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Final Views
Category: Blog Date: 11/04/2010
Final Views from the Team. Avalanches, awful weather and the snow conditions all conspired against us. We never made the 1000km, but I believe we have all benefited from the experience. We have achieved a great deal; young have learnt from old and old have learnt from young. Twelve Royal Marines and a Telegraph Reporter skiing together successfully and without injury from Lillihammer to Rjukan via 4 of Norway’s magnificent National Parks is an outstanding achievement and every team member should be justifiably proud of their contribution and look back on the challenge with a smile on their faces. For me, this has been a personal journey, brought about by the tragic loss of my wife Dionne to cancer. Nine hours of skiing a day, in my own little world and thoughts, looking at the backpack or ski’s of the person in front of me has helped me tremendously to come to terms with my loss. I have had the time and space to think about my dear wife and children and I truly believe that I have come out of this a stronger person and I can now go forward with the rest of my life. Dionne was my inspiration to do this and she was with me for the whole 20 days. I will look back on this time and cherish the experience; always. We had hoped for 20 days of brilliant Easter weather, we got 2
8 Apr – Day 19
Category: Blog Date: 08/04/2010
8 Apr BLOG Distance covered today 21Km and the Baton was carried by Gus. All now realise that the Hardangervidda has its own weather system after we woke to temperatures of +3C and rain. Our plan to visit the saboteurs hut was thwarted and we ended up with a much shorter ski in wet, slow snow. With lakes now beginning to thaw the team had to navigate carefully to avoid anyone going for an impromptu swim in the cold water now covering some of the lakes. The team arrived at their overnight destination in the much accustomed to white out conditions, wet clothes and boots. Tomorrow is day 20 and the final ski day and will be heading for the Helberg Hut and onto some of the German gun positions on the hills surrounding Rjukan and the heavy water plant. The team are looking forward to meeting Oivinds grandmother and hearing her first hand account of meeting with Helberg and Poulson just prior to the attack on the plant. The team are at Kalhovd mountain hut overnight shown by tracker number 3.
5 Apr – Day 16
Category: Blog Date: 05/04/2010
5 Apr – BLOG Today the team covered 28 km in 8 hours with an ascent of 650 metres The Baton was carried by Jim This was the day our Mountain Leaders (Jon, Willie, Clive and Gus) have been waiting for, the climb up and over the Hallingskarvet – they were all heard muttering throughout the day, “another Quality Mountain Day chaps” We started early with a 6 km ski across a low lying lake As we moved towards the Hallin
3 Apr – Day 14
Category: Blog Date: 03/04/2010
3 Apr – BLOG Sunscreen applied and morale high in expectation of the first sunny day in over a week, the day started with a steady traverse up a mountain valley Sadly as the team climbed onto a high mountain plateau the weather “clagged in” once again and they faced blizzard conditions with strong winds directly in the face for much of the day, making the ski much tougher than expected. This was exacerbated by having to trail break through deep snow for most of the day and delayed the arrival at the overnight mountain hut
2 Apr – Day 13
Category: Blog Date: 02/04/2010
2 Apr – BLOG Today the team covered 29 km with an ascent of 1553 metres We then skied across a mountain plateau with wind speeds of up to 45 mph in our faces; the Mountain Leaders amongst us called it a “Quality Mountain Day”
1 Apr – Day 12
Category: Blog Date: 01/04/2010
1 Apr – BLOG The team covered 43 km today and the Baton was carried by Danny. We woke this morning to overcast conditions, but with the expectation of a sunny afternoon. Following a hearty breakfast and a long discussion over the ski wax for the day, we headed back up into the Jotunheimen. We climbed for an hour and a half in heavy snow conditions making reasonable progress. The 5km climb was surprisingly easy, which could well be an indication that we are now well and truly acclimatised to the conditions – the young guns of course continued at their normal fast pace – they have been described by some of the oldies as “Duracell Bunnies”; wind them up and they are off, and nothing can keep pace. Unfortunately the further we climbed, the more we ventured into the clouds and eventually we met with the now accustomed blizzard conditions. On went the snow goggles and waterproof gear and we “cracked on”. As we descended, the snow conditions got heavier but morale improved. We stopped for lunch in a small ski resort – civilisation – and took the opportunity to eat as many waffles and hot chocolates as possible in our half hour break. What followed was a long 20km ski across Tyin Fjord – we naturally assumed that a Fjord would be flat, but we are all now convinced that we spent at least 3 hours skiing uphill! We eventually made our destination at 1800 this evening Song sung by Jim at the Remembrance Service on Lake Tyin on 1 Apr 10 Will ye no’ come back again Will ye no’ come back again Will ye no’ come back again
