Survivor Ellesmere

Tobias and I went for the best walk ever yesterday, down the opposite ridge towards the fjord, and then back up AStrO ridge. This walk is basically my favourite view in all of Eureka the whole way there, and then, on account of the sunny skies, super-great white on crazy blue sky with bright red AStrO in the background all the way back. It also provides plenty of opportunity for sliding down snow covered hills and - newly discovered this year - a tiny tiny amount of climbing! Funnily enough, this is really hard to do in boots rated to minus fourty. When/if I come back this summer, this little stretch of rock had better watch out.

On the way back we walked through the valley between these two ridges. The wind was blocked by the ridges, and was dead calm. Normally you can hear the wind rushing past you, or, when close enough to the lab, or anywhere at the station, the low rumble of the power generators. Literally the only things making noise were us. We stopped and sat there for awhile, listening to absolutely nothing. Almost every day here I find something else to love about the Arctic. This trip has flown by, and weather permitting we'll leave Friday. As much as I look forward to not having to spend ten minutes getting dressed to go outside, and meals that don't involve meat and deep fried things, I'm not looking forward to heading south. Except, maybe, for the sushi. And people (hey that's yous guys). Oh yeah, and my next trip north-east. The life of a grad student is hard sometimes.