Made It

Janet's in Longyearbyen. Only took about 30 hours. Weather is cool, but just above freezing.

She's staying in the Polarrigg again, at least for one night. Tomorrow she moves to an artist residency, a bit up the valley.

Day 15

October 20th

After two hours of sleep, I woke at 6am and frantically packed my gear. Not only did I have to pack my cameras, hard drives, computer, etc., but also the kayaks and all their gear (drysuits, neoprene skirts, poggie hand grips, life jackets, paddles, etc.). It's a good thing I hadn't brought many clothes. Even going to the Arctic, I had to prioritize what to bring since we had a weight limit. Cameras and kayaks took top priority.

I raced around for a couple of hours, stopping once to gulp down our last breakfast cooked by Anna. I had to get drysuits back from both Audun and Amy Witta (a social scientist who was studying our responses to the environment).

The drysuits were mandatory for kayaking - they were hard to get on, but they kept the ice-cold water off your skin. Without them, a flip of the kayak (a very common occurance) would lead to hypothermia and probable death in under five minutes.



Amy had borrowed my drysuit a couple of times during the trip so that she could take a swim!! The first time she climbed down the ships ladder and swam out to an iceberg a few feet away. From that point on, if the weather permitted, we could usually find Amy floating around off shore or somewhere near the ship with a big smile on her face!

Once everything was packed the lugging began. Jan helped me get the kayaks to land. I had made arrangements with a produce delivery truck driver to transport the kayaks the mile and a half (3km) back to the Svalbard Sailing Club.

I was lucky to find someone with a truck, without this lift, I would have had to carry the heavy kayaks by hand. The night before, I spotted the driver bringing pallets of food on board for the Noorderlicht's next trip to Tromso. I bolted up on deck and asked how big their truck was. Kindly, he didn't think I was a crazy woman, and agreed to come back the next day and move the kayaks for me.



We all had most of our luggage on the dock when we realized that Raphaele wasn't with us! We raced back in and woke her from a sound sleep. I've never seen such speed packing! Just as she got her last bag off the ship our bus arrived to take us and our luggage to the Polarrigen.



This was the first moment all morning that any of us had had a moment to breath and face the fact that we were leaving our beloved Noorderlicht and her crew. With tight throats, and eyes brimming with tears we said our goodbyes. The crew stood on the dock in front of the Noorderlicht and waved goodbye. No one spoke on the bus. I avoided all eye contact, afraid that a glance from anyone would start the tears again.



Once back at the Polarriggen we unloaded our luggage and went to our rooms. We were all so sad that our adventure at sea was over. Eventually hunger drew some of us out of our rooms. We decided to walk to a "downtown" Longyearbyen cafe for a late lunch. As we were climbing over a hill Ian said, "Look!" The Noorderlicht, with her sails raised was leaving the fjord. It was the most beautiful and saddest sight I think I've ever seen.

During our voyage, whenever Jan was on shore he would call out to the Noorderlicht on his walkie-talkie in a special way - he would sing her name three times. I will always hear that song in my head and my heart.

Here are some shots of my beautiful Noorderlicht.


Last Night Aboard Ship

October 19th - pm



The deck was completely iced over and the sleet was still falling. The crew and any artist with prior sailing experience worked together to raise sail.



Not an easy feat under these conditions. At one point the bowsprits sail became tangled. The Captain left the wheel and made it to the bow in about six strides. He slipped only once, righting himself with ease. (everyone else had gone down repeatedly).



He climbed out on the bowsprits and wrestled the sail into submission, and returned to the wheel with a smile on his face.

For the next couple of hours we lived at a forty five degree angle or better. Lunch was a challenge. Food, dishes, glasses, and people were all sliding downhill. Moving about the living quarters took a lot of planning.



To get from the lower saloon onto deck I started by hanging onto the table ... running downhill to the wall next to the galley, pushing off and grabbing onto the railing at the bottom of the stairs, dragging myself up the stairs at a forty five degree angle, pausing at the top to get my breath and plan the rest of my path, use Osman as a ricochet point to come back around and brace off the mast that ran down through the upper saloon, push off the mast to hang onto Matt who was trying to get back downstairs, run towards the door to deck, glance off the bar and finally make it to the three stairs that led onto deck. This was all done with good footing. The deck was covered in ice.



Once outside, the howling of the wind was matched by the howling of our group! We were all out in force and loving it! We had to hang on to each other and to the ship to keep ourselves from being blown overboard. I had grabbed the Sanyo underwater camera as I was heading out on deck and it was a good thing!



The waves were flying over the ships railing, hitting us full force. I was hanging on to the uphill side of the boat with one arm and filming with the other. I looked down at Osman who was on the downhill side of the ship. It was like he was standing on a floor below me! It was exhilarating!!!!



Even Willie, who had experienced real fear on some early "nights of terror", was hanging over the rail, camera in hand and a huge smile on her face. It's amazing how much we've all changed in a couple weeks at sea.



We arrived back at the Longyearbyen dock in the early evening. We will spend one last night on board and then it's back to the Polarriggen tomorrow. Most of us are in complete denial that this is the end of our voyage.

We invited the crew to be our guests at dinner. We chose the Polarriggen since it was close to the dock and large enough to handle our group. We walked to dinner feeling the ground undulate under our feet. It was tough to walk on solid ground after so many days at sea. Dinner was festive, but tinged with the knowledge that tomorrow the Noorderlicht and her crew would head to Tromso without us.



We slowly straggled back to the ship after dinner. As more and more people showed up the night felt more and more like a party. It finally kicked into gear when chef Anna showed up. She had kept to herself and kept us in fear throughout the trip. Tonight she was ready to party with us. Soon the Captain, Jan, and Sebastian arrived and the Captain started pouring drinks. It was getting late (actually early, as in 3am early) and most partiers had wandered off to bed. We had to be packed and off the ship at 9am. Katja, Ian, Raphaele, and I were reluctant to let the night with the crew end. We hung on as long as we could and then finally made our way down to our cabins.


jet lag

I seem to be suffering from a bit of jet lag so I'm updating at 4am Svalbard time.

Last night I checked out the bar in the hotel ... I say hotel, but think polar outpost. Mary Ann's Polarrigg was an old Russian mining dorm. It is a series of long, low buildings, strung together, each on a slightly different level...so there is a lot of going up and down steps to walk through the buildings.

I left my wing of small rooms, past the office, communal kitchen, through the common sitting area (one stuffed polar bear here), through the restaurant's kitchen, through a dinning room with old mining hats, boots, and pick axes left from when it was a working dorm, through what looks like a rock cave and into a long,candle lit, greenhouse style dinning room full of plants and a waterfall (three stuffed polar bears here and a few Arctic foxes too). This is a new addition to the old structure.

There were three people in this huge dinning room having dinner. It's off season. I sat at the bar and talked to the bartender, who was also the woman who checked me into the hotel on the first day (everybody does everything). She is third generation Svalbard (although each generaton was born on the mainland as required). The table of diners left and the chef and her assistant came out and joined me at the bar. The chef is from Thailand and her assistant is from Croatia. We taught each other words from our native languages, but they were all much better at English than I was at Norweigen, Thai, or Croatian.

[These aren't my pics, I should have some up soon.]

Out the Polarrigg Hotel Window

Here are some pictures out my window of the Polarrigg hotel. It's near the docks of Longyearbyen. These are low-resolution images from my netbook's camera, hopefully, I'll have better pictures soon.

Travelling to Svalbard

Here I sit in the most beautiful place I've ever seen. I knew it was going to be amazing, but to see Svalbard from the air as we flew in was incredible...corny as it sounds it brought tears to my eyes.

I've checked in at the Polarrigg hotel, walked around town, shopped at the local grocery, and met with Eike Müller and fellow paddlers. Mary Ann's Polarrig is perfect for the group...full of character, stuffed polar bears and endless hallways (since I'm the only guest it has horror film written all over it). The communal space is great and the rooms will acclimate us to life shipboard (they can't be much larger than the boat's cabins).

The shopping area here has lots (considering the size of town) of sport outfitter shops so if anyone is lacking clothes they can pick them up here. There is an hardware/electronic store, but I haven't checked it out yet.

The hotel has wifi, but charges for it ($20 US for 24 hours access and about $1.50 per hour). Eike told me that there is a coffee shop in town with free wifi and it's also free at the library.

There is a communal kitchen here (that can be used for a small fee) which is great for me staying for a couple of days.

It takes about 15 minutes to walk into the town center (depending on how much ice is on the roads...there are two main dirt roads with smaller roads off to private residences.)

Great facts I learned tonight about Longyearbyen ... you can not retire here so all people of retirement age must return to the mainland. There is no unemployment and housing is expensive (most owned by mining companies who will only rent, not sell. To buy a house here costs more than in Oslo). No children are allowed to be born here as they don't have the medical care for births at the hospital and the child wouldn't have a nationality since the treaty makes Svalbard neutral (a great book in the making ... the birth the government doesn't catch). All pregnant women are flown to the mainland at about 6-7 months.