Dan & Elaine Vardamis: Brooks Range Traverse

633 South Broadway,Boulder CO 80305

28 July, 2022

Description

The Brooks Range in Alaska is the northernmost mountain range in North America and one of the most remote locations on the planet. In 2021 Elaine and Dan Vardamis hiked 600 miles from the Canada/Alaska border along the Continental Divide to the headwaters of the Noatak River. At the Noatak, they traded in their hiking shoes for packrafts and paddled 400 miles down the Noatak River to the Chukchi Sea that borders the Arctic Ocean on the far northwestern edge of the continent. Along the way they encountered multiple grizzly bears (including 13 in one day), wolves hunting caribou, snowstorms, flood stage river crossings, hundreds of miles of marshy tussocks and battled a severe case of trench foot. The two-and-a-half month journey, which traversed the entire Arctic National Wildlife Preserve, Gates of the Arctic National Park and the Noatak National Preserve also brought them face-to-face with huge herds of caribou, wild mountain passes, native villagers practicing subsistence living and a rare discovery of an entire woolly mammoth tusk. This will be a story of an epic arctic traverse in the wildest section of Alaska. 100% of the proceeds from the show will be donated to "No Road to Ambler" and the Brooks Range Council.  Elaine and Dan Vardamis live in Eldora, Colorado. They have hiked the Colorado Trail, the Continental Divide Trail, the Great Divide Trail, completed multiple ski traverses in Norway and have competed in long distance ski races in Colorado and Norway. They are avid backcountry skiers and have skied at least one day per month since October 2010. This summer they are returning to the Brooks Range for a hiking and packrafting trip into the caribou breeding grounds in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and will attempt a ski crossing of the Greenland icecap in the fall. They are Neptune Mountaineering alumni and were both hired by Gary Neptune in 2010.