Posted: Jul 06, 2009 09:48 am EDT
(ThePoles.com) Derek Crowe, Devon McDiarmid and Adrian Hayes reached their furthest North point, JP Kocks fjord on the Arctic Ocean on 4 July after 46 days on the Greenland Ice.

Yesterday Derek phoned ExplorersWeb from their tent at JP Kocks fjord. He talked about the awesome landscape, their last miles through an icy swamp, their kites with advice to kiters, and getting ready for their next stage. Correne Coetzer spoke to him.

ExplorersWeb: Where are you camping and how does it look like?

Derek: We are camping 500 m above sea level. It is warm outside; 0°C day temperature and barely freezing at night, -10°C, compared to –25°C at 2500 meters.

Outside is the most amazing scene since we left the South. When we arrived we were sailing our parawing storm kites. The storm clouds turned into mountains and a fairy tail landscape opened up. The fjord walls are steep and phenomenal. It was like traveling back in time through the Ice Age glaciers. The first moments were very special.

ExplorersWeb: While kiting into Peary Land you and Devon had quite scary experiences. What happened to you?

Derek: Peary Land was 150 km away. We used our large kites, the winds increased. My sled tipped over and it anchored my kite, pulled it up and I went up in the air.

At times like this you have be experienced and in full control of your kite. You work on instinct. There is no time to think. I landed and it gust again. We changed kites.

ExplorersWeb: How many different kinds of kites do you have and when do you use them?

Derek: We have four different ones; 3 kites and one storm sail. The storm sail is good to use in white-outs and in crevassed areas. The kites are used to travel long distances with.

What we use different from most other expeditions are bar kites instead of a handle kites. Our kites allow us to kite in a wide range of winds. We have Ozone Manta 8 m and 12 m kites. The 12-meter is the favourite kite and a joy to ride. We are happy with our choice of kites.

ExplorersWeb: Tell us about your walk to the sea ice.

Derek: We traveled with backpacks and climbing skins to the sea ice, which was a jumbled mass with ice bergs and carving glaciers, but no open water.

We walked through a world of melting ice and countless streams. We should have had life jackets. Sometimes the melting streams were like rivers. It was an icy swamp.

The 32 km round trip took 10 hours. It was rough ground; the most difficult mountain, alpine ski. We earned JP Kocks Fjord; it was no gift. We were not able to kite on that terrain. You can read more and see photos on our 4 and 5 July website dispatches. (Ed: see links below images)

ExplorersWeb: What advice can you give to adventurers who want to kite from the South to the North of Greenland?

Derek: Firstly, make sure you have kites that you can use in high winds, like 45 knot winds, as well as kites that can be used in very low winds. We also have great skies; G3 skies.

Secondly, have something for the down days, to pass the time with. I have an iPod with books to read. Have a chess computer or games to play to take up the time while the winds are down.

Thirdly, the teammates are very important. Team bonding before the time is very important. We are a great team. Each one has his area of expertise. I did the gear, Devon the food and Adrian the communications and logistics.

ExplorersWeb: You are also the photographer.

Derek: Yes, it was a challenge to take interesting photos on the Inland Ice where there was no change in scenery. The low light and the steam in the tent made some good photographs.

I have great success with charging my camera’s batteries. They last up to a week. The camera and the lenses also work very well.

I shoot raw files with an open exposure for the press photographs and jpg photos that I share with the world over Contact 4 on the PDA. Contact 4 works amazingly well. I am really, really impressed with it.

We read ThePoles.com in the evenings and have read about the Norwegians’ kiting world record and the Danes who were in this area. We are in awe of these people and were sad that the Danes had to be evacuated because of such a medical reason.

ExplorersWeb: When are you going to start your stage from JP Kocks to Qaanaaq? How much food do you have left?

Derek: We are waiting for favourable winds and cooler night temperatures now. We like traveling at night. The light is beautiful and we were facing the sun, which was warm.

It will be about 800 to 900 km to Qaanaaq. We brought food for 65 days and have ways to stretch it for 5 more days. Our travel time totally depends on the winds. We have a good slope to Qaanaaq and should get the katabatic winds.

The windless days that we experienced on the plateau were because of the topography. There was not enough temperature differences to move the air.

We had no problem kiting 200+ km per day, it was in fact easier than to sledge-haul 12 km. Our sleds are good for stability and kiting. When we kite we do 2 hour to one and a half hour sessions and rest in between to get the blood back in our legs.

We’re looking forward to this next stage and we’ll talk to you again when we get to Qaanaaq.

Day 46, 4 July, Position JPK: 82.14.98N, 39.57.54W
Position camp: 82.08.90N, 39.54.87W
Total dist. traveled: 2998 km
Total dist. north: 2378 km (1277 NM)
Elevation: 508 mtrs

The Emirates NBD Greenland Quest with Devon McDiarmid, Adrian Hayes and Derek Crowe attempt a kite-ski expedition from Narsaq in the South on the Atlantic Ocean to the JP Kocks Fjord in the North on the Artic Ocean and subsequently Qaanaaq in NW Greenland – a 3500 km journey with no resupplies.

Devon and Derek are from Canada and Adrian is British but based in the UAE. The expedition takes place from May to July 2009. The team will take food and fuel for 65 days.

This is a new route and the longest kite-ski attempt on Greenland.

Derek Crowe was born in 1974 and lives in Yukon, Canada. He is married and has a one-year old daughter. Derek is interested in woodworking, trail building, Mountain Biking and Backcountry skiing. The latest book that he read was “World Without End” by Ken Follett. His favourite movie is “Into the Wild” directed by Sean Penn and based on Jon Krakauer’s book. His favourite food is a Roadhouse Burger in his hometown, Whitehorse in Yukon. Derek favourite music is of JJ Cale.

Greenland’s total ice area of 1.8 million km² (695,000 square miles) corresponds to 14 times the size of England. The ice-free area amounts to 350,000 km² (135,000 square miles) – equivalent to the area of Germany. The ice contains 10 per cent of the world’s reserves of fresh water.

In 1978 Naomi Uemura’s solo dog-sled a north-south crossing with air resupply from Cape Morris Jesup to Narsarsuaq.

In 1992 Rune Gjeldnes and Torry Larsen parachuted onto the southern tip of the icecap. They paddled a kayak to within a day of Cape Farewell but were turned back by heavy pack-ice, arriving at Cape Morris Jesup after a total of 2928 km and 86 days, using skis and kites.

In 2008 Alex Hibbert and George Bullard did a 1374 miles (2546 km) ski return journey diagonal across Greenland and placed food depots along the way.

From mid-March to mid-July 2009, Jesper Melin Ganc-Petersen and Erik Bruun Jørgensen attempt to cross the Greenland Icecap diagonal from Kangerlussuaq (Sønderstrøm Fjord) in the Southwest to the fjord area of Independence Fjord in the Northeast. From there they will travel along the North coast of Greenland, via Cape Morris Jesup to Qaanaaq on the northwest coast; according to them a total of app. 3500 km. The guys were evacuated because of a serious medical condition in the first half of June.

The east-west or west-east routes are the most popular on Greenland. Not many teams had done a vertical route. The vertical kite ski or parasailing expeditions start mostly from either Narsaq or Narsarsuaq in the South and end in Qaanaaq in the Northwest; a distance of about 2500 km.

 EMAIL   PRINT   SHARE   TEXT