Arctic Surf Featured in Outside Magazine

Outside Magazine online featured a six-page spread on the First Ascent- sponsored Arctic Surf expedition. The article chronicles the month-long journey of the six professional surfers as they braved the 30-to-40 degree Fahrenheit waters off Lofoten Islands, the southern portion of a secluded archipelago in northwestern Norway, in search of untamed waves and undiscovered breaks. To read more about their expedition, go to:

http://outside.away.com/outside/destinations/201001/arctic-surfing-norway-3.html Read More…

Last Day Brings Perfectly Tubing Point Break

[EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the last in a series of five posts by Yassine Ouhilal chronicling the month-long Arctic Surf Expedition that he and four other surfers began on April 5, 2009.]

May 1. Morning comes with fanfare and a parade. May 1 is a national holiday in Russia, leading up to Victory Day on May 9. That’s when Russia celebrate the defeat of the Nazis during World War II. We discover that all official activities are closed for the week. Without any chance of going through official channels to obtain permits, we have to get creative Read More…

Team Crosses into Russia to Surf Barents Sea

[EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the fourth in a series of five posts by Yassine Ouhilal chronicling the month-long Arctic Surf Expedition that he and four other surfers began on April 5, 2009.]

April 28. We’ve spent the last week surfing up and down the coast. We went back to “Broken Hearts,” and managed to score some fun surf at several different breaks. But now it’s time to go even farther north. We’ll spend a few days exploring Norway’s extreme north coastline. Then we’re heading into Russia, in hopes of being the first to surf in the Barents Sea Read More…

Weathering Storms & Healing at “Broken Hearts”

[EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the third in a series of five posts by Yassine Ouhilal chronicling the month-long Arctic Surf Expedition that he and four other surfers began on April 5, 2009.]

April 15. It’s been howling, raining and snowing for three days. The winds from the north are blowing at 25-35 knots. The surf is big and messy—“Victory at Sea” conditions. A light onshore wind can be good for some types of surfing, especially maneuvers; but storm-force winds are another matter Read More…

Arctic Surf Team Scouts Conditions in Kraemmervika, Norway

[EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the second in a series of five posts by Yassine Ouhilal chronicling the month-long Arctic Surf Expedition that he and four other surfers began on April 5, 2009.]

April 6. We wake at 6:00 a.m. to bright sunshine and the sounds of seagulls. Unpacking our boards, we get ready to take to the waves. Filmmaker Cyrus Sutton has one of the most unusual collections of surfboards I’ve ever seen. I’m not sure if using the word “surfboard” is even appropriate. But surfing is the ultimate art of self-expression. The wave is a surfer’s canvas, and the surfboard is the artist’s brush. Read More…

In Search of Unsurfed Waves Above the Arctic Circle

[EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the first in a series of five posts by Yassine Ouhilal chronicling the month-long Arctic Surf Expedition that he and four other surfers began on April 5, 2009.]

April 4. After several months of planning and years of scouting polar regions, our journey is about to begin. It will take us all over the coastline of northern Norway and Russia, in search of unsurfed waves above the Arctic Circle in the frigid waters of the Arctic Ocean and Barents Sea Read More…

Arctic Surf Documentary

Five world-class surfers. Thirty-two days. One destination: the Arctic Circle. How far would you go to find a wave no one has ever ridden?