The 2005 WindPower Greenland Expedition
Wowser. I'm not sure how this expedition passed me by, especially as Tony and I were in Greenland that year, but it's something very special indeed: in July 2005, three young Norwegians, Niklas Norman, Trygve Nakling Kristiansen and Carl Gustav Rye Florence kite-skied from the south coast of Greenland (Narsaq) to the north (Qaanaaq) in an amazing 21 days. That's a total distance of 2,300km. Their average speed for the last nine days of the expedition was an incredible 210km/day, with their best day being a world record distance of 442.7 km in 24 hours.
The contrast with my next expedition, SOUTH, couldn't be more marked. Tony Haile and I are setting out to walk 600km further than this expedition, and we're expecting it to take us three months longer than it took these guys to cross Greenland using kites.
The video is a great example of how proficient people (Norwegians especially!) are getting at using traction kites to haul sledges over huge distances in polar conditions. A lot of people ask whey we're not using kites in Antarctica this year (SOUTH will be an entirely human-powered expedition, and if we're successful, the longest unsupported polar journey in history).
The answer is that kiting hasn't even entered our minds. The two disciplines of 'manhauling' and kite-skiing are now so far removed from each other that you might as well ask an Olympic rower why they don't windsurf, or why a marathon runner doesn't use inline skates. Walking when we could be using kites might sound foolhardy to some, and the idea of expeditions aimed at athletic rather than academic endeavour certainly seems anathema to many. I was encouraged, therefore, to read that Fridtjof Nansen described his brand of polar expedition (he was the first to pioneer small ski teams pulling lightweight sleds, more than 100 years ago) as "the sportsman's method".
That's not to say that kiting hasn't entered my mind for future expeditions, and this video has certainly set a few ideas bubbling away… Well done Niklas, Trygve and Carl Gustav!
— Filed under Other expeditions