FOLLOW Bård, Mardi & TEAM Across Greenland spring 2022
#1Allright blog!
Here we are, sending directly from Kangerlussuaq Greenland!
During the last 5 days the team have been gathering and preparing for the crossing towards the east. Good weather and cold temperatures have made us optimistic about the conditions on the ice and it seems to be correct
After waiting for the permit to cross to arrive from Nuuk for a few hours, we decided yesterday afternoon to move ourselves up to point 660 and the edge of the Icecap.
So we just finished our first night in the tent
Still we are waiting for the actual permit to arrive before we for real start our journey east.
Yours sincerely,
Bård Helge
#2: THE ICY MAZE
We had a slow morning this morning, getting used to the routine of waking up and getting out of camp. We emerged from the tent to a bluebird day, a sprawling maze of ice and snow laid out in front of us. Sleds packed, sunscreen on, crampons on, and off we went! After just half an hour we realised just how challenging this day would be, hauling our unruly sleds up, over and around the icy mounds. The aim of the game is to find the path of least resistance, while maintaining travel in the right direction! The ridges and valleys run diagonally, and so it’s very easy to get sucked down these valleys and find yourself off course. Much of the surface was bare ice, and luckily with the cooler temperatures we’ve been experiencing, the melt had not yet begun. This meant that we could use the frozen melt rivers and pools as little highways through the undulations. Finding these channels heading in the right direction was always a delight, and provided some relief from the constant stopping and starting, climbing and descending, sliding and sled tipping. A lot of the time we would have to unclip from our sled, walk up to a high point and scout a possible route. It’s tricky to remember where you are headed when you’re at the bottom of a channel surrounded by walls of ice! By lunch time everyone was ready for a break. We soaked up the sunshine, ate hot noodles for lunch, danced to the ‘rollin’ on a river’ song (Proud Mary?), taped up some hotspots and continued on. After lunch felt a lot harder than the morning, probably just due to our bodies being tired and acclimatising to hard work! After a few more hours of up, down and around-ing, we came over the top of a rise to find a perfectly flat snowy section perfect for camp. There were no complaints at the mention of putting up tents, and in no time people were set up, water boiled and eating dinner. Today provided some of the most mentally engaging travel I have experienced. Literally like being in a maze made of ice, with a mildly disobedient dog (sled) that sometimes digs it’s heels in and drags you back, sometimes races in front of you trying to pull you along, and sometimes flips onto its back refusing to go anywhere! A great day in the bag!
Mardi - Co-guide from Icetrek
#3: FRESH SNOW
We woke up this morning to a fresh layer of snow, gorgeous to look at -as though we were camped on top of the clouds- but as we found out, fairly tricky to travel through! The deeper snow makes every step take a little more effort, and certainly makes the sled feel heavier. We started the day on crampons again, but the terrain began to flatten out slightly after the first few sessions and we made the switch to skis, woohoo! After a tough morning we enjoyed a nice long sunny lunch break, but just as we were about to begin our next session the clouds came in and visibility dropped. The low contrast light made it tricky to navigate and judge the height and steepness of features. A few times I stood at the top of a small rise, looking down at what looked like a steep drop off, only for Bård to ski up next to me, and ‘off the edge’ down a half a metre gentle slope to flat ground 😅 the light plays tricks on you! When the sun came back out after an hour or two it was a relief, like the blinds had been lifted. There was all of a sudden so much texture and colour in the world around us, that had been invisible just minutes ago! The lumpy terrain is beginning to smooth out a bit in comparison to the first few days, and we think we can see flatness in the distance 🤞We found a nice spot for camp, and settled in for the night. The team is happy and ready for a good nights sleep after a tiring day, in fact I can hear snoring already from the tent next door!
Mardi co-guide from Icetrek
#4:DAY FOUR:
Windy morning and suuuunshine!
A bit windy this morning after a night of about -20°C. We delayed starting an hour expecting the wind to go down during the morning. And it did. At 2pm the problem was more that it was too hot!!
Mostly flat going today, but a series of looong uphills. Ending the day with putting the big crevasse field behind us. Well tucked in our sleeping bags now, awaiting a little wind in the morning.
16,5 km today.
Cheers
Bård Helge
#5:Smooth and sunny
As we put the crevassefield behind us yesterday evening, the terrain is much smoother and flat from here. We still feel that there are some considerable uphill, but it is much easier. 8x50 minutes gave us 18 km progress. Big sun on the sky all day but not super warm.
Cheers
Bård Helge
#6, finally on flat ground !
Starting to become a habit.
It’s not so much about how fast you go. It’s more that you actually keep moving. We have established a good dayrythm of 8 legs of skiing. It is starting to become familiar and we still have good weather with bright sunshine and a little wind.
Just over 80km left to DYE2!
Cheers
IceIceBabies
#7, Norway’s national day
Today we did 20 K, best mark so far for our team. 17th May is Norway’s national day, so we had and national anthem at lunch time !
Introducing our team below, left to right: Sherief and James, ladies center: Susan, Hege Victoria and Nia, guides Baard Helge and Mardi to the right
Headed straight.
As we have cleared the icefall completely, we now have our course set straight for our next big goal of the trip: DYE 2. the old abandonded radar station. The terrain is really quite flat now, but still a few big waves in the terrain. And uphill. But we are doing good and put another 20km behind us today.
Cheers from the IceIceBabies!
#8 , Great weather again today!
Sunny and not too cold, a little windy in the morning, but died off around lunch time. We have two drones with us on this trip, and Nia and James being the excellent pilots they are have managed to get some amazing footage. Below is a still shot from one of James’ videos that really captures what it is like out here!
Did 21 Km today, more efficient everyday on packing, navigating and all other routines !
Greetings from the Ice !
#9 , Friendship
Our eighth day out on the ice and what strikes me most is the huge progress we make every day. Yes that means another team best of 22km travelled for the day, making camp at 1730masl, meaning we’ve now climbed more than half the altitude to the summit. But it’s the growing sense of team and support that is really making a difference. The congratulations as someone completes their first turn navigating, the willingness to take a bag or two from someone having a hard day, the encouraging hugs, and the chants of ‘ice, ice baby!’ as we set off on another 60 min ski (we do 8 x 60 minutes each day with a 12 or so min in between and 30 mins at lunch). Just over a week ago we didnt know each other but friendships that will endure are forming fast.
For me i had my first time taking the lead today and it was my favourite hour of the expedition so far. When you follow in line you can too easily focus on the back of the pulk in front, ignoring the snow globe environment around. Out front it is totally peaceful - a snowy wildnerness with magical light snd today at least a bright blue sky. It’s a privelege to be out here.
Cheers from Susan and the IceIceBabies!
#10 , cold and flat
Cold windy sunshine!
Day 9 came and went with bright sunshine. A strong breeze from the south east made it a quite cold morning, but managable.
Terrain is getting very flat now, and pulling is a little easier.
We did 6,5 legs of skiing and made still a good 17km progress.
Cheers
From the IceIceBabies!
#11 , windy but good progress
Windy sun, keep going!
This morning was beautiful but a little windy. More clouds in the skies than what we have seen in many days, but still sunshine peeking through for most of the day. A few hours of the day with very low light, which makes navigating a straight line more tricky. But steady doing 8 times 60 minutes gave us another 22km progress towards the east coast.
Cheers
IceIceBabies
#12 ,Something on the horizon!
After 11 days of hard work we finally have DYE2 in sight. Just as we put up the tents this evening, the weather cleared and we could clearly see that it’s there.
This morning came with a lot of wind and snow. So we stayed in our tents for most of the day. At 17:30 we finally headed out and did 11km towards DYE2. We stopped skiing at 22:15 and expect a similar day tomorrow. We are now just 9,8km away from the radar station, and we are excited to arrive there tomorrow evening.
Cheers from the IceIceBabies!
#13, DYE2!!!
Finally we reached the second big goal of the expedition. The old abandoned radar station DYE2. A relic from the cold war.
This morning we have been waiting in the tents for the wind to go down, which it did, and we could go the last 10 km into DYE2. We spent an hour and a half inside before we put our skis on again and skied for one more hour and put up camp. Good to have reached DYE2, but also good to have it behind us. As we are now at almost 2200masl it is getting colder in the evenings. -20 is not uncommon at this point. So it is more work to stay warm in the tents. But we manage.
We are now aiming for the «SUMMIT». It is at our current location 101km away.
Cheers from the IceIceBabies!
#14,Bye bye DYE!
We ser off this morning at 10:00. Did 8legs of skiing and put behind us 25km. Weather has been cloudy but good. The sun has been visible through the clouds most of the day and the wind has been from the West. Tailwind
Big event of the day was meeting Polar Explorers with Nancy, Taylor and offcourse Salo and their dogsled expedition coming in towards DYE2 in the opposite direction.
Cheers from the IceIceBabies!!!
#15,What a day!
Bright sunshine. Almost no wind. A little cold.(-15) very smooth and hard surface. What else could an expedition possibly whish for??
Beer maybe, but we will get that soon enough.
8 good legs of skiing gave us a progress of 25,5 km. Currently cruising at 2350masl. 50 km left to the summit.(highest point of our journey)
Todays entertainment was made up of a pack if canada gees flying by at a dangerously low altitude.
Cheers IceIceBabies
#16,Another what a day!
So far this expedition, we all agree that we have had the weather gods on our side. Again today we had sunshine and very little wind. We are now approaching the summit platou, and everithing is more or less flat.
This morning we had a little fog dancing around us for the first hour. With the sun shining down through it, it was an especially beautiful morning.
26km done today, and 26km left to the summit. Camping at 2400masl.
Tomorrow the forecast says it is going to be a windy day, and in saturday it looks like really stormy weather.
Cheers from the IceIceBabies!
#17,Summit!!
Our toughest day so far started with winds with up to a gail force. The weather forecast says that tomorrow comes witheven stronger winds. We had to get out and push east as far as we could. In this kind of weather it is easier to be skiing than to have breaks. So we skied longer legs of 90 minutes before a short break, followed by another 90 minutes eastbound. Then we put the big tent up and escape the wind. What a relief. We eat. Laugh. Smile. And see in eachothers faces that this was tougher than yesterday. Then we tear the tent down. Strap it to the sled. Eastbound again. Put your back into it. We do the whole day like this. Put 23km behind us.
We gather for a minute in a tight circle holding arms around eachother.
We have made it to the summit.
In camp we try to line the tents up as best we can for the expected wind direction. SouthEast. We build a wall of snow in front if each tent. At this point of the day you can read «tired» in all of our faces. It is 10:30PM. We crawl into our tents. And further into our sleeping bags. Tomorrow we will rest through the storm.
IceIceBabies
#18, Tentbound!
As the forecast predicted, it was a very windy day today. We have mostly been in our sleeping bags, eating drinking reading and recharging. We also had a good gathering in the big tent with lots of laughter and games.
Looking forward to skiing again tomorrow.
IceIceBabies
#19,Rough day in the wind.
We had to spend some energy today. Strong headwind kept us in the tents until 1PM and pushed us backwards as we started skiing. Hard work. But in the evening the wind finally died down and gave us a nice ending to the day. We still managed to move 20km east. We are very happy.
Cheers
IceIceBabies
#20,Tailwind.
A very beautiful day with increasing wind from the NorthWest gave us a solid push towards the east coast. 29km in 8,5hours,
So much more comfortable with the wind from behind rather then the opposite. Camping now at 2400masl. Going down.
Cheers
IceIceBabies
#21,What a Ice day!
Sunshine from a clear sky. Almost no wind. Heaven on earth. Conditions tried to make us unhappy by putting big Sastrugi in our path. With Nia Owens in front, the IceIceBabies plowed right trough the bumpy section, without even noticing on the average speed measurer on the GPS.
At 9:05PM we stopped to make camp after nearly 12 hours at work. 30km behind us. Now we are recharging in our sleepingbags in front of a new windy day tomorrow.
IceIceBabies
#22,Another day, another 30K!
Oh yeah! Got out of the tents and started skiing 09:30 AM. Quite lovely tailwind from the morning, increasing to a bit more tiring winds in the evening.
At 21:10 in the evening we had done 30km and stopped to make camp in gusts of up to 18m/s. Bright sunshine all day. Now down to 2100masl. Going down
Cheers
IceIceBabies
#23,Windy morning!
As we packed down our tents this morning we had strong winds and had to be careful. Allost lost a lid for one of our pots. But it was rescued. The wind slowed down during the day and we managed a good 30km again. 125 left!!!
Restimg in our sleeping bags now for the upcoming weekend with some strong winds expected…
Cheers
IceIceBabies
#24,PushPush, Sastrugi, Wind…
Our longest day so far. And the heaviest. From the morning on, very challenging terrain with a lot of sastrugi. Snow formations formed by new snow and wind. Drains the body of energy and limits progress. Still, the IceIceBabies pulled out their two aces, determination and brute force. A long day, but we got 29km progress in the end. Quite windy in the evening, but we are getting used to that now. So that goes well.
95 km to the coast. We can almost smell the salty sea from here, but there is still two windy days ahead of us…
Cheers
IceIceBabies
#25,Good conditions and we are on a roll!!
Today the conditions have just become better and better. Hard surface with an icy crust. Makes the sleds super easy to pull, but makes skiing a little more difficult.
Sidewind the whole day, increasing in the evening so we had to stop at 21:00.
33km progress.
Now we sleep and wait until the wind dies down in the morning before we start our final push towards the coast. We still cannot see the mountains, but hopefully we will see them before the sun sets this evening.
Almost there
IceIceBabies
#26,Land in sight!
After a stormy morning, we got out of our tents at 12:00PM. Bright sunshine but still a little windy. We skied for 6 legs and got land in sight this afternoon. At 21:00 we stopped to rest afew hours, before starting ti go down the hill at 02:00AM this night.
We are getting tired, but still have it in us enough for the final push to the coast.
See you there!
IceIceBabies
#27,The early bird catches the worm!!!
We made it!!
It is 01:00AM
Outside we can hear the wind blowing. But nothing too crazy. We get out of our sleeping bags and me and Mardi look at eachother. I ask Mardi: «should we just get out and do this?»
She nods: «fuck yeah.»
We have 40km to go.
02:04AM and all the tents are down. We start skiin on a much more southernly heading. At 02:06AM the sun shows itself as a glimpse on the horizon. And quickly rises. It is very cold. As we are now going downhill the body does not work so hard. I am wearing my down pants and my down jacket. Conditions just keep improwing. And the firs hours go by. At 08:00AM we have breakfast brake. We have made it to the point where we have 20km left.
After breakfast we rope up to move over some crevasses and down a steep hill. Mardi is in the back of the rope team. That is the hardest position. James who is second last keep hearing: «this is fucked up. This is fucked up…» hard work for the last person. We make ot down the hill. 15km to go. Then 10, 7, 3,8…
And suddenly, we are there. At the edge of the icecap. Bu the isortoq cabin. We cheer for a little while. It is 16:00PM on june 6th.
After some food and water we muster our last strength. The expedition is not over. We have to decend the glacier front down a steep snow slope and not end up in the water. Then out on the sea ice. At 19:15PM we are at the edge of the sea ice. We can’t get any further. A boat from the Isortoq village is there to pick us up.
They take us to the village where we stay in a house until the next morning. On Tuesday 7th we get into the helicopter that takes us to Tasiilaq. We are back in civilization.
Tonight we will celebrate with actual cooked dinner and drinks at the Hotel.
We are happy.
What a couple of days.
Cheers
Bård Helge, Mardi, Hege Victoria, James, Nia and Sherief.
Thank you for the trip!
IceIceBabies