only to follow herds of Caribou, or to stay within hunting distance of the Flow Edge. They moved to allow their homes to air out, and to let the scent of man leave for a time, thus allowing nature to follow it’s course uninterrupted by man.

Many of the Inuit ways are confusing to us. They fight for rights to lands rich in mineral deposits, and yet do not mine them. They are a people backed by oral tradition, with knowledge passed down from the Elders. Those who lived solely off of the land are older now, mostly in their 80s, and it’s they who understand the reasons behind the laws. As with many oral traditions, they are passed on only when they are of use to those who keep them, and they are intimately connected with the language they were created in, changing the language changes the meaning of the story. Mika is fighting now to preserve not only her people, but their ancient ways. It isn’t easy, she is bending the rules by recording what has been an oral tradition for so long, and it’s considered rude to tell the Elders what to talk about. On the cusp that binds the generations, Mika is fighting to hold together her culture.

Part 2

2008-03-26T22:14:00.001-06:00

Not all struggles can be described in full just by recounting the events. This last day was one of those days. Iʼve deliberated at how to complete this story over the last few days, and have had a great deal of trouble ﬁguring it out. Iʼm still not sure that Iʼve
found the best way to convey the feeling of both desperation and determination that all
of us were going through that morning as we left the last camp amid waist deep snow.
At a certain point, I was acting outside myself, with my self consciousness conﬁned to
the hood of my parka. As nice as it was to be on autopilot, at the same time the danger
of falling into a complacent pace was more than just possible, it was our greatest
enemy. Breaks dragged on, snow still fell. Finally as darkness began to fall, we passed
the ﬁnal descent to the sea ice and made it to open sea ice. Only 21 miles stood before
us, and for a moment we almost felt we were home. The Sea Ice was slow, and the
blizzard obstructed our view of the city lights. Flickering in the distance, just barely in
visible range, a single light occasionally broke through the storm to guide us home. All
it takes sometimes is a single light to remind you that you arenʼt alone. That there is
someone out there waiting for your arrival, standing and looking into the windswept
darkness waiting for you, silently rooting you on. As hard as those ﬁnal miles were, they
were impossible to give up on. Our beacon in the dark led us to the waiting friends and
families. They stood in the bitter cold, in the whipping wind and welcomed us home. At
midnight, on the ﬁnal day, we had ﬁnally overcome our greatest challengers, ourselves.

New Photos From the Race

2008-03-25T15:34:00.001-06:00

Qamaluaniq Challenge ~ Part 1

2008-03-25T10:58:00.000-06:00

I hate competing. I loathe it. I was convinced by my teammates for an upcoming Ellesemere Island Expedition that it would be good training though. It was only going to be 7 days, and it would be fun. Besides, we weren’t actually “racing,” it was all in the name of fun. I can’t say I was in the least bit excited about covering 320 kilometers without cross country skis, and the mandatory 120 pounds of flower that we were to deliver to Kimmirut. The weight of our gear, the flower, the heavy wooden sleds, and my team mate and I was to much even for the 9 bearlike inuit sled dogs we had fan hitched to the pulling end of the sled. Fan hitch is how the Inuit used to run their dogs. In the Arctic, and near arctic, there aren’t to many trees for the dogs to get tangled up in, so having each dog separately tied to the sled allows them to pick their own path through tide tossed sea ice, and the boulders that roll down from the stone walled canyons broken off by the intense cold. All dogsledding is descendant from the Inuit. It has even been argued that the Inuit could not have survived in the Arctic without dogs. Pieces of dogsleds made from baleen, whales jaw, have been found alongside bones of dogs in archaeological sites 5000 years old, the oldest of the arctic ruins. Not to much has changed in the designs, better wood is brought in and carved into shape. It used to be the only source of wood was driftwood that washed up from the south. Imagine what you might think of driftwood if you have never seen a tree. Imagine what you might have thought of a ship sailing north full of Southlanders were you Inuit. Inuit people imagined ships carved from single gigantic trees. It seems silly to us, but try to fathom a home built from snow warm enough to wear a t-shirt in.

Arguably things have changed more quickly for the Inuit than any other culture. Just 30 years ago, people where still living in Igloos out on the land and traveling by dogsled. A friend, and a great source of knowledge in the wild is a small unassuming woman named Mika. She was number 9 in a family with 12 children, and offers a great perspective on the changes that the Inuit have been through. She sees her siblings as covering three generations, the first children where born out on the land, to a family that moved with the seasons and followed the hunting grounds throughout the year. The middle children were sent to town to go to school, while the family still lived on the land. The last generation of which Mika was a part grew up in a town, close to a school and in a world constantly in touch with what we would call the “Western World” and what they would call the “South.”

On day one of the race, I wrote in my journal that I had just been through the hardest day of my life. Even when the dogs are fresh, and the the trail flat, the dogs had trouble carrying our weight, so one of us was constantly running the flats, climbing the hills, or skating, a technique kind of like riding a giant skate board on your knees. 75 kilometers later, and 2000 vertical feet climbed. We stood atop a plateau that represented (at least to me) five more days of struggle. This same night, the temperature dropped to about -40 degrees. It doesn’t matter if you want it in Fahrenheit or Celsius, at -40 it’s the same. It’s the point where both parties can agree that it’s freezing out. We set up our tents and retreated into our many layers of sleeping bags to sleep out the night.

Do you know that feeling, when you are in your nice warm bed, and the floor around you has cooled in the early hours of the morning but you still can’t sleep because nature has been calling. Eventually you have to throw off the duvet and roll out of bed, your feet cringe as they first touch the floor. Now imagine the same feeling except in a tent at -40. Earlier that night, I had watched water freeze as we poured it into a pot, building a rough stalagmite of ice before our eyes.

Day two was far, far harder. We were already exhausted and sore from the first day, and the dogs must have realized they weren’t going home. According to my GPS we actually did more climbing on day two than on day one, but we didn’t get the satisfaction of standing on top of a peak and looking out over the bay ice to see what our efforts had added up to. The climbing was all done in long slow climbing sections quickly followed by short descents that nullified any gains we felt we had made. A rolling and mostly featureless landscape that offered no short term goals to reach for us or the dogs. Dogs love the rough ice that forms where the frozen ocean has been pushed by tides and winds against the shore into a cracked and broken accordion of Ice. To them it’s the equivalent of a racetrack, they yip and bark and growl each vying for the front position in the pack, another reason why having different length ropes tethering the dogs to the sled is so effective. The Plateau had none of that thrill. Yet, standing on the edge of the plateau at the end of the daylight hours and watching the sunset stands out as one of the most beautiful sights I’ve been privileged enough to see. After descending into that valley during the twilight hours, we lead the dogs for 4 more hours into the night and that stands out as one of the most difficult nights i’ve ever experienced.

The halfway point, Kimmirut, welcomed us on the third evening with a feast and a warm place to lay our sleeping bags. The locals were more than willing to lend a hand with any of our tasks. Even the dogs were treated as royalty, dining on the same fresh meat as the people instead of hard packed and frozen dogfood. Seeing the blend of cultures that have created Kimmirut and the way in which the people live their day to day lives in the far North forces reflection on our own cultural development. After a lengthy prayer by one of the village elders, locals descended upon raw caribou laid out on a sheet of Tyveck. To the side, a table waited with cooked caribou for those that didn’t find the raw caribou appetizing. The inuit culture like many other native peoples has found a blend of religion and tradition with those of the foreigners that have shown up over the years, this blend has paralleled the peoples adaptation to life in houses and villages, as well as having replaced dogsledding with snow-machines. As we found on our return trip to Iqaluit, the changes have their downfalls to survival in the North.

Back at camp 2, with dogs and racers well rested and inspired from an easy day traveling up a frozen river from Kimmirut. They sky held signs of a coming storm, but the racers readied for another day. The race organizer Muni held us back against our will, even though we trust him and his unparalleled knowledge of the trail implicitly. It wasn’t until waiting a full day in the tent that we found out we had been held for a search and rescue operation. Suddenly we didn’t mind waiting so much, the head Ranger, Jameson, was missing. He had left in the early afternoon the day before to pick up spark plugs for the snowmobiles and hadn’t returned. In a landscape as vast and dangerous as this, anything could have happened. Theories on his disappearance verged from the catastrophic to the mundane, but when a man like Jameson disappears without a trace something must have gone horribly wrong. After spending the night in two sleeping bags, a bivy sack, a vapor barrier and a tent, I couldn’t imagine anyone surviving a night out in such bitter cold. Mika was more optimistic, and in her way quietly gave us all hope. The wind had swept away most of the snowmobile tracks, the snow in the sky blended with the snow on the ground, and only the occasional rock added depth or contrast to the scene. In this weather, the Canadian Rangers had combed the land for two days and hadn’t turned up a sign of Jameson. It wasn’t until the next morning, after his second night out that he was found. He had veered off the trail, and had fallen over 20 feet into a ravine breaking his pelvis. He hadn’t moved in two days, and he was alive. Chills sent shock-waves up and down my spine when I heard that he had kept his willpower to live. According to Mika, your will is your strongest force against the cold, and Jameson had little else to protect him.

We had to feed the dogs their emergency food which had previously weighed down the sled even more, along with some of our extra fuel, and without the weight of the flower, climbing back up onto the plateau was tough but quick and manageable, the weather was holding, and the dogs had had plenty of rest. Throughout the day, the weather slowly started to lean towards storming, the wind began to build, and oddly enough the temperature began to rise. Dogs run slow in the warm weather. I watched my altimeter all day, and the barometric pressure was dropping faster than we were climbing indicating the onset of a low pressure system. By nightfall, we were in a blizzard, winds buffeted the tents at 60 miles an hour and our dogs had curled up into themselves letting the snow cover them for more insulation. Again, we had no choice but to wait it out in our tents.

Two mornings later, I stepped out of the tent to find our sleds buried, our tents in self created wind wells, and the dogs still sleeping under the snow. It was late in the morning, and according to the locals, it was the most snow to have dropped in over 15 years. Snowmobiles where bogging down before they even began to move, tents had been ravaged, the storm was in a lull and would begin anew at any moment. We had 50 miles to go, and not enough food to wait out the storm.

The Northern Lights

2008-03-14T21:26:00.001-06:00

Tonight I went outside to catch some fresh air, I'd spent the majority of my day inside packing food for the expedition, and the fresh air was a great way to unwind. Looking up into the starry sky, a faint green ribbon, almost smoky in appearance began to unravel across the sky. Within seconds, the most beautiful Northern Lights I've ever seen burst into the atmosphere and unfurled in hues of green and purple. The green is common, but the purple is a rare treat. The lights are caused when Light from the sun enters the atmosphere at an angle that ionizes certain atoms in the upper atmosphere giving off the light that can range from soft and lazy, to a rapid fire kaleidoscope reminiscent of a lazer show from the 90's. When we are in Ellesmere Island, we won't be able to see the Northern lights, because there will be no night, and the sun will not set while we are are above the arctic circle. The lights were feared in ancient times by the Inuit, but now that it is understood that they do not bring harm, they serve only to inspire.

Iqaluit to Kimmirut and Back

2008-03-14T19:03:00.000-06:00

So tomorrow the team and I are leaving for a 7 day dogsled race to Kimmirut and back. The round trip will be 320 Kilometers, most of those miles will be run by at least one team member. Tomorrow will be our hardest day, and I'm glad that we are getting it out of the way right off the bat. We will sled for about three hours to cross the bay, then we'll hit rough sea ice that has pressed into shore all winter, creating massive folds in ice many meters thick. Just behind the sea ice, our trail heads for the sky, and a very poorly covered slope strewn with boulders marks the beginning of 700 meters of climbing. The dogs are not going to be very happy about this, and I probably won't be either. To do a race of this distance is intimidating, but to do it in the frigid temperatures that we will be in is downright terrifying. It's so cold out here, that cargo holds and transport trucks called "refrigerators" are actually heated to keep food from freezing to much.

There are six teams in the race, one of them has already said that he will only be along for half of the race, he already had to do the first part of the course just to get to town, and the tough 70 year old Inuit man is running with puppies, as all of his dogs died from disease last year. It's guys like this that make me reevaluate myself. What I call adventure, and what I prepare for many months to do, this guy has done his whole life. I listened very carefully to his words of advice through an interpreter last night as he advised the teams on the condition of the trail, the speed of the snow, and the dangers that we will be encountering. I am certain that his words will echo in my mind as all that he warned us of comes to pass.

Training

2008-03-14T11:34:00.001-06:00

With most of the team here finally, and the expedition coming up quickly, we have been working overtime trying to get everything ready. Food needs to be packed so that in two months when we pull it out of the box, we aren’t missing anything, and gear needs to be tested and readied for the expedition. Even with all of the things we have to do, the dogs need to be run every day.

Time is running short. But every day, when we get out on the ice with the dogs, everything seems worth while. Passing kilometer after kilometer in the silence, with the beautiful and surreal landscape stretching out around us, our stresses disappear. Training in Iqaluit is not just getting our body ready for the physical stresses of skiing all day every day, or staying warm in the cold. Training is also getting our minds ready for the solitude that we will find on the ice. Ellesmere Island offers some of the most remote landscapes in the world.

For me, training also involves figuring out what camera equipment I should be taking with me, and how my equipment will handle the cold. I’ve already learned so much about taking pictures in the cold, but in training, I always have a warm place to come home to. Hopefully, we will all be able to learn as we go, and adapt to our environment well enough to get our job done. The pictures from Ellesmere Island will be used to show the world the effects that global warming has on our planet, and because of that the pictures are one of the most important aspects of this trip.

In a couple of days, we will have our best training run yet. We are doing the 6 day race from Iqaluit to Kimmirut and back. We will get to test our gear, our food, and our stamina in another beautiful landscape. For us, the race is about figuring out our systems, and having fun. Winning would be a great bonus though!

Friluftsliv

2008-03-09T09:41:00.000-06:00

Friluftsliv (frí-loofts-live)

Toby taught me a new word in Norwegian today. We were having a conversation about languages and how you can express certain things more precisely in one language verses another. Toby speaking more than 4 languages was more than understanding of what I meant by that. I gave the example of one of my favorite spanish words, ‘tranquilo’ which translates directly to ‘tranquil’ but it’s meaning is so much deeper. It’s a way of being, a mood, and is a way of life in sleepy little beach towns in Central America.

Friluftsliv. It means literally: Free-Air-Life but again, the real meaning is so much deeper. Like any of these words, they loose meaning when they are forced into another language. Toby helped me understand the meaning by changing the words around to “open air life,” We can get a general understanding of the meaning right off the bat, just as we know the “meaning” of the word tranquil. But in Norway, it goes deeper.

It means living in the open air, but living ‘for’ the open air. You may be stuck in an office all week, but you look forward to spending your weekend outdoors. You could drive your car, but you walk. It means that your heart is in the fresh air, and you will do whatever you can to be there. I guess in a way, it combines a few of our american words. Like the over used and bastardized environmental word ‘Green’ and the personality trait ‘outdoorsy.’ You could probably even throw in a little bit of ‘inspired.’

We may not be able to pronounce ‘fruluftsliv’ with any sort of accuracy, but we can certainly make an effort to live by it. I’ve seen the effect of the word, even before I knew it existed. When at 53 years old, my dad suddenly decided to become a surfer and get in shape, or in the way my 83 year old grandmother still goes hiking after a recent hip surgery.

There is a power that language holds that is revealed to those people like Toby who speak a number of them. Like my friend Wade taught me, Language is not just a code that is designed to explain the world, it is a way of seeing your world.

New Suits

2008-03-07T20:27:00.000-07:00

30 K Across the Bay

2008-03-06T15:55:00.000-07:00

Stepping off of the airplane in Iqaluit reminded me of running head long into a brick wall. The cold wind was penetrating, and impenetrable. In the short walk from the plane to the building, the wind had pushed the cold through every layer I had on, and I felt like I was standing naked on some fictional icy planet. Iqaluit is not actually above the arctic circle, but sits just south of it on the map. The map lies. If you follow the tree line, the northern limit of where even large plant life can live, you will find that there is a sudden dip just around Iqaluit. Arctic storms that can be heard coming, howl across the ice, bringing temperatures that make your bones brittle. It’s a white dessert, with no open water, no trees, and scarce life to be found.

After meeting up with the team, I went back to the house where I’ll be staying for the next month, and was given my clothing that will be my only protection from the elements for the upcoming expedition to the even colder Ellesmere Island. The words of a good friend came to mind as I pulled on my bibs, and bent down to my knees to zip up my jacket. “Function over fashion,” Craig had said. I have no problem with that, as long as it keeps me warm!

Soon after, I was introduced to the dogs. They need no artificial warmth, or layers to keep them warm. Even the puppies can spend nights out, curled up on the ice. These dogs however are closer in relation to arctic wolves than they are to the handbag stuffing chihuahuas and the overbred lapdogs we find comfort in. It shows too. The elongated stride, the tooth scarred muzzles, and the cold, calculating, but intelligent stare of the dogs remind me of the feeling of looking into the eyes of a lion on the Serengetti.

The dogs you see in movies are malamutes, and siberian huskies, kitty-cats compared to the canadian eskimo dogs that are pulling us. Three of the dogs on our 9 dog team have drug their previous owners and 800 pounds of gear to the north pole twice. They are easy to make friends with though, and just like people, each dog has it’s own personality. The new dogs on the team are skittish, and afraid of people, just like a captured wolf would be. The veterans have the system so figured out that they could practically put their own harness on and will snap at other dogs for stepping out of line.
After a hard day of pulling you around, the dogs are tied up individually and fed, then after all the other work is done for the night, they look forward to a good petting that is the highlight of their day. Sarah, my teammate impressed the value of “saying goodnight” to your dogs early. A dog that is your friend is going to listen a lot better, and is going to enjoy pulling you around a lot more than one that resents you.

On my second day in Iqaluit, we load the sleds and harness the dogs for a 30 kilometer run out to a cabin that Sarah and Eric own across the bay. Sarah and Eric are the children of the famous arctic explorer Matty Mcnair-Landry. Matty is like one of the sled dogs, she pulls people up to the arctic. People with dreams of the North Pole invariably will come to Matty to lead them there. Sarah and I team up on a sled, and are yanked by the yelping dogs through a kilometer of broken up sea-ice before reaching the smooth ice beyond. I can’t say it was the easiest place to learn to ski. Dodging chunks of ice, wind hardened drifts of snow, and the sliding sled the whole time. Some of the new dogs didn’t always know how to pick their way through the ice while tied into the sled, and would try to go around the ice on the wrong side. As the sled went forward, the momentum and the 8 other dogs would suddenly yank the misguided dog backwards and the dog would get drug around the ice chunks and catapulted back toward the sled. Sarah has been doing this since she was two. She can remember being tied down to the sled and bundled up as her mom mushed the dogs across the ice. A life in the arctic running dogs makes for a strong person. I got to see Sarah lift an 80 pound dog (one of the small ones) as it got caught between two ice flows, and throw the dog over the ice, and over the sled, clearing some of the other dogs, probably saving it from being smashed to death between the flows by the frenzied other dogs.

Pictures from Iqaluit Airport

2008-03-03T15:49:00.000-07:00

It's minus 15 degrees, and that's not including wind chill... This was my first taste of what training is going to be like. I guess it's nice to make the step down to -80 slowly.

And I'm off

2008-03-02T20:25:00.001-07:00

Denver is 20 degrees, and the wind is blowing the snow sideways at 45 miles an hour. I suppose I should take advantage of the nice weather before I get to the arctic... I'll be in Baffin island all month training the dogs for the actual expedition. Or should I say they will be training me.

It's Times Like These I Wish I Still Believed in Heaven

2008-02-28T00:10:00.000-07:00

It’s times like these I wish I still believed in heaven. An old man is taking what could be his last breath with a few family members there to see him through it, all whispering a different hope into his ear. I would be there if I could, and it makes me think of what I would say. It’s a question I’ve wrestled with for 6 years now, ever since I gave up on what had been fed to me since birth.
Four years ago, my first friend passed away, and in the following two days two more followed. Since then another 13 people in my life have risen, or fallen depending on how you look at it. With each one, the question grinds deeper into my mind, and becomes harder to answer, and now, as my grandfather lies in a hospice, I wonder, if death can’t be a release, or even a reward. His pain is so great, and his body so deteriorated, that only drugs and machines keep him alive. Is he alive? Are we holding him captive when a better fate awaits? Can we not just let his soul go? If there is one to let go.
My grandfather was a man of war, raised in a generation that is said to be similar to my own. He was not in the World wars, but was raised in the aftermath and it’s effect could still be seen in his stance, if he could but stand. I’ve been wondering lately, after reading “Soldier of the Great War” if a man who has lived through war as my grandfather did in Vietnam, can respect someone who hasn’t seen the face of an enemy. I have no doubt that my grandfather is proud of his children, and his grandchildren, but to him it must seem as if we have never been tested, our foundations have never been shaken. Nomater what tribulations we face, they cannot match leaving your wife for a war, knowing you may never return.
I imagine that’s what he is going through now, he is about to walk through a door that he has no idea what is on the other side, and all he knows is that if he does return he will be a changed man. He is leaving his wife and children, who will say goodbye, and just as before they will try to keep a smile on their crying faces so he will see that those he loves are left happy.
If I were there, I wouldn’t be whispering hopes into his ears, I’d be holding his hand, smiling, telling him stories, and just maybe, bringing a little bit more life into his last days.

From our Favorite troublemaker

2008-01-29T16:43:00.000-07:00

"I was reading about how countless species are being pushed towards extinction by man's destruction of forests.
Sometimes i think the surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere is that none of it has tried to contact us. "

-Calvin-

Maybe I don't know what I'm talking about...

2008-01-24T18:01:00.000-07:00

...Infact, it's quite likely. I do feel the need however to make a comment regarding all those little plastic bracelets that everybody is wearing into Whole Foods and REI. The goal here is to save the planet, it's people, cancer, whatever color you chose. Would it not be better then, to stop producing things like little plastic bracelets that end up in landfills, oceans, gutters, and in every case will be either removed or lost at some point? It's a waste, and although they probably only cost a few cents to make, that is still a few cents that could be given to a cause. The problem is not with the companies that produce these little amulets though, it is with us. We need to be able to give money or time to a cause without having to advertise what we did to others, and until we make that fundamental change, the bracelets will be necessary. Let me offer an alternative. If you want to stop poverty, or hunger, have those you are trying to help weave or create the bracelets out of local organic materials. It's the give a man a fish vs. teach him to fish illustration all over again. If you want to save the rainforrest, definitely don't buy one. Even if it's made out of natural rubber, that rubber comes from a tree, one that had to have land cleared so that it could grow. But, maybe I don't know what I'm talking about, infact, it's quite likely.

2008-01-20T13:19:00.001-07:00

Video from Corcovado

2008-01-20T13:05:00.000-07:00

Can you spot the Croc?

Turtle Rescue

2008-01-10T11:30:00.000-07:00

Up and down the coast fishermen have been working the sea heavily for days now. It's not often that the ocean seems to boil over with life, what with all the overfishing that takes place off these shores. When, pods of spinner, stinky, and spotted dolphin where seen only 15 miles from shore, and stretching far out into the horizon, the fishermen knew that the tuna would be with them. Our first day in the water we hit it big. We go great shots of the schooling spinner dolphin, but we wanted the rarer, and more difficult spotted dolphin. These more elusive dolphin carry with them the big tuna, and are one of the species that is constantly under attack by the tuna fisheries... If you find the dolphin, you find the tuna, and the dolphin are what people search for.

We returned the the ocean yesterday with all of our gear, new knowledge, and refined techniques ready to "get the shot" but it seemed like a whole new ocean. The dolphin where not just to far out, they where gone. Yet, while we where in the ocean, we found a long line in the water about 20 miles out. It's not illegal to use long lines out here, but while we followed the line of bouys, we found a sea turtle in distress. It had swallowed the bait, and had been fighting for hours, it's fatigue apparent as it didn't even try to escape the boat. And so, we entered the water, and freed the turtle. In Costa Rica, even the endangered species are used for food, as any meat is generally a delicacy for the locals. All turtles are protected, and it was a privilege to help this one along on its never ending ocean voyage.

Osa Expedition

2008-01-07T13:29:00.001-07:00

Finally the boats arrived and we managed to get on the road. With about 8 and a half hours of driving and 9 rivers to cross before we get there, it still doesn't quite feel like we've started, but at least now we know that the expedition will happen. We only have to do our time in the truck and we will soon be on Playa Carate pushing out into the waves. Before we arrive however, we will drive through much of the inner coastline of the Osa Peninsula, and through the cloud forests that don't just catch the moisture in the clouds but produce it. As we drive we can see puffs of cloud rising off of the trees, it's as if it's the breath of the forest. The land here is becoming alive!

Part I

We spent a night on the beach at Playa Carate, and set about getting geared up for the trip. All the while, the waves break heavily on the shore like the teeth of the ocean gnawing away at the land. Scarlet Macaw, Howler Monkeys, and Poison Dart frogs
keep us entertained, and we get to test our system as the tropical rain pours down almost dousing our camp fire, and threatening to drown us in our hammocks.

Finally, after dozens of unexpected set backs, our boats are packed, our hearts are racing, and the waves aren't letting up. We decide it's time to make a break for blue water, and one at a time, peel out into the rip tide, hoping against all hope that we will be swept into the blue and not catapulted back onto the beach in boats weighing upwards of 200 pounds full of gear.

I pull Jesse through the head high shore break to give him a head start and as he gets up to speed, he begins to break through the white wash from waves the just broke a few meters in front of his boat. My stomach begins to drop when I see what in surfing we call a "cleanup set"
forming in the distance. The set rises above the rest of the waves and charges the shoreline, it's obvious Jesse sees the set coming, because his arms have started pumping like cylinders in an engine to get him through the coming battle between man, boat, and the pacific. Two more meters and he would have risen gracefully over the wave, and he would have had a magnificent vantage point to look out to sea for more waves, but instead, the wave broke just in front of his boat, and the whitewash blew the sprayskirt right off of his boat. In a moment, his boat was full of water. When they get this way, they are almost impossible to control, like paddling a telephone pole through the water, there is no chance of turning. Perhaps, that is why Jesse didn't turn around and try to make it back to shore. With his boat now going through the waves instead of over them, Jesse managed to get into the blue water and begin to bail his boat. I'm obviously relieved, but I turn around and find that Izzi doesn't look so good. She is fair skinned, but she is now as white as a pearl. She doesn't hesitate, and gets in the boat, weakly commanding me to help pull her into the water.

In only a few meters, Izzi hits her first wave, her first wave ever actually. As it turns out, she's only sea kayaked once before, and that was in a harbor. I push her forward, hoping to save her some energy for when the big waves come. The rip tide as stopped going out, now it's coming in, the waves are steadily marching forward, and Izzi looks like she is towing an anchor. After a few minutes, she is still pushing forward only to be pushed back nearly to shore, and she's obviously getting tired. With the coming set, she gets turned sideways, and then inevitably, upside down.

I prepare myself for an angry or demoralized team mate, but as soon as the boat is empty of its water, Izzi is back in it. This time I tow her out until I can no longer stand and we wait there with me holding her boat for a break in the waves. In a mad dash, Izzi makes for the blue water, and cresting the peak of the last threatening wave, she now only has to worry about coming back in further up the beach.

Part II

We arrive at the first ranger station, only about 3 miles up the coast, and we have to check in with the rangers and pay the park fees. Coming to shore was easier than going out, and Izzi amazes us with a natural ability to side surf a kayak, never having done it before, still though in a comical collision, she and Jesse get tangled up in the shore break and both end up in the water trying drag their boats to shore. At the station, we hear that since nobody has ever done a trip like this in the Osa Peninsula, that it must not be allowed. So the ranger says that he is going to have to call the "director" to see if Sea Kayaks are allowed in the park. I doubt he ever called, but the word was that we would have to hike it. No boats. As he said this, we could see fishing boats motoring up the coast without so much as a glance from the rangers. We could get in the boats and paddle forward, and they would have most likely been unable to have done anything, but we decided that we would do our best to work with the park instead of against it. The only problem being that we are in no way set up for the 16 click hike that we have in front of us. Jesse has a drybag with shoulder straps, and a pair of shoes. Izzi and I are equipped only with our Hammocks and soft bottomed neoprene surf booties. The trips status as an expedition is waning the only thing we have left to call it that is our firm resolve to work through all of the obstacles that stand before us. So, we throw our gear in Hammocks, put our heads down and start walking.

Part III

There was once a time, when the sharks came up the Rio Sierpe in such great numbers, the locals say that you could have practically run across the river on their backs. Now, with sport fishing boats and longliners just past the breakers, it's no wonder we saw a mere 3 sharks the entire time we where at the river. I don't know much about the range of these sharks, but they are known to stay near this river mouth, and with no protection whatsoever, their numbers have dropped drastically. There is no enforcing of the law in Corcovado when it comes to fishing in the park, and the park only extends 500 meters out into the ocean. One of the locals of Playa Carate just told me about a battle that she and a few locals had against the powers that be who had planned to put a tuna farm at the mouth of the sierpe river where the ocean floor drops off to as deep as 2oo meters. I am not a biologist and I don't know the impact of putting a tuna farm in the area, but I do know that any time I've seen nature messed with, the only things that happen are bad.

Part IV
While sitting on shore and waiting for the bull sharks one evening, we saw a the back of a crocodile with all its serrated ridges moving up the coastline through the waves. It disappeared rather quickly, and our interest returned to looking for sharks. The river water was clear, and so as we stared into the depths, with my underwater camera at the ready, we felt confidant that we could not be snuck up on. With the light failing, I moved up river to photograph a few smaller crocodiles (2-3 meters) that where lounging in the shallows. Just upstream of Jesse and Izzi, a fully grown crocodile popped it's eyes through the surface of the water, obviously the one we had seen in the waves, and quite undetected by our vigilant eyes. Crocodiles most often attach from downstream is what we were told by Dr. Brady Barr, and this one had just swum up from downstream and passed within a few meters of us without ever even causing a ripple of concern from our team.

Preperation

2007-12-23T13:14:00.001-07:00

I've come down to Costa Rica a few weeks early to get everything set up for the expedition. After working in Central America on a few previous trips, it is painfully obvious to me that even on a bare bones trip like this, things will come up, pieces of the puzzle will be missing, and nothing will happen like you plan it. At a certain point, it's always necessary to just take what you have and go for it. Like deciding which stroke is your last on a painting that has taken hours or days to complete, a certain point comes where whatever you do will only complicate things further. In a few days, Izzi's plane will land in Liberia, Costa Rica, and we will head south on our 8 hour drive to the Osa Peninsula where, with all the planning that has been put into this trip, plans will change and it will gain a mind of its own. These are the best kinds of trips. We have goals, but how we get there will be a fluid and entertaining process.

Corcovado Expedition

2007-12-05T13:49:00.000-07:00

My Brother, my friend Tony a girl (who has yet to be decided) and I will be following up on my Cocos Island Project along by Kayaking around the Osa Peninsula in Costa Rica, going through the Sierpe Reserve, Drake Bay, Isla Cano National Reserve, and Corcovado national park. The trip will be fully self supported, living mostly off of the land (coconuts and speared fish), and will take about a week of kayaking through mangroves, open ocean, and uninhabited coastline to complete.

The trip will be going through a number of ecological habitats known for sharks, Rio Seirpe and Rio Sirena are fresh water hunting grounds for inumerable Bull Sharks, and Isla Caño attracts some of the same schools of hammerheads that we documented off of Cocos Island. Isla Caño is only 10 miles from shore, and about 40 miles from some of the closer fishing villages, so I am anxious to see how much more affected it is by the fishermen than Cocos Island.

Our plan is to sleep in hammocks on the beach, eat coconuts and catch fish for food, all the while surfing what waves we can on the secluded coast line. This adventure is to be an example for other young people, by showing that adventure can have a purpose.

This expedition will be taking place the first week of January, and we will be covering it with HDV video, and High quality still imagery above and below sea level.

An Interview for Global Warming 101

2007-11-26T14:13:00.000-07:00

2007-11-24T09:23:00.001-07:00

Sharks

2007-11-20T15:42:00.000-07:00

Here's a quick video to give you an Idea what it's like filming and shooting on Cocos Island. When you're lucky that is.

Preperation

2007-10-13T00:16:00.001-06:00

A new generation of explorers has been invited to sit around the same table that has been Will Steger’s base of operations for over twenty years. The biggest difference between the planning of our expedition and those before us is the road that allowed our easy access to Wills cabin, far removed from the town of Ely Minnesota which itself is far removed from the city life that has become all to present in my life. It used to be that to get to wills cabin, skiing, dogsledding, or canoeing across the lakes was the only way in, and this is exactly how Will brought in the supplies to build his cabin.
Few buildings sidetrack my gaze as I scan the shoreline along Wills lake. Steam rises from the lake and a stairway descends almost directly into the water from Wills sauna. After letting the sauna wring the sweat from us, the cold water is as inviting as a tropical beach and for hours we trade off between hot and cold..
We are here because Will has chosen each of us to join his latest expedition. We are from around the world, and we all have different takes on life, but we come together for a single task. Through the Circumnavigation of Ellesmere Island in the high arctic, we will be bringing back first hand accounts detailing the effects of global warming. My job is to capture the many critical moments on camera and to bring home the imagery that will inspire people to take action.

Gili Air

2007-08-21T12:02:00.000-06:00

It seemed more like a vacation, a month in Indonesia shooting surfing is nothing to complain about. I left the US again, but this time took a few extra weeks to just do some freelance work before the surfing shoot started. I found a small Island called Gili Air just off of North Western Lombok and took a transport out to the Island. With no motorized vehicles on the Island, I walked the extent of it over the three days that I was there. The Circumference was dotted with the occasional restaurant or hotel, (an expensive one being $5Us) But the interior was tranquil and untouched as the few tourists who visit never venture far from the turquoise waters and the local dive shop. Once beyond site of the beach, paths disappeared, and plots of land with little thatch huts started to pop up under the coconut trees. The people here work mostly as coconut farmers and are happy with their quiet lives. Soon I was to return to the dollar soaked tourist town of Kuta, Bali, and when in need of an escape, I only needed to imagine I was once again on Gili Air.

Bali Surfing

2007-08-18T12:14:00.000-06:00

The colors are brighter, as they usually are in a dream. The water is bluer, and the horizon is rippling with steadily marching clones of the perfect wave. Through the ethereal water that moves more like a fog than an ocean, the corral is stretching toward my feet, and tiny jewel fish take refuge in the shade below my surfboard. In the dream, I’m riding a fluorescent green board, and wave after wave wraps around me, carrying me all the way to a beach covered in seashells and coral. It’s a dream that I struggle to keep myself from waking from. It’s the inevitable grumble of my fully awake stomach that finally rattles me out of bed.

I walk the quarter mile to the beach and check the swell with a fresh cup of coffee. The swell has risen, and although not the ribbed ocean from my dreams, waves twice my hight stretch to the distant horizon. Nobody is out, and I grab my board and run down the beach to the most manageable peak. With a quick stretch to wake up my muscles, I slip into the water, letting the rip tide drag me beyond the peaks quickly.

My first wave comes, and I turn to face the shore. Less than halfway into the wave, I get thrown in front, into the teeth of the ocean, where water gnaws away at a retreating shoreline. Thrown over myself again and again, I watch the light change directions around me, and try to keep track of which way is up. By the time it’s done, I am standing somewhere between where the sand is churned up in the wave and where it makes up the solid floor of the ocean, and this time, I’m not in the rip-tide, so the paddle out takes twice as long.

Again and again, I’m thrown into the churning white-water, and it seems impossible to get my board into the wave before it pitches over. Demoralized I head for the beach and with my head down, I walk back to my hotel to rinse of the salt and the memories.

That afternoon, I walk through Kuta, and stop into one of the back alley surf shops where other travelers have sold their boards desperate for cash or just demoralized like I was. There, sandwiched between a pair of old beat up boards, a sliver of fluorescent green catches my eye. Curiosity couldn’t possibly describe what I felt, but that is the closest word I can think of. I pull it off the shelf, and right there in front of me is the board from my dream. Hardly a pressure ding in it’s smooth glassy surface. And it’s cheap.

Before I know it, I’m standing up on a set wave, gliding over the coral and under the waves pitching teeth, caressed by the ocean. The colors are brighter, as they usually are in a dream. The water is bluer and the coral waves at me as I surf by, and in the half-speed world that comes around during these moments, the water moves more like a fog than an ocean.

An afternoon in Singapore

2007-08-18T12:12:00.000-06:00

Greenish storm clouds roll off of the frothing ocean and collide with the Decrepit buildings of Singapore’s red light district. The sun as strong as it is, only just filters through the clouds enough to give an eerie glow to the buildings.

Shark Attack

2007-07-01T21:27:00.000-06:00

I´m on Cocos Island photographing sharks and shark poachers for my project that I´m working on with National Geographic, and on my last night on the Island, after a full day of diving with massive schools of sharks, we decide to do a night dive and hopefully catch one of the more impressive congregations of sharks, a feeding frenzy. There is a pretty reliable group of perhaps 200 white tip reef sharks, each between 5 to 7 feet long that come into the particular bay that we were diving in every night.

After about 45 minutes of taking photographs of these sharks searching every crevice in the reef for fish, I began to get a little to comfortable... I allowed myself to descend into the school which stuck pretty close to the bottom, and was mostly left alone except for one of the bigger sharks that rushed me, and was successfully discouraged when it ran into my big metal camera housing.

Perhaps 20 minutes later, just as we were about to resurface, I was alone on the bottom perhaps 50 feet underwater, behind me a huge boulder hid the sharks from my view and I hoped me from them. The sharks swarmed around the boulder, and I was instantly in the midst of hundreds of sharks! One of the larger ones, obviously a leader in the pack came up from behind and latched onto my foot from the side, and began to thrash about. I put a good kick into it´s nose a couple of times and it finally released me and took off, seeing it run must have discouraged the other sharks, because they all turned and swam a safe distance away, I dashed up about 15 feet to get above the school, and then looked down to assess the damage done to my foot. I count myself extremely lucky, because the fin was torn not an inch from my flesh, and the thick rubber together with a neoprene boot had stopped the sharks teeth from penetrating too deep, and left me unscathed. This seemed the perfect time to end the dive!

Bright Moon over Cocos

2007-06-27T20:46:00.000-06:00

It will be a few days until the full moon, but the way the light shimmers on the sea makes the area light up. I´m getting dropped off in Waffer Bay on Cocos Island, and the captain of the boat doesn't want to risk coming close too shore. The water is shallow, only ten feet or so with reefs coming up almost to the surface, but it´s that way for about a quarter mile. So as they lower my gear overboard and onto a kayak, I look into the crystal clear water and wonder what lies below. As if on cue, the unmistakable silouette of a shark passes under the boat, perhaps 7 feet long, but it could be deeper, and bigger. Wafer bay is full sharks using the cover of night to hunt. It´s one of those places you don´t swim past dusk. Soon however, I´m halfway to shore, approaching the shallows, where the water is only 5 feet deep. The waves are beginning to break, and as I paddle to ride a swell to shore, the familiar shape slides alongside the boat, and surfs along side the kayak only a few feet away, ducking away just as the wave finally breaks on the rocky shore.

Sea Sick

2007-06-24T13:58:00.000-06:00

Even the hardened sailors got sick on this passage. 36 hours of traveling against the swell, with the boat constantly crashing into the next wave, then gaining speed and rising only to crash again. Inside, where you can´t see the windswept ocean, it looks like the walls themselves are dizzy, rocking back and forth trying to find balance.
I finally have arrived on Cocos Island, and am greeted by a rising sun. The Island is lush, and overgrown. More so that I remember. I don´t believe in omens, but i need one, so I take it as a sign that this trip will finally end my search for the perfect image to go along with my project. Setting foot on the sea soaked sand, my body sways back and forth, as if the island is being rocked back and forth by the swells crashing against the limestone walls that make up the coast. I know it´s just me though, and I stumble to my bunk to sleep off the Dramamine...

The Last Expedition to Cocos

2007-06-22T12:29:00.000-06:00

I'm sitting on the Pier, waiting for a boat to take me out to the Sea Hunter, the vessel that will be taking me to Cocos Island for the last time. I'm told that the sharks have arrived, and that the water is clear, so my hopes are high that I will arrive in time to finally finish off my project. I present to the Geographic on the 10th, and with some dedication and luck, I will be able to make a difference for Cocos Island.

Ispiritu Santo

2007-06-16T08:24:00.000-06:00

The breeze from the wings are all that alerts me to the Ispiritu Santo hovering just behind my shoulder. Its head turned to the side throws an inquisitive look at me which I’m sure I returned. In the green world full of ferns feathering off from whatever they can hold onto, the little white bird seems to have been sent down from another realm, an ethereal light pouring out from its feathers. Up into the canopy it returns to it’s roost and our team moves on with not a step lost, even in a moment which has had as many moments in it, as all of eternity.

The Great Blue Void

2007-06-15T13:59:00.001-06:00

Kicking slowly through a great blue void, to deep to see the surface, and hundreds of feet above the ocean floor, I allow the current to carry me so that I can conserve the priceless breath of air I'm holding in. I can hear a pod of spinner dolphin approaching, though I can’t see them yet. First a few flashes of light off of the sides of tuna, then the torpedo shaped fish begin to dash by on all sides. Following close behind, five hundred porpoise effortlessly glide by in formation. Some circle just beyond arms reach and others herd the young away from me. As quickly as the ocean revealed them, they are gone, their whistles still audible.
With a single kick my body rises along side the bubbles that the dolphin had left behind. With the appearance of the surface, the hull of our 38 foot sailboat looms overhead like a gigantic oceanic bird resting on the surface. With no land in site, the sails are hoisted, and slap of the waves on the side of the boat carry me away, and below into the void.

Urgent

2007-06-14T11:15:00.000-06:00

For over 60 years Costa Rica has had ties with Taiwan, and now, the ties have been cut and Costa Rica announces their new contract with China. Taiwan was granted the fishing rights to the Costa Rican waters and had hungrily scooped up everything in it's path, now, with an even hungrier benefactor, the oceans of Costa Rica are about to come under siege. Already, over 90% of the large fish are gone. Not missing, just gone.

Costa Rica let it happen, bribed by Taiwan with bridges and roads, and of course large payoffs to the right government officials. Costa Rica has long enjoyed the reputation that it's held as the Eco friendly vacation spot. With tourism dollars pouring into Eco tourism, hotels have been built on what was once mangroves, cities have been built around "pristine" rain forest so as to bring gawking tourists closer. Thus isolating species, and encroaching on their habitat.

With one of the best dive spots in the world in Costa Rica, they again appear to be doing everything just right, all those who visit are wooed by the vast schools of hammerhead shark, the gigantic tuna, and the jack schools so large that they block out the sun. This Island is a protected area, and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The Costa Ricans have dedicated one small boat to patrol over 450 square miles of ocean. Fishing boats enjoy lax laws that just barely allow the government to say that they are making an effort. Just outside of the the 12 mile radius, sea life falls off drastically, a testament to the overfishing that is rampant in the region.

It seems odd that a country whos number one income is tourism would risk it all by openly squandering their recourses, and they will continue to do so until that tourism market is affected. Of course, your average tourist is ignorant of the main issues of the world, and travel to places like Costa Rica where there is little besides the landscape to make them feel like they have gone too far from home. Awareness is our only weapon against transactions like these. When it is common knowledge that we are on the brink of disaster, and that certain places like Costa Rica have actively fooled us for decades, then and only then will they take action.

Inspired

2007-06-12T18:35:00.000-06:00

Four days on safari in Africa feels like you just dipped your toes into a cold pool. You feel like you know something about it, but there is nothing that can capture the feeling of diving right in. There is strong desire to get out as quickly as possible, yet it's so invigorating. I'm going to dive in, by walking around Lake Eyasi with a group of Bushmen. Traveling for two weeks with the second oldest tribe of people on the planet will be a good way explore the Dark Continent. The Hadzaba tribe is threatened right now, by a family from the United Arab Emerates that wants to relocate the people outside of their valley, and redesignate the area as a hunting preserve. Hopefully, through photo-documentation, and making the world aware of their plight, we can hold off their destruction and have the Yaida Valley and Lake Eyasi made into a reservation of sorts. How though do you make a reserve for a Nomadic People? That's why I'll be living with them, to better understand their way of life. A way of life which we desperatly need to keep on our planet. Without them, we will have lost a large part of the soul of the human race.

For More Information:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06
/09/AR2007060901465.html?hpid=topnews

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Eyasi
http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~hbe-lab/

Africa

2007-06-12T18:12:00.000-06:00

It feels like I'm home, and yet, I can't remember being here before. They say that human life started in the Rift Valley, and my body tells me that's right. I'm in the Serengeti, and the rare but powerful grasp of instinct has taken hold of me. It is quickly forgotten however, and the comforts of life 20,000 years later drown out the part of me that says never to relax, you never know what lurks in the tall grass. I'm hunting, but my trophies are images, not skins. It's better that way, harder too.