Wk 11 Signs of...
Location: 68º58'N 21º41'E
Sápmi, Finland
Weather Conditions: Sunshine and windy, 31°F (0°C)
..Spring! Warm winds from the southwest sweeping across the tundra push the grip of winter out. "I thought I knew wind before today - after all, in California, we get our yearly Santa Ana's that knock down kids and knock out power. Wind, I did not know thee until today..." says Wendy. Yeah, and it was not just one day. It was a windy week indeed. It was a 'Wendy week!' Wendy learning the ropes of Arctic exploration; Wendy learning of traveling with the Polar Huskies; and Wendy living on the land in the midst of changing seasons. | ||||||||||||
| "We stood atop a particularly grueling hill to take it all in today, and I realized how much our clothing is like adaptations on animals. Goggles and sunglasses, furry hoods, face masks, gloves, and rubber boots all are items that allow us to explore different areas of the world at all seasons!" Big flakes of glimmering snow that reflect the moonlight making for a most magical landscape; drizzling snow turning to water making for wet, wet, wet everything the second it hits a surface; and scorching sun from a clear blue sky making for drenched mukluks while helping you remember that deodorant you never thought about earlier when it was cold enough that one forgets about 'body odors.' "I forgot to put on my deodorant this morning," Wendy uttered as she desperately tried to make her skies steer straight alongside the sled carving through the deep snow. Mille giggled, "Looking at Wendy, she was really having to work extremely hard to keep up, yet she did not loose her humor - or her will to go forward!" | |||||||||||
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| We had Wendy write a daily diary this week, and by Wednesday the signs of just how exhausting it can be out here on the trail set in. Wendy writes... "Auggh! No! What are you doing? My muscles all cried at once. Even the smallest of them - imagine a small one on your back that barely gets used - was exhausted over the last two days. They couldn't believe I had the audacity to get up and do it again! It made me truly realize in what good shape Paul and Mille are in. In the city we work out a few days a week, do some recreational activities in the evening and weekends, but to have the endurance for these 10-hour days is amazing. | |||||||||||
"I am thinking it is not that we are amazing as much as the fact that this is what we have been doing every year for more than 15 years. Maybe it can in some way be compared to the physical and behavioral adaptations of an animal to its environment. Like how our facial skin is used to the cold and our muscles use to the workload," says Paul. What we do think is amazing, is that it was not 72 hours after Wendy and Aaron had landed in Fennoscandia flying from the United States (Wendy arriving from 80-some degrees-balmy California (some-25˚ Celsius)) that the sleds were packed up and we headed out on our last leg of this year's expedition! It had been 72 quick hours of being introduced to all the details of being on the trail. From learning how to set up a tent, performing snow measurements and cutting out cheese chunks for the lunch bags to helping doing repairs. Last but not least, they were trying to adjust to the time difference. Getting up for a hearty breakfast on the day of departure, it was just about midnight in Wendy's hometown of Los Angeles! |
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 | But, loaded sleds and Polar Huskies jumping were signs of the time: it was time to go. "I strapped the skis to my mukluks, grabbed a hold of the tow rope on my sled, and the dogs went! I was blown away by their power, and it was tough for me to keep up. We rolled down small hills, through birch trees and the snow falling was relentless!" writes Wendy. And by the end of that first day, once in camp, she was blown away yet again. "I crawled into the warm cave. Our nice tents heated with a stove and onto my bivy bag where I was amazed at how only thin nylon separated myself from the cold and the winds outside." | |||||||||||
The wind has been welcome though. Not just as a sign of spring, but it has actually been what has made it doable for us to still be traveling during the day. The sun has such strength now that it is melting the snow. Every day the sun has been moving higher and higher above the horizon and it is by now barely setting below the horizon at night. "The other morning we woke up at about 4 o'clock in the morning with the wind pushing the side of our tent in a bit. The wind had shifted overnight and was now hitting the tent walls sideways. We crawled out of the bags, got dressed and ran outside to stake out the sides of the tent to make it better withstand the pressures of the wind. It was light out, like in the middle of the day, already then at 4 AM! When we get to bed around 11 PM, you can still see the light in the horizon from the setting sun. It is one of my favorite things about the Arctic," Mille continues, "The energy, the intensity, the beauty of this bright, bright light!" |  | |||||||||||
| The 24-hour daylight is very much what makes up the Arctic environment. In the winter the 24-hour darkness makes it one of the harshest environments on earth and in the summer the continuous light makes for a place that for a short time explodes with life. This is why birds from around the world migrate to the Arctic tundra to breed and raise their young. This week, we saw our first snow bunting playing in the air above the sleds the other morning as we were getting ready for take off! A sure sign of spring!
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As you might have gathered from any earlier reports you have read, this year's expedition has been a challenge with a great deal of snow. Not least when it comes to setting up campsites. "First campsite had me a little surprised," admits Aaron. "I know Paul and Mille have been reporting of unusually deep snow conditions this year, but when making camp the first night I had not expected to fall into snow all the way up to my crotch as I stepped away from the sled to walk off a spot for the tent." |
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| Now, if it is the first time you read this, you might go, 'Huh? Snow is a challenge? What else is to be expected in the Arctic?' Well, when traveling at a latitude of 68, 69, and 70 degrees north anywhere else in the Arctic but here in Fennoscandia, snow is everywhere but not at the depths we have experienced and not as much falling on a continues basis. Instead, it is the wind that moves the snow and makes for many ground blizzards. | |||||||||||
We traveled in big wide-open sweeping vistas of white, with sprinkles of birch trees that in the distance that looked like huge herds of reindeer. "I really thought they were!" laughs Mille. "I guess it had been a long day in the wind. My team just came across the crest of another looooong fjell (old mountain) when I saw all these reindeer straight ahead in the direction we were heading and also the direction from where the winds were howling at us. I was so excited that I stopped the team to show Aaron, Paul, and Wendy coming up on the team behind me. I wanted to warn them that I thought we were going to be flying down the hill. Paul just grinned, quietly letting me know that what I saw was not a million reindeer, but it was little trees!!! It did not matter, the mighty Polar Huskies in my team were just as excited as me. With Kodiak throwing himself into the air, we went flying down the fjell side covering a mile or more (about 2 kilometers) as if the winds of winter were right on our tails. I was wondering when my team would pick up on the fact that they were not reindeer, and I even felt a little bad that they were being fooled. Even when we stopped at the bottom to unload the sled and set up camp, Disko was still barking keenly looking ahead. Turns out, the fool was not them. Hidden from line of sight, a small herd of reindeer were right by the next hill crest less than 400 yards (about 400 meters) ahead!" |
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Reindeer in this region is a sure sign of spring! It becomes too hard for the reindeer to feed with the deep soft snow in the boreal forest, so with the coming of spring, much like we were doing, they migrate up onto the mountain tundra for better conditions. Here, they stay cool and can dig much easier through the not so deep snow to eat the lichen on the ground underneath. | ||||||||||||
 | Speaking of reindeer, seasons and climate, this week's chat about 'climate chaos' is with our own GoNorth! Cool Scientist Dr. Terry Callaghan who is at the Abisko Scientific Reindeer Station, less than 90 miles (about 150 kilometers) from where we are sitting in the tent today! Dr. Callaghan is an expert on the flora and fauna of Fennoscandia and he is simply one of the world's leading scientists of climate change in the Arctic. You may already have watched him speak in the movie about the ten key climate change findings in the Arctic! If you haven't seen it, watch it now :) and don't miss this chat on Tuesday, April 22 at 10 AM CST. | |||||||||||
They are definitely being watched by this week's Polar Husky Superstar, Trigger, who is a great hunter! Fun loving and easy to excite, Trigger loves to be on the move looking for thrills. That said, Trigger is also quite easily bored, quickly loosing attention if anything becomes boring. However, Trigger has all the potential in the world. Though he is sure a trickster, he is intelligent, athletic and is in dire need for attention. For Trigger to learn endurance and persistence while feeding his enthusiasm, during this expedition we have run Trigger in almost all positions in the team, from wheel to point. And slowly but surely it is paying off as signs of all what Trigger beholds become apparent! Be it as he whirls himself into the air much like his mother Rubi to start the sled; crouches his back into what looks like a tight string to plow the sled forward; or he loops with all his might to see what is beyond the next fjell crest. GoNorth! Fennoscandia 2008 will explore with Trigger as we set out in the week ahead. |  | |||||||||||
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| Note: While Aaron is on the trail, his Adventure Learning class back at the University of Minnesota is still hard at work making their own adventure learning projects. Aaron decided to say hello to his class from the high Arctic! | |||||||||||
