The "two mile mess" was filled with various sized rubble.
Date: April 10, 2009 Location: N87° 13.047' W075 19.632' Time Traveled: 11 hours Distance Traveled: 10.1 nautical miles Drifted .4 nautical miles S/SW AM Temperature: -18°F PM Temperature: -17°F E wind 4-8 knots, clear but haze on horizons 167 nautical miles to the North Pole
By: John Huston
Audio Transcript:
"Tyler and I traveled 10.1 nautical miles today in 11 hours and we are extremely happy with that performance. It is a full moon today and that affects the tides by increasing them to their greatest extent and we are also near an area where we have heard there is a large lead. So we have been wondering about how the tides are going the affect the ice. Normally they increase the drift and action in opening up a lead. So we're a bit curious as to how that will affect the area that we are in. And last night, toward the end of the day, we noticed a whole lot of humidity in the snow and a bunch of recently frozen-over leads that we crossed the last 2 hours.
As we went to bed last night, we could hear in the distance, kind of a churning of the ice slowly moving as high tide came. This morning, about 12 hours later, we traveled through what we came to call the "two mile mess." The "two mile mess" was two straight miles of ice of all different sorts and recently frozen leads, most of them very frozen, of all different sorts and different directions as well. I don't really know how to describe it other than a labyrinth of new leads frozen over and just chunks of ice with frost flowers everywhere.
Some of the chunks of ice were as big as a car or bigger. Some were just kind of small cauliflower that we would ski right over. It's kind of frustrating to encounter an obstacle like this because it slows us down. However, while engaged in overcoming that obstacle, Tyler and I are never frustrated at our pace. We realize that we can only travel so fast and we actually enjoy the engaging route finding of going through rubble and kind of more open labyrinth type areas like the "two mile messes." Fun, as it makes the time go by quickly and we marvel at the power of nature and the Artic Ocean.
So we also encountered a "one mile mess" later on and then a "half mile mess". But the "two mile mess" took us 3 hours to go through. And to finish that and go quite slowly, take our skis off about 10 different times and walk pulling our sleds, and still do 10 miles in 11 hours of travel, we are thrilled. We are full of pemmican and happy. And we had some Cajun spice tonight in honor of my mother who is celebrating her 65th birthday with my father in New Orleans.
So thanks for listening everybody and we will talk to you (later). (Dispatch was cut off)"
Date: April 9, 2009 Location: N87° 03.306' W075 13.153' Time Traveled: 10 hours Distance Traveled: 9.7 nautical miles AM Temperature: -22°F PM Temperature: -18°F clear, light N/NE breeze 4-8 knots 177 nautical miles to North Pole
By: Tyler Fish
Audio Transcript:
"Well, our day was spent weaving our way among the rounded features of hills and hummocks of older sea ice and around and over some pressure ridges that were newer. We also crossed 6 frozen leads, gliding like silk over the frost flowers. It was a day that John and I like to call "heavy" but "steady" because we try to keep the pace so we're moving all the time. And during our day at some point in the mid-afternoon, we crossed 87°, our next degree of latitude, and so tonight we are celebrating and we are really happy that we made 87°.
So how far to the North Pole? It is 175 nautical miles or 210 regular miles that you are used to thinking about or 340 or so kilometers. That's to the North Pole in a straight line. Well how far is that? Well, I have 3 examples for you.
If you were to get on the freeway and drive 70 miles an hour, which the speed limit on some freeways is, if you drove for 3 hours you would be at the North Pole. That's if you're driving a car.
If you're biking on a road bike, you could do a century ride. A century ride is where you do 100 miles in a day. Means you woke up in the morning, did 100 miles and camped somewhere, got up the next morning, biked back home, you'd be at the North Pole. That's one way to get to the North Pole.
Then to stay with the cross-country skiing, there's things called ski marathons and John and I have a favorite. It's called the American Birkebeiner. It's named after a race called the Norwegian Birkebeiner, or the Birkie. The American Birkebeiner's largest such event in North America is very much looked forward to by all sorts of people. It's a 50-kilometer race (about 30 miles). Well if you did 7 Birkies you would be at the North Pole. That's one a day for a week. Now if your average time was about 3 hours and 30 minutes, which is a very respectable Birkie, if you did 7 of those, that would be about 24 hours. So you can think that, from a certain perspective, we have 24 hours left of skiing. Of course this would be if you had enough light all the time, you had groomed trails, easy food and water and if you were a little bit crazy.
Well John and I are, perhaps, a little bit crazy and we do have the light of the sun 24 hours, but we also have obstacles: rubble, open water, drifting ice - that kind of thing. So, it's not quite the same. It's not going to happen. And at -20° Fahrenheit no ski race happens. But we do keep skiing to the North Pole. So, you can choose however you want to relate the distance that we have left to go. But, that's how close we are and how very far away."
Date: April 8, 2009 Location: N86° 53.747' W075 11.969' Time Traveled: 10 hours Distance Traveled: 11.7 nautical miles Drifted .4 nautical miles N/NE AM Temperature: -30°F PM Temperature: -24°F S/SE wind 2-4 knots, high clouds, more sun that previous days
By: John Huston
Audio Transcript:
"Sun, I love you like never before. Sweat, you are my sworn enemy. I will do everything in my power to stop you. Sun, glorious orb in the South and now the North as well, you brighten up the tent so that we don't need headlamps anymore. Sun, you highlight the ice chunks on the horizon like a beacon and make navigation so easy. You warm up the tent so nice. You relax my muscles. You make breaks enjoyable for 10 minutes. You give me energy when you shine 24 hours straight. Sun, you dry my sleeping bag a little bit. And sun, you melt the icy, frosty bits from my facial hair.
Sweat, you are my enemy. You make my clothes damp and cold. You drain my energy. You tell me my body is working too hard. You make my mittens wet and then icy and my hands cold and numb. Sweat, you fog my sunglasses. You dehydrate me and make me grumpy. Sweat, you make me hungry for more salt than we have. Sun, I will never, ever take you for granted again. Sweat, you have taught me discipline and moderation.
We have 24-hour sunlight and it's warming up our trip making things more enjoyable and relaxed. However, we are skiing in warmer conditions and it is a battle not to sweat. It is difficult for me to stay dry. To keep from sweating I am always unzipping my Bergans clothing and doing everything possible to change my clothing systems not to sweat. And so far, so good but I've had a few rough spots here and there. Okay. Thanks for listening everybody. It was a great day today and it definitely will be tomorrow."
Date: April 7, 2009 Location: N86° 41.729' W075 00.544' Time Traveled: 10 hours Distance Traveled: 11.2 nautical miles AM Temperature: -26°F PM Temperature: -20°F clear, some haze on all horizons, S/SE breeze picked up 198 nautical miles to North Pole
By: Tyler Fish
Audio Transcript:
"Well today we made a new distance record for ten hours of travel, 11.2 nautical miles. John and I are very pleased. What do we think about while we're skiing? That must be a question on people's minds. Well, I'm going to try to explain.
It depends a little bit on whether or not you are leading or following. The leader thinks about being out ahead. Where are we going? What are the obstacles? Are there any leads to cross? Are there ridges? Where are we going to go over those? What's the easiest path? Where is my expedition partner behind me? How far? That sort of thing.
The follower has a little bit less to think about and can get caught up more in: How's the snow? This is great skiing. Oh, this is kind of crusty. I'm just going to sink through this a little bit. That sort of thing. Either way, if the terrain is easy or has a good rhythm to it, either skier can really get into it. And what I mean by that is you can get into a meditation in motion. You just ski. You go. And you just, you're going and going and you're thinking while you're going and you sort of lose time, which is my favorite way to meditate. If I were to sit and to meditate likely I would just fall asleep. But the meditation in motion is awesome. And your mind wanders all over the place. Yes to friends and family, to the past, to the future but also you could think about the present for a long time.
Today when I was skiing, meditating in motion, I got fixated on the white splatters on my skis and finally I realized that those splatters are from my dripping nose, which drips most of the time. And when the ski passes under it, sometimes it catches a drip.
Well eventually we do stop and the two of us take a break together. And now the weather and the terrain are such that John and I can sit together for 5 or 10 minutes during our breaks and sit and stare into the warm sun and share our thoughts that we had or maybe thoughts about our expedition and planning things a little bit. And increasingly we talk about food. What we want to eat, when we want to eat it, how much of it. The quote from today was, John said, "I wonder how long I'm going to want to eat everything I see?" Good question. And onward we go."
John standing in front of an open water lead on Day 30.
Date: April 6, 2009 Location: N86° 30.177' W074 57.139' Time Traveled: 10 hours Distance Traveled: 9.7 nautical miles AM Temperature: -22°F PM Temperature: -20°F sunny all day but hazy, light undefined cloud cover 210 nautical miles to North Pole
By: John Huston
Audio Transcript:
"Today, by far, our highlight was crossing a mile wide lead. It was sunny. There was no wind, very little ocean current. The coolest thing that we felt, I mean there was a lot about it that we really reveled in, was that we saw the ice moving. In other words, we saw our drift that we've been talking about happening. And what that was like was, and sounded like, was one huge sheet of ice slowly (just a thin sheet of ice) pushing underneath a thicker sheet of ice and like incremental grunts. So our drift has been a little bit to the northeast, mostly to the north recently, so we actually got to see our drift happening.
We felt quite safe on this huge lead. The ice was very good. We skied quickly across sections that are thinner and the ice actually has a rubbery feel which is quite fun as long we are moving but it's very safe. And we were on that rubbery ice for about 100 meters, 150 meters. And then we were on thicker ice for the rest of the crossing and quite safely we could stop and talk to each other and just appreciate the sunshine, the windless area and the stunning view of being on such a flat area and seeing all around and the mist in the distance and the rubble in the distance.
And the skiing was quite good. The ice was very good. We felt very fortunate to encounter such a lead on such a perfect day. To encounter this lead on a day where there was a lot of action due to high winds or increased tidal effect, we might still be at our camp waiting for it to freeze over. So we're quite happy to have crossed that. It was the high point of the day.
It slowed us down a little bit because we knew we needed to test the ice, but we feel that we have added to our experience level on such leads and that we are going to encounter more like this and we hope that we are as lucky as we were this time, as far as the conditions.
The moon is waxing, increasing, getting towards a full moon. The tidal action will increase and that affects the ice quite a bit. We're seeing more cracks as we progress north and we know that there is one more big lead right after the 87th degree of latitude, at least in the near future. So we'll see how that turns out. So you can look forward to that.
The leads are becoming more and more a part of our story and we're encountering them more and more everyday. I think we crossed 5 or 6 little, smaller leads and then that one big one. And we feel quite safe with our decision making around them.
Today was also a big day. We boosted from 6700 calories to 7500 calories per person per day. And that is in the form of an extra truffle for lunch, more cheese and milk powder at dinnertime and a little other additives. So those extra calories will have no problem getting into our stomachs and we are quite happy to have a little more energy going into us as we ski to the North Pole. All right, everybody. Thanks for listening and talk to you next time."
