- Welcome back! How does it feel to be home?

Hehe, thank you! It feels good to be home, yes! Of course, going on a trip is exciting, and you experience so many amazing things in three months, with six trips to Antarctica and over 27,000 km of sailing! But as they say, there's no place like home, right?

- That's probably true! Please tell us about your experiences - and of course, we'd love to hear how the clothing worked for you along the way.

Yes, where should I start? I'll send you some pictures; it's almost easier to take a look at them - describing the nature experiences with just words is difficult. I work as a photographer, and in my daily life, I do much more than just nature photography and expeditions. But especially during winter when it's dark and wet here in the West Coast/Stavanger, I take assignments as a photographer on ships sailing to Antarctica. The job is simply to cover what's happening, the experiences we have, and to drive Zodiac boats with passengers to see icebergs and wildlife.
 

Photo: Espen Mills

Antarctica is truly unique, both in its beauty and, most importantly, the vast wildlife in the area during the summer months in the southern hemisphere. Of course, you can talk a lot about mass tourism and such, but what I find great is the strong focus on sustainable tourism and the fact that visitors are not supposed to have any impact on the wildlife. All tour operators in the area have come together to establish strict rules that regulate how often different sites are visited, how close you can get to the animals, and how long you can observe the animals - for example, seals resting on an ice floe - before you retreat. Antarctica is truly an example of international cooperation that works.

The places we visit are on the Antarctic Peninsula, located around 1,000 km south of the southernmost areas of Chile and Argentina. It's the massive bloom of krill during the summer that forms the foundation for all other life there. In the same area, you'll also find the Falkland Islands and South Georgia, which are also exciting areas that some of the trips include.
 

Photo: Espen Mills

- But you were curious about the clothing, of course! For me, they worked absolutely great! They were heavily used, especially the heated vest, which became my favorite. It's so small and light, and I often had a wool sweater or a thin down jacket on top of it, and then a shell jacket as the outermost layer. On cool days when I was engaged in low-intensity activities - like strolling around on land and taking pictures - it was convenient to keep it on the lowest heat setting all the time. The battery lasted a long time that way. Often, I didn't even use the heat at all until I stopped for a while and started feeling a bit cold. If I took a time-lapse, for example, and stood still for 15-20 minutes, then it was just a matter of cranking up the heat to the maximum and immediately feeling a delightful warmth. Something I really liked was that both the vest and the hooded sweater used a battery with a USB-C connection. That way, I could always bring extra batteries or invest in one with more juice.

Many people probably imagine that Antarctica is extremely cold, but that's not always true. Tourism takes place during the summer, and if it's calm and sunny, it's a bit like early Easter in Norway. Unfortunately, there are far more overcast days than sunny days (just like home on the West Coast). There's also a lot of wind - again, like on the West Coast, haha! The temperature is often around freezing, which means we can have days with rain and wind. The wind is also icy cold, much colder than what I'm used to at home. That's when it's lovely to be able to "turn on the heat."

Another thing I used every day was the Pullover Mittens. The cameras I use (Olympus OM-1) are designed for outdoor use and have good buttons and controls that can be operated with gloves or mittens. But sometimes it's still convenient to be able to "flip away" half of the mitten and use my fingers. During the trip, I also had the All Mountain Mittens with me. They mostly stayed in my backpack, dry and ready in case my fingers got cold. A typical situation was when we were on a zodiac tour for a few hours in the rain and wind... the mittens would get wet and eventually cold. Then it was great to have the dry mittens with fully charged batteries in my backpack. It was actually very effective for warming up my fingers again. And I have to say about the mittens, the fact that they have battery-powered heat is almost just a bonus because they are actually excellent on their own. So, I have nothing but good things to say about everything I had from Heat Experience - it's solid quality.
 

Photo: Espen Mills
 

ESPEN: As a photographer here in Stavanger, I have various assignments. It involves a lot of real estate photography and some other commercial projects, and the wedding season is soon starting. But I hope I won't need gloves and a heated vest for that, haha! However, I'm planning a little trip to the mountains this weekend. If the weather is good, we'll probably sleep outdoors. Maybe I'll actually test sleeping with the heated vest... I always get a little cold in the middle of the night, no matter how good the sleeping bag and sleeping pad are. It might be useful to see if turning on some heat around three in the morning helps? That's actually a thought I just had, haha!

We're looking forward to hearing more about it! It's clear that the heated vest has many uses!

If you want to see more pictures from Espen's three months with the heated vest among penguins, take a look at www.espenmills.no
 

Photo: Espen Mills // Hurtigruten Expeditions