Tough start for the Basque team
Published on 19.11.2011 - TransAntartika 2011
The ascent towards the plateau is quite hard
© Expedition website
Quite difficult terrain conditions for the three Basque climbers. It seems that the 'Horizontal Climbing' has really begun.
18 November : third day of the basque adventure.
Alberto Iñurrategi, Juan Vallejo and Mikel Zabalza started their trek on 16 November from Novolazarevskaya Russian research base.
For their first days on the ice, the terrain conditions were quite bad : the presence of numerous sastrugis fields prevent them to use their skis and sails.
As their sledges weight about 170 kg, the ascent towards the plateau is quite hard.
What one of them as called the 'horizontal climbing' has begun. In addition, the weather is quite poor and they do not have a single ray of sunshine to charge their batteries and their solar panels.
What does not help them at all is the fact that the meteoroloigt of the expedition, Fritz Buyl, has forecasted quite a heavy storm for today Saturday 19 November and also for tomorrow Sunday ; 100 km/h winds with gusts until 130 km/h.
Their HQ contributor finishes his daily update writing that, for this centenary season, the Antartic seems ot have decided to make the things really hard for the expeditioners ; it's not true everywhere...
