It's many peoples dream to participate in something big or wild enough to be considered a world record. I was super stoked to hear when Shane Dunn announced he was organising a big way in Norway and could not wait for the opportunity to rub shoulders with many jumpers whose videos I had been watching in awe for years!
I arrived a day or so before the event was planned to have the opportunity to see the location a bit more, meet up with my good buddy Bill and hopefully get a jump or 2 in before the big way was attempted.
The following day Bill & I met up with Annti and hiked Katthammaren with our new local buddies Ander & Anton and I have to admit, I was struggling.
Living in the Netherlands doesn't give much opportunity to train for such long, steep hikes, it was a rough one! :)
Sitting with Antti, trying to dry our sweaty shirts mid-hike
I think the first day it took a good 4 and a half hours to get up there
The amazing thing for me was that once on this amazing mountain top with views that I had never imagined before also had a flat area being the exit point and a large lake of crystal clear water surrounded in parts by some chunks of ice which were melting and creating this pool.
As we were above a cloud base and the sun was quite hot, we all took a dip in the icy water pool on top of this huge mountain, which was a first for me. It felt so good on my legs after the long hike :)
We were clouded in and couldn't see the ground....
We were optimistic that the clouds would clear and allow us to jump but after 3 hours of waiting we decided to make the call and hike back down before it got too late/dark.
I found out after about 10 minutes that my legs weren't working on the way down , it was almost as hard going down for the next few hours as it was climbing up !
The next day more people started to arrive, so some catching up with old friends and meeting new ones was done.
Briefings were planned and explanation of the master plan was made but sadly conditions the following day were not in our favour.
Finally on day 3 the weather gods promised us the goods , check out the vid below for an insight on how the build up and jump was, awesome stuff!
Video credit to Andrew Wright.
Smashing the previous world record of 53 jumpers, Bill & I were stoked as you can imagine!
It was one of the coolest things I have done to date, great working organising and special thanks to Shane Dunn for setting it all up!
