Hi everyone!

I am now up on the ice sheet and am having a great first day! We made it to Albany late Saturday night, then up at 4:30 am on Sunday to board a C130 headed to Kangerlussuaq, Greenland. Sunday evening in Kanger consisted of eating at the Greenlandic cafeteria (a strange all-you-can-eat buffet that had unknown meat and lots of beets), hanging at the airport bar (the airport is the hopping place of the town), and getting our gear ready for this morning’s trip to the ice sheet. We boarded the C130 again this morning, this time with only about 12 of us on board (mostly ice core drillers and scientists) and successfully landed on the ice! First order of business was claiming our tents – the main strategy here is being close to the “big house” (kitchen + bathroom) and far from the outhouse. In “tent city”, I am now 3^rd back on the left side…an important thing to remember since all the tents look the same!

We had a big lunch, where I met a neat guy named Pat who had wintered over here (with 3 other men) and kept active cross-country skiing all winter…at temperatures down to -85 C (if I could capitalize those numbers, I would!)…and in the DARK! He would guide his way back to camp by using the stars. Now this guy has now won my highest ranking of hardcore people I have met. The guy in the Colorado Rockies who hiked up mountains with a broken hip…unfortunately has fallen to second. J I am definitely a softy! It’s ONLY -30 C here today. The air definitely has a bit more bite to it then it did last year in July when it was around -20 C. Apparently, it may get down to -40 C tonight…whooo! It was so cold today that my Nalgene dripped a little on my parka and then froze. AND, what is even more interesting is that instead of having a runny nose, your boogers just sort of freeze in place since you are breathing in such cold air. Thought you all would like to hear the fine details of just how cold it is up here! Luckily, I’m actually feeling fine and I think I have the right gear to be ok at these temperatures. Hopefully I’ll be still saying that in a week!

I’m off to go play a round of cards and then head to bed. Tomorrow we’re going to be riding a zero-emissions electric snowmobile around setting up our satellite camp…40+ big boxes to move and a lab to set up!

I’ll try to send another update later on this week! Right now, the internet connection is too low for me to upload pictures. I'll try to get online at some odd hour for the next update to have enough bandwidth for pictures.

Cheers,

~ Gayle