2:30 – Northern Lights produce a 5-minute sequence that includes rapid flickering, up-tempo wavering, a base of green, and a touch of red.  At least two of our crew find god.

9:00 – Sunrise over mountains, magical light.

9:30 – While Dan is casting a block of glacial ice, the Zodiac is headed for shore with a film crew, and Marcus is about to be thrown in the water wearing a survival suit, three marine mammals are spotted swimming in the general direction of the boat.  After some deliberation, and much disbelief, it is confirmed that these marine mammals are not, in fact, seals, but rather a mother polar bear and her two cubs.  Video with embarrassing commentary is captured.  Incredible luck (unlikely polar bear spotting on final day) is repeatedly noted.

10:30 – As threat of predatory polar bears has passed, Marcus is thrown in icy water wearing a survival suit.  Hilarity ensues.

10:30 – Polar bear progress up nearby mountains is tracked; position relative to Beth and Ko onshore is monitored.

13:00 – Lunch

16:00 – This correspondent takes a nap for the ages.

18:00 – First watch in four days as we make our way from Greenland. Sunshine and flat seas are a welcome reintroduction.  As we later enter coastal fog I say goodbye to Greenland for second time.

18:45 – Coastal fog clears.  Say hello to Greenland again.

21:00 – Sun sets behind mountainous coast of Greenland, light reflects in iceberg filled waters through which the Noorderlicht navigates, for a good while in the wrong direction, back towards Greenland.  Ice seems inescapable.  The absolute beauty of the sunset and it’s reflection off the ice field and the light surrounding could not be more diatmetrically opposed to the reality of what this backtracking (already, merely 4 hours after “leaving” Greenland) means for our voyage across the legendarily harsh Denmark Straight (b/w Greenland and Iceland), where we’d rather not be dodging icebergs at night, and where-according to a recent weather report) very, very strong winds await.

22:00 – Polar bear prints are spotted on nearby iceberg.  Had we not seen real live polar bears earlier today, this would’ve been wildly fulfilling. As we had, it was merely “very neat.”

24:30 [next day, technically]:  Northern Lights provide encore performance. Hooting and hollering emanate from the top deck.  Phospherescents (sp?) stir in the boat’s wake.  Many cameras fail to capture them justly.

Representative quote of the day:
Carole (at sunset): What can you possibly ever do to match this?
Ben: It’d probably have to be illegal.

So rather than burden you with an overly emotional attempt at restructured narrative (abbreviated highlights: morning in thick ice field; climb to crow’s nest; walk along coastline in Barclay Bay, where quite possibly no human has ever tread before; drinking cocktails poured over glacial ice; Vikram swimming in -1-degree Celcius water; the best photograph I’ve ever taken in my life (on somebody else’s camera); projections onto icebergs at night), for our American audience I’ll offer a basic glossary of British dialect common on the ship, and possibly causing minor confusion to the Stateside readership.  [Note: this list might be heavy on the Manchester euphemism, as my cabin-mate Liam has plied me with Mancunian talk.]

knackered:  tired
shattered: see above
throw a wobbly: to get mad
Mum: mom
slag: [retracted]
borf : [retracted]
chunder: to vomit
make sick: see above
bollocks: exclamation of frustration; or [retracted]
brew:  tea; or, a beverage (quite possibly life-sustaining), served hot every 40 minutes or so
slash: to use the toilet, #1
[retracted]:  [retracted]
nick: to steal

By the way, we’re settled now in Barclay Bugt.  Which translates to Barclay Bay.  The last recorded voyage into the bays along this coast (according to the ship’s pilot, a guide-ish book of sorts that breaks down a bunch of info from past voyages to various areas) was 50 years back (of course, our pilot is a bit outdated as well, having been published in 1981).

Representative quote of the day:
“It’s always Christmas in the arctic.”  –Liam, with wintry wonder.

Before delving into today’s installment of Something Spectacular That Is Probably Impossible To Experience Anywhere Else, I should probably mention that we didn’t wind up in Scoresby Sund.  Rather we’re settled into the coast just south, Blosseville Kyst, fjord hopping our way down.  Having spent the first night in Deichmann fjord, we swung around the point to Turner Sound, tucked behind Turner Island.  Here we experienced the aforementioned S.S.T.I.P.I.T.E.A.E.

Which was:  a snap freeze.  Now I’ll implore you to check out the posts from the Science Team for a much better description of exactly what this is.  But here’s how I experienced it:  the boat circled through a spot in the Sound where thin, wispy crystals of ice were barely scattering the surface.  After completing a loop, Beth (thankfully) asked for a second pass, during which the Noorderlicht was breaking through ice probably 2 inches thick, where just 15-20 minutes earlier it had been nearly pure liquid.  Simon guessed that by morning it’d be about 3-4 feet thick.

And that’s why we’ve got to pay attention to where we park.

I think there’s some video I took floating somewhere on the site as well of the freeze, and the Science Team’s reaction.  Check it.

Representative quote of the day:
“Noorderlicht, the icebreaker!”  –Renska, digging the snap freeze.
“Not in 35 or 40 years in the field have I seen it.”  –Simon, also digging the snap freeze.

Quick freezing sea ice in Turner Sound. (Duration: 1:18mins)

Representative quote of the day (which today will lead the post, as it’s the most welcome quote of the trip):

“Ladies and Gentlemen, we have Greenland.” –Barbara, at 6:15am (Norweigan time), to Vicky and Ben, who then behaved a bit silly for that time of night.

We’ve arrived. Greenland, first appearing through the early twilight, rising from the horizon and looking a little too ambiguous (cloudlike, thin, atmospheric, imagined) to get hopes immediately up . (Mental process: “Could that be? No.too big, too white, must be a cloud.Looks a damn lot like mountains.Should I ask Barbara? Don’t want to sound dumb. Looks a lot like
land. Can’t be, no way, mind playing tricks. Big clouds that look just like mountains. That must be it. Yeah, that’s it. But damn that looks like land. Don’t be dumb.” And so on.)

Eight days across the Greenland Sea, sixteen watches up topside, twenty-four meals served at varying angled degrees from the horizontal, a bundle of bad nights’ sleep, plenty a sing-a-long, many a turbulent tummy, and altogether too may slips, falls, and bruises.

And every ache and pain, each sleepless night and every breakfast lost has been completely worth it. At risk of seeming like I’m mailing it in, I can’t offer much by way of words about this place. Not yet. There’s too much: too big, too emotional, too abstract, too pristine, too majestic.

Suffice to say, spirits are lifted, and we lifted many a spirit in celebration (and relief), after a long day of general arctic (land)-induced merriment: circling floating cathedrals of ice recently calved from nearby glaciers; touching down on land for an (at first wobbly) walk up and along a coastal ridge, the elevation giving a bit of perspective to the fjord; some snow fights; and, yes, to top it off, a late night gift of the Northern Lights. All is very, very good.

By the way-anyone who has tried to email me for whatever reason (Jenn w/r/t SooF, Team Evolvist, etc), we don’t have any internet access, so the best way of getting in touch is to either leave a comment in this blog. (As comments are then forwarded along to us via Satellite phone from the Cape Farewell office, our only tiny keyhole into the world outside the
Noorderlicht.) Red Sox updates are keenly encouraged.

Representative quotes of the day:

“For all the hearts I’ve broken and [retracted] I’ve [retracted], I did nothing to deserve that.” –Matt, coming in from the 8-10pm watch, which featuring sustained Force 8 winds with periods of Force 9, horizontally blown icy sleety mixture, and salt-spraying waves that left faces numb and (on the plus side) nicely exfoliated.

“Your t-shirt says ‘A bad day on the boat is better than a good day in the office’.Today, I don’t know about that.” –Captain Gert, on a hellfire Monday evening.

There are great ways to start the day (think: a hot cup of tea, the newspaper, a bicycle ride, SportsCenter, the face of a loved one) and then there’s standing harnessed to the bow of a lurching 100-year old schooner at 6am (which is more accurately about 3 or 4am since we’ve maintained the same “ship time” while crossing at least two time zones), peering through the pre-twilight dark and horizontally wind-driven ice, trying to distinguish potentially threatening icebergs (smaller than an oven: not dangerous; bigger than a refrigerator, definitely so; anything in between: your guess is as good as mine) from the white foamy churn of waves piling over themselves, and then seeing a massive gleaming mass roll over a swell at the limit of visibility, a glowing white chunk unmistakable for anything but a hulking solid state of H2O, and realizing with startling urgency—“shit, this is what I’m here for”—immediately turning with flailing arms and yelling at lungs’ top “BIG PIECE OF ICE” repeatedly so that Barbara (of the Noorderlicht crew, now helming the wheel through this tenuous stretch) will hear, apparently yelling loud enough to awaken a sleeping Vikram in his cabin below, and then watching with a certain helpless angst as the boat laboriously banks against its 8 knots of momentum and Force 6 tailwinds to port, and the broad, jagged white mass pushes closer, on a seemingly target-tracked course to the bow, before finally, after the slowest of seconds, the Noorderlicht pulls left, not sharply, but enough to let this iceberg—now obvious to be the size of a 15-passenger van, or maybe even a box truck—glide harmlessly off of starboard, an innocent chunk bobbing along, perhaps beautiful and awesomely intricate in another setting.

So, yes, on this Sunday, our opinion of ice has changed. Long gone are the warm, welcoming sentiments of yesterday. Ice is now our enemy, and we want desperately to be away from it. Which is getting trickier, as some odd developments and oceanographic anomalies have sort of pocketed us in a swooping arm of this ice flow, which we thought we’d soon be around, but which to the downtrodden spirits of many, curved east just about where we thought it’d end, so that we must now turn with it, backtracking in a very real sense. As I write late on Sunday evening, we’re traveling due north—which isn’t proving all that helpful to crew morale. The ice flow, it seems, has formed a large “reverse J-curve” at it’s southern terminus, and we’ve no choice but to follow it back east then north to wrap around and get back outside of it.

This is interesting for a number of reasons (if, meanwhile, totally confusing, causing more than a bit of anxiety, and plenty frustrating). To the best of the onboard oceanographers’ knowledge (and the very arctic-experienced ship’s crew), this sweeping tail of the East Greenland ice flow is totally unique. An anomaly.

So, as we backtrack, our sea-weary crew all figure out how personally to mentally accept one more (at least) day at sea. At the trip’s outset, when most folks had their minds (and hearts) set on a Friday arrival in Greenland, I put Sunday in my head as an arrival day, as I prefer to play the psychological game of preparing myself for the worst (well, not the best, at least) case scenario and enjoying a pleasant surprise rather than a disappointment. I didn’t shoot quite far enough.

Representative quotes of the day: “Well, you said we were heading to the ‘front lines of climate change.’ There’s the front line.” -Ben to David, on the odd appendage of ice flow.

“I wish ice were warm.” –Liam, on ice’s cruel tendency to cause discomfort while on watch.

Here a touch of science is called for: the ice we’re seeing is “old,” probably formed two or three years ago up in the polar icecap. It’s then driven down the northeast coast of Greenland by northerly winds and the East Greenland Current, and generally (for the past few years at least) it breaks up somewhere in the neighborhood of Scoresby Sund. Which is where we’re heading. So the plan from here is to follow the ice south to Scoresby Sund, or wherever it’s loose enough (meaning about 10-percent ice cover) and make for the coast.

The blocks of floating ice are somehow captivating. It’s possible that this is because we’ve seen nothing but sea for five days, but I think there’s more to it. The history of this ice, formed years before up towards the pole, carries through it, and the pieces we see have broken from the main flow, weathered and shaped by warmer (it’s all relative) water, wearing their years of frigid floating. In these bits of ice we can feel the last gasp of the solid state.

[Note: I’d started and put on hold this post sometime midday Saturday. As I revisit it Sunday evening, and after spending more time with the ice all day Saturday, we’re feeling a bit different about ice. See subsequent post.]

Representative quote of the day: “It’s like someone has taken the most boring soup in the world, and added croutons.” –Marcus, on ice in the sea.

– Waves rise as walls, aside the vessel, gathering and folding over themselves, flashing in a fleeting moment an iridescent tropical blue hue-the only touch of warmth in our cold, damp, dreary surroundings.

–A bunkbed discussion with Liam about what our friends back home in Brooklyn and Manchester respectively are up to, it being Friday night and all. We conclude, with some certainty, that they are likely having a better time than he and I, cooped up in our “zero gravity” cabin. We then figure that many of those Friday nights will be forgotten, but this one will likely be remembered for a lifetime. (We then agree that I’ll be visiting him in Manchester after the trip, and that we’ll be getting a proper drink on.on solid ground.)

–Dinner. Once again, Anna has outdone herself. One of the special treats of the 6-8 watch is that we are called inside a few minute early (again prompting pangs of guilt in myself and my watch-mates) as dinner is being served. Tonight it was a pasta carbanara. Were I not on a boat in the middle of the Greenland Sea it would’ve been delicious. Being on said boat, it was a true taste of heaven.

–Oceanography. I’m learning a lot about water. Amazing how little most of us humans know about this feature that covers the vast majority of our home planet, and is entirely unique to it. I won’t flaunt my newfound knowledge now, but if you ever care to lose an hour to talk of salinity, water density and thermaclines, buy me a beer and ask me about the North Atlantic currents.

–Route update: Not a highlight, per se, but a development. We’re unclear of the ice cover at the entrance to the sound. Nobody is really ready to think about what it’d mean if we couldn’t make it in, as we’ve been given some pretty enticing descriptions of the place (see next point). And while I’m sure that the fjords just south of Scoresby Sund will be equally mind-numbling and awe inspiring, there seems to be a magic to the place that no one wants to miss out on.

–Ko’s lectures: Ko has been doing a series of talks about Greenland-the history, the ecology, the sociology-and it has me (and all others who huddle into the lower salon to watch the captivating Technicolor slideshow) awfully excited to get to Scoresby Sund. This is, he has said again an again, a real adventure, traveling by schooner to one of the last outposts of traditional arctic life. For our sake, hope for southerly winds up the east coast of Greenland, to help push that icy barrier back north where it’s retreated of late.

Representative quote of the day: “Nope, something’s wrong-this is where we were yesterday.” –Marcus, relieving our watch at 8am, upon looking around at the nondescript sea surrounding.

She’s a salty sea and an unforgiving one. Every swell pitches the boat into a violent two-stroke rise and fall. A pattern emerges–heavy tilt to the starboard, snap back to vertical-but while your body attempts to learn this new gravity, the rhythm is disrupted, punctuated by an irregular swell or as the ship’s course slips from true (which happens aplenty with our amateur helmspeople). It’s a scene that’s part slapstick comedy and part poorly produced disaster flick. Glasses careen through the Noorderlicht’s upstairs salon, bodies flop, benches overturn. A bell hanging above the bar shows us hanging about 25-degrees from horizontal. At times (check that-most of the time) it feels like an amusement park ride that doesn’t end.

I’ve managed to avoid the fate of many of my companions. Despite the persistent low-grade threat of ill that sits in my gut (much worse when in the boat’s lower interior level), I haven’t succumbed to any real high-grade sickness. I don’t know whether to credit the copious consumption of raw ginger, my cabin’s fortunate position towards the middle of the boat (meaning a mere 10 foot vertical drop between swells rather than the 20 foot or so plummet felt by those in cabins towards the bow), or simply good fortune and lucky genetics.

Still, the day that will hopefully prove the trip’s most violent has provided us (well, those of us who’ve emerged from our cabins to commiserate) with plentiful laughs and, no doubt, a lifetime of memories. I even managed to film some video that should prove a youtube hit. Spirits remain high with the walking wounded, or “stumbling bruised” might be a more accurate description, as I think we’ve all collected a body full of bangs, and the “drop and slide” across the floor has become a familiar and practiced maneuver. We’ve also found some fun in gravity games, tossing one another fruit across the salon and watching its twisted trajectory. (Oftentimes botching the reception.) It’s the simple things now that bring the best stimulation.

Wishing my parents a very happy hello. hi Ma, hi Dad! Remember saying how jealous you were of this trip? Well you needn’t be envious of this seaward stretch!

Representative quote of the day: “That was my moment of elation.” –Matt on singing Dire Straits while steering the ship a mere 5 minutes after “having a sick” over the boat’s side.

(Well, not really, but the mere thought of composing-thoughts and words-wrenches my gut.  In fact, one of the oddest effects of life on the sea is how dumb one feels.  The way I figure it-a good 95-percent of one’s mind, that is normally free for thought and consideration, is now occupied by the most basic of actions, body movements that typically require only the subconscious.  As a result, we all become blabbering fools.  Well, for much of the time.  I for one have been ridiculously slaphappy, laughing at the dumbest of jokes, at fruit falling from a bowl and casting across the room, or at any of the dozens of remarkable falls by just about every crew member.)

So we’ll see how we’ll fill the time the next couple of days.  I spend the hours between watch wishing I could read the many great books aboard the boat, or the half-dozen plays I brought along, or that I could write something more considered than these half-minded  blog posts.  But I plead seastupidity (and a bit of sea sickness prevention, as I certainly don’t want to test my boundaries by spending too much time in front of small text, or a monitor, or a notebook).

Repesentative quote of the day:  “It really is about patience, isn’t t?  –Vikram on enduring this trip.

–That said-there’s comedy, there’s high comedy, and then there’s watching a bunch of landlubbers try to deal with shuffling about the cabin. Stumbles and near-calamities are frequent (we’re talking every couple of minutes) and we’re averaging no less than 3-4 good spills a day as a crew. There will be bruises.

–We’ve chartered a slightly different course, responding to ice patterns and weather concerns. We’re no longer taking the 78th parallel straight across, but rather taking the hypotenuse straight to Scoresby Sund. The upside to this (besides not sailing into sea ice) is that we’ll have more time in Scoresby, the largest fjord in the world, and by all accounts (including Ko’s) is a place of unspeakable beauty.

Now, I must check out to revive the tumbling tummy with a breathe of fresh midnight arctic air above, and to glimpse a touch of the northern lights through the cloudy cover.

(But not before watching Liam land on his arse.)

So we’re sailing, after nightfall, and we’ve cleared site of land.  Stomachs are somewhat woozy (no proper tossing yet, but it does seem imminent with certain clammy-faced crew members).

My shift “on watch” (above deck, steering the boat, watching for ice, and setting sails when need be) is 6-8 am&pm, and I’m feeling somewhat guilty about such a choice timeslot.  My watch crew-Vicky, Brian and myself-is also top notch (although I’d likely feel that way about any grouping I’d find myself in).   And we’ve got morning and evening twilight (and sunrise and sunsets, I suppose, if the clouds break).

Interesting realizations of the trip today, that this is no little jaunt around the arctic, but rather a pretty serious endeavour.  This somewhat humbling recognition was prompted by Ko (real name, real badass) answering my question about why he came onboard for this voyage, as he’s sailed and travelled the arctic plenty in the past, but has somewhat “retired” from the life of adventure.  Now Ko is our “guide” on this trip; he’s insanely knowledgeable about the history and science of the region, and has been to Greenland four times in the past, has been all over the arctic.  He seems to have as good a take on the North Atlantic as anyone out there.  So I ask him why he comes out of “retirement” for a trip like this, and he starts talking about the “adventure” of it, and how he wants to see how a little boat like ours-which, apparently, doesn’t normally take such a trip-is going to make the trip all the way to Greenland.  It’s a trip that Ko-who has done it all-has never done, and he’s in it for the adventure.

So, yes, we’re on an adventure-not just an arctic “experience.”  750 miles at least (as the crows flies, and our route certainly won’t be so direct), which will take 5 or 6 days, depending on the wind.  Now the thought of being on this boat for 5-6 days without even a view of land has caused at least a few of us a bit of jittery nerves.  Claustrophobia, seasickness, and boredom seem to be the main concerns.  (The last seems unlikely to me, but it is really difficult to read or write in this rolling cabin, before the stomach starts to wince.  And, that said, even within a parentheses, I must close the computer.)

Flying from Oslo, our crew was collectively jolted from the weary fatigue of travel (this correspondent tallied up six airports in the 36 hours prior). The sense of shared bewilderment of 20 relative strangers upon landing in Longyearben was nearly as stirring as the scene into which we touched down.

A beautiful day blessed our arrival-not common for this place, according to David-with a mat of clouds keeping temperatures comfortable, if still below freezing. A jaunt through town yielded the group many a precious souvenir score-mugs were purchased, a couple of savvy travelers posted cards, and a run on canvas shopping bags (branded with the ubitquitous Longyearbyen polar bear, who we fortunately never met in the flesh) impressively left the local supermarket sold out.

Longyearbyen is an interesting place, seemingly having grown about a coal mine and power plant that lights and heats the town’s 2000 or so residents, 25-percent of who turn over every year. (Surely there’s an interesting paradox to be explored about an old coal town that is so clearly being tugged by climate change, but none of us had the wherewithal to dive into it.) As a hub for research expeditions and modest arctic tourism, it’s a place of transience, and our scattershot international crew warranted not a second glance while traipsing about town in our matching hunter’s orange caps. (Team Zissou Farewell!)

Returning to the Norderlicht for departure, spirits high as the journey begins in earnest. Gliding through a thankfully placid sea, as the sun sets beyond a mountainous island direct off the bow. Cameras working overtime on deck, so that the post-dinner cabin scene is one of competing wires and adapters and whirring laptops as memory cards are purged into hard drives.

The anchor drops as the Norderlicht sits in a fjord, mountains surround rising through the lolling twilight.

Apologies if I’m not so lucid this evening (or for the rest of the trip for that matter). Typically I feel it’s a cop out to say that “words cannot describe,” but for once it feels an apt excuse. And the conversations I’ve had this evening make clear that, for more folks than myself, this place-this experience-is still a bit beyond expression.

Ben Jervey
Journalist (USA)

Ben is a freelance writer, environmental consultant, and ‘ecopreneur’ who, over the last decade, has been working towards a more sustainable life in New York City. He recently released a book to help others do the same, The Big Green Apple: Your Guide to Eco-Friendly Living in New York City.

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