Jeremy Jones is undoubtedly one of the greatest, if not THE greatest, big mountain snowboarder of all time. From slaying lines in Alaska to remote high alpine peaks in Chamonix, Nepal, and the world over Jones has done it all. In this moment, Jeremy Jones bags an incredibly steep spine in Nepal.
“I think this is probably the highest and burliest spine line ever done on a snowboard,” says photographer Andrew Miller. Miller had met snowboarder Jeremy Jones, one of our Adventurers of the Year, two weeks earlier while testing snowboards in Chile. Soon after, Miller heard from Jones. “I got a call from Jeremy asking if I had any interest in a trip to Nepal because a spot might open up. A few days later, he called back to see if I was still serious about going. And a few days after that, he called to tell me the spot was mine if I wanted it. I said ‘yes.’ ”
During the 40-day expedition to try to ride two new lines above 20,000 feet in the Everest region of Nepal, Jones’s film production crew mapped out and reconned several different options and angles on the glacier for shooting the wall, as well as the safest spots. “I setup two still cameras for two different options to make sure I nailed the shot and had photos to choose from—we knew this trip would be one, maybe two lines ridden total,” recalls Miller. “I was shooting from a barbie angle, adjacent to the spine wall. We had to scramble up a rock face to the toe of the glacier, put our crampons on, and rope up for a three-hour walk across a broken glacier to set up our angle at 18,500 feet.”
Typical snowboarder, side slipping all the good snow… Next thing you know he will traverse under the landing and pack it out.
No doubt super gnarly, but where is the joy in a death sideslip? Jones is a wild man