Close to home

20k southwards from where I lived before I went to Svalbard this May, and good access to the local hills still.... I can quite happily explore around here a while yet...

Waiting for Winter

Well, his expression says it all! Dovre wants SNOW and he isn't scared to tell me this.... as I painted the sledges in readiness for winter....

I have been disconcertingly busy these weeks: moved home, moved boxes of my stuff in, and then boxes more of the same... looked for work... found work (working with dogs/helping at a farm, and at a childrens' nursery....(a little more obscure, for those who know me!....))....started to train Dovre the Lean Keen Racing Machine (er!)... and generally basked in end of summer SUNSHINE (shhhh).

And so now all we need is TIME to train the dogs with a quad bike/trolley on the forest tracks. And then.... a thousand hours of husky training later...

SNOWWWWWWWW: and we can hit the deck (hopefully not!) running.

So, here's to waiting for winter. It's not so bad, after all.

Anyone for coffee?....

Somehow it tastes better this way...

Reflecting on light and (field) life!

I've just experienced another summer of relentless 24h daylight, and as I marvel at the arrival of the disarmingly peaceful 'evening light' (it's midnight, and dusk outside) I am reminded of how this will soon be replaced by the solid presence of winter dark time (as per. this photo, taken on 1 January this year).

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I have just returned to mainland Norway from a summer field season in the Arctic. Again, I feel very fortunate to have had such a rich and fulfilling summer. Life is never dull as a field biologist, and such work has really shaped my life for almost as long as I remember.  As I feel intensely at the time, and spend much time reflecting upon after, I feel very fortunate to have worked for the researchers I have had the privilege to work for/with.  I have met some very good people, and all are very motivated to get 110% out of their field season time whilst... enjoying the experience.  I guess that's what keeps me going back!

Today I sweated my way to the top of Gråhøgtun, a mountain framing my current location, its English name being 'Greyback' (or 'Hornyback' depending on whether you pronounce it with Norwegian or English accent...).  So there I was, on the grey/horny back, and I felt some real attachment to the summer I just had, and the place where I am living right now.  I wanted to share this quote, written by Eric Shipton, British mountaineer ca. 1940.

'He is lucky who, in the full tide of life, has experienced a measure of the active environment he most desires. In these days of upheaval and violent change, when the basic values of today are the vain and shattered dreams of tomorrow, there is much to be said for a philosophy which aims at living a full life while the opportunity offers.

There are few treasures of more lasting worth than the experience of a way of life that is in itself wholly satisfying. Such, after all, are the only possessions of which no fate, no cosmic catastrophe can deprive us; nothing can alter the fact if for one moment in eternity we have really lived.'

Arrival

We arrived in Longyearbyen to a warm welcome of mild (5C) temperatures and very pictoresque ice floes in the bay.... the ice floes bringing along with them a polar bear: welcome to the Arctic, I guess!  

A few days of sorting out rifle and boat training, then...

A short (45 minute) plane ride to Ny Alesund, the most Northerly permanently inhabited settlement in the world.  It was like stepping back a few months. Here there is more snow, and n 'early-spring' feeling still.  The arctic terns have only just arrived.

Mind you, the weather is still mild and Kongsfjorden is ice free already.  Eider ducks are beginning to settle on the study island just offshore... this is good news as it means the field work can soon begin in earnest.

Meanwhile, as we await final boat training and kit issue we are living like royalty! Kings Bay, the company that supply and cater for all here in Ny Alesund provide outstanding accomodation and facilities for all researchers and visitors here (showers, tv in the room, posh meals 3x daily, climbing gym facilities, solarium, sauna.... shall I continue??).  

So, it is making waiting rather, shall we say, comfortable???

A strange start for a field season. Luxury Unlimited - we shall have to get used to it, I guess... ;)

289 Days Of Solitude

The hut.

It's over.

I left the cabin on the lake on Tuesday, and came to Tromsø. Dovre off to friends for safekeeping; Boxes duly packed and distributed between whoever would take them - a very deserved thank you those who did! Invaluable friend Ole Johann helped with the final box delivery to the forest road. 400m of forest tracks to the roadside over 'not-yet-melted snow' (icey after recent rain) was challenging to most of us who bore boxes to the parking place... The forest was just reminding me that it has the edge over me, or anyone else!

(I guess moving out is difficult, and maybe that's why I stayed beyond the original 'for autumn' spell that I first proposed to the hut owner...)

9 months later...

In Tromsø, flight to Longyearbyen today, onward to Ny Ålesund on Monday.

Life is a challenge. Boxes'n'all. My coming season in the Arctic will be a needed tonic.

Meanwhile: Barry White is helping me pack and weigh my final bags - those ones that are coming with me. No field season is complete without his vibes...

....bring on the summer!

Snowsoup/the sudden end of winter

Well, it's not often you are contemplating the crossing of a fast, rather knarly looking river whilst composing blog posts in your head! Heaven knows why, but I was struck by a poetic moment the other day at a rather inappropriate time.

Spring is here. Most definitely. Visually and physically (hence the wet feet).

I should add - I was trying to ski when I encountered this river in full force. I had been struggling through soupy snow (heavy, waterlogged, granular: you get the picture?) which was proving fiddly enough to ski through when I came across a benign looking 'stream' on the path. It was small enough, but not to be trifled with. An ice channel gushing over the path - like a sort of luge track, with a deep gauge to it. With all that inverted light, it was hard to gauge its depth. It looked deep enough, yet exactly how deep and where the max. depth was, was hard to say. Deep Enough anyway. And Fast Enough. Especially on skis.

It reminded me of a river on Svalbard in De Greerdalen, when I encountered another knarly river, all set to 'surge' (consequence of a springtime surging river: to be possibly swept away, over the ice or under). Geography leader Lucy and I were really stuffed for where to cross safely, to get back to camp. Blue ice. Big river under. Slushtastic. Not a good feeling.

Anyhow, back to Bones valley, where my nemesis was a mere trickle by comparison! But still, unskiable (sigh).

The detour was to clambor up the river, to find a better crossing. And it was as I ice climbed on skis up the slippery upper banks, hauling myself along by grabbing for trees as my skis preferred to go downwards - watching the swirling water breaking through the ice and thinking 'don't cross above a hazard' like a Mountain Leader mantra - well, that was when I thought of this blogpost.

So here it is.

It's Norwegian National Day today. It's about 20C out there. And has been this hot since Wednesday. It's extremely nice, but rivers are in full spate and a flood warning has been issued. So, there's a flipside to everything.

I was up a sheer sided valley yesterday skiing/slush trudging up to the Swedish border, and witnessed the full force of ice and snow and rocks and mud when the mountainsides clear themselves suddenly of their winter cloak of snow. Quick reactions won't save you when several tons of such rubble sweeps down the mountain slopes and into the river at the bottom. Yes, I got out of that valley pretty darn fast.

The ski season is pretty much over for mere mortals who don't live above 500m.

And I can definitely state - here comes summer :)

Walk to school - last month

Dovre

Here he is: arrival DOVRE.  Happy husky, retired from the cares of working.  And seems to enjoy the fireside comforts these days.... (though persuading him first inside took a bit of effort!)

Hut life

The promise of summer

I didn't deliberately miss the sun's return. The light coming back is a gradual process. So you feel, after the long winter with no rays of light at all on the hut since October... Believe you me, I have been long-anticipating the sun's return, and yet.... often I am away at the weekends...during daytime (see post below, titled 'Sunworship'). I find it so hard to sit in the hut, at minus whatever degrees, just in the dark: Waiting for the sun. So, I go outdoors. Get warm. Anything. Therefore, perhaps I missed the first rays of sun on the hut. And yet I wonder....

It was the last weekend in February, and I was working night shifts at the Asylumottak. Bed at 8am after a night shift seemed a good excuse to be in bed, in the hut, during the day time. In the hut. And so, I awoke, 2pm, to the hut bathed, yes bathed, in sublime sunlight!... yet only for a few minutes....

You may think I'm waxing poetic about this, but it was so warm and light and suddenly the promise of summer was there.

And, although it might um and ahhhh a bit about coming back: once the sun creeps back here, it suddenly isn't so gradual anymore. A few days of teasing past the windows and not quite making it into the room proper. And then, quite unexpectedly, the sun is back. It's here. Mornings are light again, you don't need the head torch to go to the outhouse, you can see your own slippers in the dusky dawn. Small things that make life easy again.

The light is back. And it isn't going to go away again for a while now!

I hope you enjoy these photos as much as I enjoyed experiencing looking through the lens.

Velkommen tilbak til solen

Shall we just say

- the solar panels are charging once again :)

The sun's return to woods near home

Sunworship

(The ski model is named 'Nansen'. It inspires me. But alas, doesn't stop me faceplanting.)

hmm. if you look closely enough you can see the smoke from my hut chimney ;) true

It's always good to get out, and ski near home. Here I am, not 4km from the hut, enjoying sunshine and snow. It's paradise in this weather: I had to ski on, and on, and on....and on... It was hard to come indoors ;)

Winter lights

Home Sweet Home :)

Sun on the lake

Sun is back, on the lake. Hadn't seen it here since November (maybe even October!) so it's a welcome sight. That's why I'm smirking ;)

New Years tur

We left on Weds and had big ambitions for the New Year to ski the 20K in to a nice mountain hut where I hiked last summer, relax, celebrate, etc... but instead...such plans can somedays go astray...

We got to a small, two bed, 2x3 m hut (free to stay, chop your own wood, turf roof, thick log walls,etc) which was en route and was all warm still as someone had used it the night previous. (this was decidely tempting and we soon decided were too late for the big push in... it was 4pm. no chance!) and guess what, my boss from the school arrived at this little riverside cabin, alone except for his dog, and a big box of red wine.... so, we had a social time instead and a pre-New Year drink, with an outdoor fire in the snow. Hanne and I ate salmon couscous stew (our own invention: lovely!). Ludwig the (loaned) dog ate salmon skin (bit skeptic of the pepper and lemon flavouring at first...). Tor ended snoring contently on his bed mat on the floor squeezed between our wooden beds and the door, as the hut was so tiny. And Hanne is so nice she let his dog sleep on her legs. (Ludwig was happily firmly chained to a tree outdoors, as he doesn't like my bosses setter so very much. Call it what you will, but it involves a fair bit of knurling (growling)).

Next day. A decent 9am start, and up the frozen river we went, then up into mountains and over a snowy plateau to the hut beside a big mountain lake. Ludwigs pulk (sled) was awkward over trees aand roots poking through the snow, and downhills and uphills, and of course the dog was not so glad of thin ice on the river (he seems to be able to 'smell' the open water underneath - we hear it tinkling sometimes and he actually crouches low and sort of crawls a bit.... yikes! Makes you ski fast over those spots) However, collapsed areas along the river were showing just more frozen layers underneath mostly - it wasnt as dangerous as it sounds ;). The worst was areas where water had seeped from under up and when you get that on evil slush your ski skins attract water and you have to sort of SKI with blocks of ice weighing God knows what under the skis... rubbish to that!). We were unfortunate that Hannes ski boot bust (the toe section started to crack off, which binds the ski to the boot...). Photo shows the moment we had to do the 2nd fix on the skiboot. Bugger.

So, we fixed with my Emergency Duct Tape but it was not really enough - duct tape is amazing stuff. But you have to use bucketloads of it to keep gear intact! She ended up hiking the final 6km on foot. Not so easy in deep snow. The moonlight was amazing as we had no need even for head torches. Just moonlight :) When we finally got to the 2 huts up in the hills at 9pm there were several people there, (16 others, includinig the kind man who had warmed the previous nights hut and whose ski and pulk tracks we followed almost the whole way...) and a few dogs to boot (including Ludwigs friend Inuk, who he lives with and who was on loan to another friend! so a social New Year for the dogs also ;)). Before we had time for the Xmas Pudding treat with our new hut mates it was New YEars. It felt like a pause in dinner! ;) a few fireworks (dogs not so keen) and hugs all round then a dash back inside for Xmas Pud! laced with Cognac. Nice. But Hanne and I stayed v sober. 20 hours trek in. hmmm. I had to work at 1800 the next day. Yes, we fixed her boot, took 2 hours kip and back on our skis by 5am the next day. a lovely ski out. Her boot survived. Arrived at work 1730...just in time for a shower! ;)

(more photos coming).... just maybe not shortly!