Patagonia Icefield November 2006

Shuttling our last load up the ablation zone of the Marconi Glacier, Patagonia

An Argentine group of eight on one rope traverses through the debris on an ice fall to avoid a small crevasse. "pelgro. zona de avalanchas de seracs."

Whiteouts, ground blizzards and blowing snow became the theme of our trip

Ryan Hokanson, kiting around Circo De Los Altares. This was only our second day of nice weather in ten days.

Jason Kwiakowski, puting the kite away after the winds died down

Cerro Torre

Storm Day, Matte?

South American Dreams

Cerro Torre, Patagonia Argentina

Lima, Peru

Punta Del Diablo, Uruguay

Two months ago I started sorting through some old slides and rediscovered some wonderful images that I took shortly before I made the switch to digital. I did a pretty aggressive edit and narrowed my selection to about 25 slides from a three month trip through Argentina, Uruguay, and Peru and promptly had them scanned. Excited about my rediscovery I immediately started touching them up, removing dust and scratches, turning some black and white, and even managed to get one on the cover of Western Mountaineering's 2009 Catalog.

... but every time I opened my blog I just didn't know what to say. I couldn't think of a single word I wanted to share about those experiences. Almost as if each picture was so far away, so far from where I am now, that they almost felt like a series of little dreams. Each picture so rich and beautiful, so full of textures, almost like I had imagined them... yet so vastly different than my most prominent memories from that trip. Where was the picture of Jason and I on our hands and knees as we crawled behind an old lift shack on Cathedral Mountain trying to escape 80 mile an hour winds? Where was the picture of me hanging 10 feet in a crevasse with my sled teetering on the lip, because I had failed to attach a prusik. Where's the picture of that stuffy little hostel room where I spent fours days fighting a respiratory infection and dysentery in Peru? It's so interesting to look through these pictures and realize what an amazing place I was in, and how my state of mind was so detached from those experiences, like I wasn't even there in the first place.

So my two month case of writers block continues... and my lucid South American dreams weave together what was a pretty incredible journey.

Skiing the Selkirks, BC... Valkyr Style

Simply Beautiful

Girls Day

Brooke Practicing for the Worlds

Heart Pass

Boys Day

Rory kicks off a small slab

Hiking out of Viking

Rory Camm

Gwen and Brooke

Brooke Edwards

US Nation Nordic Skiing Championship

The US National Nordic Championship hosted in Anchorage at Kincaid Park finished up today after a long week of waiting. Temperatures were just slightly too cold to race most of the week and many of the events were canceled. Monday warmed up just enough to allowed the Freestyle Race to proceed. The women skied a 5K loop and the men skied a 10K loop. Anchorage's very own Kikkan Randall placed 2nd racing for the US ski team and Alaska Pacific University. Laura Valaas placed 4th, Kate Arduser place 6th, James Southam place 5th and Brent Knight placed 6th, all racing for Alaska Pacific University.

Today the racing jury decided to run the sprint classic race for the final race of the event. Temperatures were just warm en0ugh despite a consistent breeze, but racers only had to brave a short distance 1.2K for the women, and 1.4K for the Men. Kikkan Randall led the pack throughout the entire finals, and came in first. Shortly behind her Laura Valaas in second place. Congratualations APU!

Laura Valaas coming up a hill during the sprint race

Lars Flora tucking around a corner in the sprint race

A Pre-Season to Remember

Andy Dietrick and Weston Morrison skinning up a peak in Hatcher Pass, late October.

The Best Birthday Present Ever. A beautiful day of ski touring in the Girdwood Valley.

Brooke Edwards making telemark turns on Sunny Side in Turnagain Pass

Kris Dudley, enjoying the powder and the view from Notch Peak, Girdwood Valley.

Why can't we be in the sun? A view from the top of Max's Peak, Girdwood Valley

New Prospects and Projects

Some grad students outside one of the buildings on the Kellog Farm.
Both are in the Master's of Environment Educations at APU.

Somehow I have managed to squeeze in a few side projects on top of my mountain of responsibilities this fall. Hence why its been two months since I've updated my blog. In August I started working full time for APU, running their aquatics program for APU's Recreation Program. I had previously committed to teaching two beginning photography classes two nights a week for the semester and also decided to work part time ski patrol come the start of ski season. November was rough, as all three of these jobs collided into days on end of work. You want something done? Ask a busy person. In late October I was asked to shoot some photos for APU's website and some of their Master's program brocures. I so badly wanted to say no, but I couldn't refuse the opportunity. Photography is my dream job. In the end it payed off and sleep was the only thing I really lost.

Kikkan Randall leading the APU women's team during a practice at Hatcher Pass

Alaska is hosting the US Nordic Championships at Kincaid starting tomorrow Jan. 3rd. This event is a big deal for the Alaska nordic community. Many of APU's very own nordic ski team will be competing in this event and are expected to do very well. In preperation for the event their coach had asked if I could take some pictures of them practicing early season at Hatcher Pass. Here is one of the images that appeared of the front cover of Coast Magazine this month.

A view of the North dorms of the Atwood Center at APU in November

Grand Prize Photo for the 2nd annual Anchorage Press b & w photo contest

In June I shot a series of commercial pictures for my friend Josh, who owns a Landscaping business in Anchorage. This was taken from the top of the new J and L Tower of one of his employees watering the grounds. I immediately saw the interesting patterns that were created from the shadows of the vertical sculptures and I really like the contrast and the patterns on the sidewalk. I decided to change it to black and white and entered it in the Anchorage Press annual black and white photo contest. To my surprise I won the grand prize and it appeared on the cover of the Press in December.

Represents of the feeling of Night Skiing from Chair 1 at Alyeska.
Actually taken early in the morning prior to avalanche control work.

Throughout the month of December I had ten prints hanging up at the Java Haus at Alyeska. All were pictures of the Alyeska Ski Patrol hard at work last ski season. Thanks guys! I will miss these early morning control days.

Psyched for Another Season

West Face of Little League, if they had only dropped in right now, this picture would have been even sicker. They chose to wait until the light was gone. Skiers Unknown.

Headwall Ridge Hike, ski patroller Brian McGorry

Sponsored by Smith

Watherfall, Shadows Area, Andy Dietrick

Greatings Earthlings

Brooke always makes it look easy

I love it when people wear lots of color, boarder unknown

Winter of 07-08 was the best season of my 28 years on this earth. I'm looking forward to another one.

Painting with Light

This is series of self portraits from a friends house in Girdwood. I created these pictures at night with a star machine, a slow shutter speed, and my camera propped up on my backpack. I shot about 15 and these three were my favorite. A tripod would have made this a whole lot easier, but I didn't have one with me and No, I wasn't on drugs or drunk. I just couldn't sleep.

Textures of the Talkeetnas

All of these images have been manipulated in Adobe Lightroom. The first seven images I shot specifically to change to colors and contrast for an abstract series of landscapes. I got the idea originally last year while out on the same Talkeetna trip, when I shot a picture of a steep mountain side drainage that looked almost like paint being squeezed out of a tube. I decided I would try to create a series of these pictures this year. Here is the original image below.

The talkeetnas are full of a variety of facinating geology. We found a huge chunk of limestone in Caribou Cr. full of fossilized shells.

The tail of Meekins Super Cub Piper, just after he supplied us with our first re-ration of food

Spikes working their way out of the rails along the longest train trussel west of the Mississippi.

Textrue along the train trussel

Silhouette of a Caribou

Raina on lookout for the students across Prairie Cr.