In July I fly together with a film crew to New Zeeland to produce the world’s first interactive 360° documentary. An example of our first promo 360° movie: http://www.northernalps.com/

We are still looking for partners

Yesterday I discovered a new river for wild water kayaking. A narrow steep river, just possible to kayak direct after heavy rainfall.  

Did ever a horse cough in your face? In my face yes:

It was nice working on my brother’s new home. Now I’m back in Karnten, working as kayak inline and volleyball teacher. There is a lot of wild water rivers so I spend my free time with wild water kayaking. There are many nice rivers close Seeboden where I live for the next two month . 

After they close the ski area in Arlberg I packed my bags for the next 7 month, like I did the last 10 seasons. This time with snowboard, kayak, climb and hike material.

Together with Mikaela I went to my brother in Freiburg in Germany were the flower season already started. We help him with his house he is building here. A very nice house basically made from glass, wood and mudstones. The last 13 years I build a lot on self-designed houses with natural materials and it was always very interested. These days the most houses are made of bad materials and boring designs. I think it influence our health and emotional state of human. We all feel the different between wood and concrete, between electric and wooden heather etcetera.

In two weeks I start working as ‘wild’ water kayak teacher in Karnten, south Austria. 10 July I fly for three month to New Zeeland for a sport and nature 360 degrees filming project and discovering the islands.

After a few bad weather days the sun is there again. Saturday was the Long Board classic, a Chinese downhill competition. That means mass start on the top of a mountain, the first person that pass the finish in the valley is the winner. I was so enthusiastic by riding probably the last powder of the winter, that I kept on riding and arrived too late at the start. After this comp there was like always a nice party with live music, snowball fights and lots of crazy funny people.

The day after we took the first lift, provided with sleeping bag and food for two days. The plan was to hike to a hut and do some touring from there. But we were already too late and we had to turn around because of avalanche danger. So we changed this plan, shaped a corner and enjoyed the jump session.

Today we went slack lining, longboarding and skating. I made some skate photos you can under the corner photos:

Below you see pictures I made for a catalogue from Rehal included the cover shot. I love to make photos but have not match time. I like to get commissioned to photograph and to unpack my good camera. But also with a small camera I have fun as you can see at the photos I made from Mikaela before yesterday.  

Hereby some awesome pictures from Edo Jungerius from last winter, also published in Snowboard Mag. The last photo where you see me jumping a melon air from the tunnel is probably the craziest jump I ever did. It is a huge jump from a tunnel into a steep couloir that ends into a waterfall. It is called the Hölltobel (hell couloir). The two old photos 1 and 2 are from the bridge made in 1905, build by Johann Bertolini (photo 3). Later in 2000 they built a tunnel over the Hölltobel. It gives you an idea about how steep the couloir is. Johann Bertolini was a sun of a street worker and started as 12 year old boy as carrier by street projects. After nine years of work he graduated as street building guide and started his own projects. With photo 4 you can imagine how hard is was to build these kind of bridges in that time.

If you ever drove from St. Anton to Zurs and Lech you drove through this tunnel, it is called the Flexenpass.

Today and yesterday I was on the way with Bas Elhorst and Filmer Elmar Strotman. Today we joyed the last sun shine on top of the Sat 1. We had more than 11 hours hike and riding action far in the backcountry from Arlberg (8:45h till 20:10h.) .

Yesterday Bas got cached by a huge sluff waterfall what came done after he finished his line. I can tell you more but I’m tired. Here some pictures from the last 10 minutes just before dropping Sat 1.

I you understand dutch read my interview:                                                                                   part 1: http://wepowder.nl/weblog/4266/Irian-van-Helfteren                                                   part 2: http://wepowder.nl/weblog/4267/Irian-van-Helfteren