2014 The Fun Stuff

Our year end summary is more about experiences than it is the results of our photography. We always have to show our best work, it’s time to show our best times. Thankfully, amongst all the work photos, there are some choice memories documented.

In the past few years, Nepal has become a big part of our lives. There, we’ve made great friends and had some experiences unique to that part of the world. In a sense, Nepal is everything we love; big, beautiful mountains, a fascinating culture, and kind people. In 2014, we traveled through the Himalaya for one month, trekking and climbing.

Living out my dream of hijacking a rickshaw.

After one month of eating very minimally, and three weeks above 5000 meters, we had all lost all 3-4 kilos. Our great friend Harka Dhan Rai kept promising us a Dal Bhat we’d never forget once we got back to his house in Kathmandu, he was right.

Another reason to love Nepal.

2014 included the most unique assignment of our career, one which we’ll probably never top. It was a week in North Korea to look into how tourism, and especially the ski resort’s tourism, might positively influence North Korea. When I saw this little boy get on the people mover I jumped in behind to see what he’d do. And of course he did what all kids do, he played. People are people, much the same all over the world, no matter what their governments do.

The friendship we’ve built with this character, Simon Duverney, is priceless. Rare is the person who is such a pure joy to work, and be with. While we continually strive to have fun, we’ve also committed and focused on working together as partners, the results are some of our best climbing images. There is much, much more to come.

I’m sure I say it each year…. it’s all about friends. While our job is to make mountain sport and lifestyle photos, we know that what we are really doing is making photos of our friends doing their thing. It’s really our job to just pay attention and be ready to capture what they come up with.

This is just a very colorful photo of me really enjoying a work day.

We spend over 300 days a year in the mountains. The things we see never cease to amaze us.

2014 was my year to run. After battling some knee issues, I finally overcame them and got back to running in the mountains. My favorite trails are from our house in an area I have written about many times, the Hardergrat. As my training ground, playground, and my happy place, it’s given me a lot of great days.

Janine and I wrote a list of new places to explore in 2014, all close to our house in Interlaken. We finally made it to a climbing cirque called the Engelhörner where we both stood in awe beneath massive limestone walls littered with classic climbing routes. We managed to go back a couple of times to climb before the snow fell and became hugely motivated to return in 2015.

For 15 years, Janine and I have gone into the mountains for work and fun. Sharing these experiences has been our life together. We called this, “Date Night”.

We’re grateful for another year of doing what we love. We’d like to thank everyone who has been a part of the process, especially our friends who travel with us, play with us, and motivate us. Also the many people who follow what we do, all the comments are hugely appreciated, especially the reports back to us of how our images & stories have inspired others.

Happy Holidays! 2015, here we come.

Dan & Janine