i used to wait for the weekends - now i have no use for them. the only time i can get anything accomplished is during office hours, so i spend weekends and evenings doing research, preparing letters and planning what i need to do next.

when i was working as a dive instructor in Gibraltar i was out pretty much most evenings, since i got back to UK, about eight weeks ago i have been out twice. its no fun but at least i am saving money.

had dinner with my Uncle and Aunt yesterday evening - they pointed out to me how bad my punctuation, spelling e.t.c. are - i was kinda aware of this. some of it is intentional - i prefer not to use capital letters, especially when referring to myself, and i have gotten into some bad habits - please feel free to point out any mistakes seen on the permanent pages of the website but as for the diary, im not really bothered, i wont have time to pay attention to the presentation once i get on the road, due to battery constraints - and typing with frozen fingers will probably cause a few more errors.

made some good progress this week - sleeping bag arrived from Vango, along with a head torch and multi-tool from Whitby. Gore-tex offered to sew the sponsors patches onto my jacket (if i had done this myself it would have ruined the waterproofing) had a glitch with getting all the maps together but they should be here on time, and i made contact with a couple more potential sponsors who i think are very close to signing on.

as i have been unnable to sign a big money sponsor (who just wants to make a donation to MAG on behalf of the expedition) i am pinning all my hopes on people coming to the website and donating to MAG through the donate button - its in the top right just under the union jack if you hadnt noticed.

to get as many people as possible to see the site i am having to get the media interested, i have never dealt with the media before, its all been pretty stressfull but a press conference is scheduled for the 14th of Dec, and it looks like we may get quite a bit of exposure - fingers crossed.

As you may have gathered from the website this diary will be charting the progress of my attempt to ski the length of Norway. I am doing this to try and raise some money for MAG, if you want to find out more about MAG click on their logo at the top, they will be able to explain what they do far better than i can.

For the last eight weeks or so I’ve been researching and preparing for this expedition. To give you some idea of how much work is involved - take the example of the skis i will be using.

Firstly i have had to research what type of skis other expeditions have used, then find a suitable sponsor and convince them to support the expedition.

Then the bindings, compatible boots, six different types of tub waxes, three different types of klister waxes, corks for putting wax on, scrapers for taking wax off, half length skins, full length skins, skin glue, emergency repair ski tips - all researched and sourced with spares incase of eqpt failiure.

Most of that list will be a mystery to non skiers; briefly, skins and waxes are used to allow the ski to alternately glide and grip the snow - different snow conditions = different requirements.

All of the research, preparation, and begging for sponsorship, i have done in connection with my skis probably represents 1-2% of the total time i have spent in the prep for this expedition so far. It is a f***ing huge task and much remains to do.

Weighed against this difficulty, has been the huge ammount of help, advice, and support i have recieved from individuals and sponsors. The list of people i would like to thank for having helped me get this far is too long, and it would be impossible for me to name them all - you know who you are - Thank you.

Hi - welcome to the website for my expedition. by now you must know who i am and what i am doing, here you will be able to follow my progress once the trip begins.