Why would James do such a thing?
James Baxter has a long association with the outdoors in Scandinavia. His first ski touring trip was in 1982 from Jotunheimen to Finse. Since then he has been back nearly every year for a ski trip, often to Sarek in North Sweden.
James has also sea kayaked extensively but has only made one trip to Norway. That was a recent solo trip round the Lofoten Islands.
Just under a decade ago James started to climb all the 2000 metre mountains in Scandinavia. It took 4 years to climb all 137 of them with the Swedish ones proving some of the hardest.
He has written a guide book on an alpine massif called Hurrungane in Norway, the most spectacular mountainous region in Scandinavia. The book is hopefully the first in a series of seven covering all the mountain regions where the 2000 metre mountains are located. There is a website, all be it half finished, where many of these mountains are described at www.scandinavianmountains.com.
James has also trekked extensively in Nepal and has visited twice in 2008 to do some research into establishing a rural school. On the last visit he met Deanna Campbell and Khenpo Tashi who had already made remarkable inroads into establishing schools in the remote Limi valley. Rather than establish his own project James decided to throw his weight behind the excellent work already done in Limi by Deanna and Tashi and their organization Antahkarana Society International.
This Scandinavian tour ‘ski up and paddle down Norway’ will hopefully raise some money for to help build schools in the Limi Valley, Nepal.
