Christina Franco North Pole Solo 2010

The search for the best and lightest equipment is what plagues all adventurers. It will take you to dusty corners of the Internet, to the workshops of the cleverest engineers and to long tea sessions with every explorer you can find to discuss, argue and sometimes agree on the benefit of a particular bit of kit.

I have a running spreadsheet where every bit of kit that has finally been approved and committed to gets weighed and entered. Currently it totals 20.987kg without food and fuel, but new kit has arrived just now in the post and I am bringing out the digital scale….

Before being approved to the final kit list every item has been scrutinized for possible weight shaving and for increased efficiency. In this process the engineers at Lotus have been invaluable. These are CAD renderings of the bindings Kieron has made for me out of Titanium. He has even run a stress test on the boots I wore to the Magnetic North Pole to see exactly how I walk and where the strain is on my bindings. WOW!

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