Arctic Dreams

I haven’t been sailing for a while—though I used to deliver sailboats across Bass Strait in the Caribbean, and race them in the San Francisco Bay. I loved it. I also love skiing. Since moving to Colorado, sailing opportunities have been few and far between, but skiing has been plenteous (most years). So when I got the chance to head to Norway with Helly Hansen and board a sailboat to hunt down backcountry ski lines, I was in heaven: This was a chance to combine two of my great loves in a way I had never thought possible before. We boarded the boat in the far northern village of Alta after an afternoon flight from Oslo. Then, we sailed into the late afternoon and began our first ski ascent that evening in the sunlight that shines late into the night during the Arctic spring. From there, the rhythm of sail, ski, sail, ski, brought us to Tromsø, still 190 miles above the Arctic Circle, where our trip ended and we bade the fjords farewell.  —Cameron Martindell