The trip of a lifetime begins

By Ryland Bell I got the call at 8 am. Groggily I listened to filmer, Chris Edmands, “ It’s a go, Jeremy is in the air scoping a camp.” I rolled over on my friend Lucks’ couch and groaned, “I’ll be down there in 20.” My hangover was pushing in, and I hadn’t slept much. We had all been in Haines for 3 days waiting for the right weather window to fly into Glacier Bay for a month of winter camping. It was here, I was stoked!!! I threw my last few things in a bag and headed to the hanger to meet the crew. The weather was off and on with big puffy clouds rolling through. As the day wore on, it was down to photographer Seth Lightcap and myself sitting alone on the runway. The planes had been grounded for over an hour and it was getting late. I started to wonder if the weather would break long enough for us to make it out. It did, but barely, we flew out through squalls and low clouds, missing much of the usually spectacular views. We made it!!! We were 65 miles from Haines and about 30 miles from Elfin Cove, where I grew up commercial fishing. If something went down out here we were about a day away from any sort of serious help. This was it, we were Deeper. Mt. Bertha, and Mt. Crillon, two of the massive peaks that make up the Fairweather range, loomed overhead. The only separation, the most disgusting spine faces on earth. An hour later as the sun left the high saddle where we camped, I took some time to soak it all in, we were in paradise. Later we would name it “The Spinal Institute.”