Sometimes when someone climbs a mountain that no one has climbed before, they get to name it. If you had such an honour, what would you name a mountain and why?
PS…The mountain above already has one…it’s name is Nupse and it is located close to Everest. This picture was taken just as the sun was fading from the sky.
Sometimes a holiday is positioned right where you need one…and today’s was no exception. I can’t remember a day in recent history (i.e. the last decade :-)) when I spent the entire day at home. I only left the house to go out to the car to get something. Marian was home all day as well and it meant we made great headway on several expedition tasks. We started the day tackling my climbing skins. Climbing skins adhere to the bottom of your skins allowing you to climb hills without sliding back down. As I’m using nordic touring gear, it’s hard to get a pair of skins narrow enough for my skis so we had to trim them down. In the pictures above and below, Marian is using the special trim tool to cut the skin to side and expose the ski edge.
I’ll be taking two set of skins…one full length for the really uphill stuff and kicker skins for when we are the ice cap and I just need traction in order to pull my pulk (sled). The glue on skins is pretty amazing as it allows the skin to be stuck to the ski and removed over and over again. You store the skins by sticking the glue sides together. We have to Macgiver tip loops for my full length skins since the ones that came with the skins are about 15 mm too big…looking for potential fill-ins will be a good excuse for a trip to Canadian Tire or Princess Auto (on a side note, my dad often called Princess Auto La Senza for Men).
Over the past few weeks, I’ve been moving gear down into the living room a.k.a. expedition staging area and putting them in a pile on the couch. Today we did a second pass through the gear list with me showing each gear and clothing choice to Marian for approval and for checking off of the list. I suspect, left to my own devices, I might pack a wee bit light…then again, light is right when it comes to expedition packing. In the picture below, you can see how the process transformed the amorphous pile of gear into well organized categories that are ready to go into zip bags. All the electronics are charged and the good news was it was sunny enough to test the solar charging system and the really good news is that it worked to charge the sat phone! Zipper pulls got installed along with a pocket on my wind pants. I checked out the long hours of daylight we can expect at 70 degrees North and we’ve got the last of the shopping/small bits to buy tomorrow in between the two holidays!
As my departure date is nearing (April 11), I wanted to introduce the leader of my Greenland Expedition, Paul Rose. I have not yet met him in person but we’ve been exchanging emails and I look forward to shaking his hand. Paul is a very accomplished explorer, TV host, speaker, and expedition guide…to name a few of his many talents.
Paul’s recently completed a documentary on Frank Wild, Ernest Shackleton’s second in command. I am eager to hear about all of the travels/adventures he completed in the production of this documentary. As you may remember, I am a huge Shackleton fan and took the book, Endurance to Antarctica with me this past December.
Paul is also the Vice President of the Royal Geographical Society and Chair of the Expeditions and Fieldwork Division. I can’t think of a better person to lead the world’s first crossing of the Knud Rasmussen ice field. Paul will be tweeting from the expedition. I have his tweets posting to my site and if you are a twitter fan you can find them @Paul_Rose.
One of my teammates for Greenland arrived in the mail today. His name is Flat Stanley. He was squished flat by a bulletin board and he now flies around the world via air mail. Flat Stanley has been recruited by Grade Three classrooms to help them learn language arts and geography/social studies. This is my third Flat Stanley and I’m eager to have him along to share the many sights and adventures of Greenland.
Flat 3.0 journeyed in from Corner Brook, Newfoundland and C.C. Loughlin School. Josh got Flat all dressed up in good expedition clothing and sent him to St. John’s early enough so Flat and I can do some training together. Rumour has it that Bobble Head Ted may be packing for the journey as well.
Regular readers of my blog will recognize the name Heather Courage. She is a reader of Everest books, climber of Signal Hill (nearing 425 ascents), and long time supporter of mine. When the call went out for schools/classes to follow closely along on my upcoming Greenland expedition, Heather (as usual) jumped at the chance to share the joys, challenges, and excitement of exploration with her students. I received this note from her yesterday:
“I showed my students the video from Tangent Expeditions. Expressions could be heard throughout the classroom wow…awesome…did you see that ….cool. So, of course, that sparked a bunch of questions.
Here they are…..
1. Are you going to go snowboarding?
2. Are you hoping to see a polar bear?
3. (And I love this one) Are you going to bring us back a polar bear?
I would like to know how do you pronounce Gunnbjorn Fjeld?”
So, here are my answers…
1. We won’t be snowboarding on this expedition but I am skiing on Nordic Telemark gear which should allow me to carve some turns on the way down from any peaks we ski to the summit of. I haven’t yet learned to snowboard but I did learn to downhill ski at age three. My parents said that I initially learned to stop my skis by running myself into the side of the chalet. Perhaps that explains a few things… 🙂
2. I would both love to see a polar bear and hope we don’t. We will be taking bear deterrents and I hope we don’t have to use them. Polar bears are magnificent and beautiful animals but they are also very scary since they can sometimes treat humans as their prey. I saw polar bear tracks when I did my polar training trip in Iqaluit. That was close enough for me.
3. Seeing as how I found a penguin willing to come home from Chile with me to hang with your class, I’ll keep my eyes open for a polar bear of the same ilk.
Gunnbjørn Fjeld…I may have to get back to you on that…once I hear it said aloud…so far I only know how I am saying it in my head. Here is a link to an intro to Danish website in case you can’t wait until I get back. Here’s how Google Translate takes it on…
Four other schools are also participating in the expedition. You’ll be able to see updates and participate every week day of the expedition. I hope to be able to take questions from students along the way and call off the answers by satellite phone. The technology/preparations are falling nicely into place to allow that to occur.
Let’s just say, hypothetically, that you were going a long, hard expedition in a remote place and you could take along just ONE book to read…it is your only entertainment, information, and inspiration for over 30 days…which book would it be?
The gift of a late March snow storm is that is prompts one to stay home and attend to one’s packing chores. Marian and I spent much of today doing Greenland prep chores. I don’t know how I ever managed to get out on an expedition without her. She’s the best! In the picture above, Marian is designing a pair of overboots for my ski boots-she is re-purposing a vest she got from Value-Vill. On those super cold Greenland mornings, I’ll be able to put a Marian original ski boot “parkas” on to give my feet some extra insulation and keep my toes happy. I’m much appreciating Marian’s skill and experience with sewing clothing and outdoor gear. She’s contemplating sewing us a spray squirt for our summer canoe expedition…truly amazing to me!
I “pulled” gear today. Working off the master trip gear list, I started the official pile in the living room…err…expedition staging area. This process always entails many decisions every step of the way-trying to choose the best option or best combination of gear and clothing to meet the challenges ahead. Having just completed a trip to Mount Vinson in Antarctica in December, I am more relaxed about many of the decisions since I know what worked well in the super cold of the seventh continent. I decided on my clothing system, my climbing gear, my med and body patch kit (I packed lots of extra foot care supplies since ski traverses are notorious for being hard on the feet).
I also packaged up the snacks I’ll take along. It’s my usual mix of sweet, savory, and sour, though this time, I decided not to mix them. (For Antarctica, I made 17 lunch packs each containing a different mix of snack items). This trip, the above snacks, are extra to the expedition food. They provide a stash for fun, extra calories and a little comfort on the way. Food is key on longer expeditions, shorter ones too. Not only does it provide sustenance, it provides excitement and incentive to keep eating (which actually gets tiresome when you are trying to eat 4000-6000 calories a day).
I saw this video yesterday of Aleksander Gamme, who made a solo expedition in Antarctica from Hercules Inlet to the South Pole and back again. The 100 day expedition was super hard and challenging, of course! On Day 86, when Aleksander came across his final resupply cache, the celebration of finding a package of Cheese Doodles has to be seen to be appreciated. You have to watch about a minute to get the full effect… Of the video, Aleksander writes, “This is day 86 on my full return South Pole Expedition 2011/2012. I`m quite hungry and about to pick up my last cache by my second pulk which I left on the way in. As a part of my motivational plan I have on purpose not made notes on what goodies I have left behind in the cache.. and on this last one, I didn`t expect very much…”
Here my “Hero of the Sewing Machine” is installing side zips in my lightweight nylon wind pants. They came with only an eight inch boot zipper but three-quarter length zips are much more convenient for venting as well as putting on and taking off the pants, so it’s pretty cool that Marian can improve on MEC’s design.
I’ve also got many of the electronics that are going on the trip charging and discharging right now. I’m deep cycling the sat phone’s battery (thanks to Terri and Kimi for the loan of it-it’s going to make dispatches from the expedition a possibility). I’m trying to get the solar panel to charge the Brunton battery I have and trying to get the Brunton to charge the I-pod. Camera batteries are loading juice and I’m finding the cords to patch them all together.
All in all a very productive day, gotta love those out with the Lion snowstorms…
As we sat down to have our Newfoundland fish cakes tonight for supper, I realized we had sauce options from four different countries on the table as possible condiments. The four bottles were from four trips to do four climbs…can you name the countries and the mountains?
I pulled this tire up Signal Hill three times this morning.
The first pull felt awfully hard. Indeed. Really, really hard. Interesting to note that that feeling of hardness made me really really want to stop. It was dark. Cold. Lonely. The hill seemed steeper than before and my legs more tired than before. “This was easier a few weeks ago”, I pined. “Wow, if Signal Hill seems this tough, what’s it going to be like in Greenland,” I worried. Maybe I knew it was going to be a tough one when I put off pulling on Tuesday morning for lack of sleep. Wednesday afternoon, I took a pass to get a bit more class prep done. I knew I need to make Thursday’s pull happen or I might lose the week and I didn’t want that. So I pulled in the dark hour before sunrise and it was hard.
But like Dory in Finding Nemo, I just kept pulling. Dropped all expectations about breaking a pace record and set my sights only on getting to the top-however long it took. Kept putting one foot in front the of the other. Step by step, the tire and I climbed the hill. Just as the sun was rising bringing light to the day, the universe delivered a gift. His name was Joe. He had a mini-van and a curiosity to ask what I was at. And he and his dog, Sam, delivered me swiftly to the bottom of Temperance Street to pull up again.
The second pull seemed easier. Maybe I was warmed up. Maybe Joe’s kind words and delight at doing a good deed lifted me out of “tough mind,” as I’m coining it now. Not sure. What I know is… I hardly took a break on the way up, the tire wasn’t as loud on the pavement, and I enjoyed high five-ing Phil Alcock (a friend and personal trainer I’ve worked with) as he cruised on by. It all didn’t seem nearly as hard. Funny thing. The tire weighed the same. The pack weighed the same (ok-it was a few grams less because of the water ingested on the way up). The slope and distance were the same. Everything was the same except my mind. Good bye tough mind, hello “it’s not so bad mind.”
The third pull was easiest. That doesn’t really make sense since at that point I’d been working in heart rate zone four for nearly 2 hours but it was. Whatever fatigue and lactic acid had built up in my muscles was compensated by “It’s OK to work this hard mind” and a decent helping of endorphins. I spent much less time staring at the white line on the pavement and more time looking at my surroundings. I was in the moment of my environment instead of drowning in tough mind.
The hill remained the same. It is I that changes each time I climb it and the toughness of the climb is relative. Relative to my state of mind. There is a lojong slogan, “Be grateful to everyone.” It is a reminder to be grateful for opportunities to practice working with our minds/emotions. Indeed…I am.
Tangent Expeditions is providing the logistics and transportation for my upcoming Greenland expedition. This great video gives an introduction to how snowmobiles are opening up parts of Greenland to exploration as well as give some picture of the amazing views and landscapes that are in store for me in two short weeks. The first 186 kilometers of the expedition from the airport to the toe of the glacier will be on these very snowmobiles across the sea ice of Scoresby Sund, passing near to the village of Ittoqqortoormiit. Take a peek-you won’t be disappointed.
In just under three weeks, I will set foot for the first time in Greenland and it’s nearing two weeks to departure to Iceland-the staging point for the expedition. Each day I try to check a few more things off the to do list and bank a few more hours in the training bank. Emails are flying and emotions range from sea level to ice cap.
Friday I pulled and hauled 80 kg from Thorburn Road to Pippy Park…my sled shattered under the load and the friction fin became a drogue. Every 100 metres or so I had to stop and flip the decently heavy (130 pound) sled over and re-bend the snow catching, absolute friction inducing, sled-stopping, mind training piece of plastic back into the sled to have any hope of forward progress. It was a slow humbling but good go. I had to do that piece of training early because I was off to the Eastern Townships of Quebec to work with/present to a group of emerging student leaders at Bishop’s University.
It was an exciting and engaging weekend of inspiring the students to find the leaders within themselves. It was a treat to work with a small intimate gathering of folks wanting to change the world around them and within them for the better. I felt right at home in the Eastern Townships and realized it was because of proximity to Vermont both in landscape and outlook. Vermont holds a special place in my heart and it was fun to find “a piece of Vermont” in Canada. Thanks to all the fine folks at Bishop’s for the warm welcome and hospitality.
I’m in the Montreal airport waiting to fly home for the final push/pull and countdown to Greenland. Taylor, my MUCEP student is working hard on the Go for Greenland Virtual Expedition for Schools curriculum and four schools have already signed up to come along! My new SPOT messenger arrived and the first test went well. I’ll be able to send off camp locations and other spots of note from the trip directly to my blog. Exciting!
PS. Drop me a line if you know of a school that would like to participate!
I’ve spent much of the evening working on my website, getting it ready to share the excitement and challenges of my upcoming expedition to Greenland. I’ve set the home page to display my blog so it will be very easy for you to get current updates, the location of the team on the ice cap, and to cheer us on. I’ve changed the background colour to green in honour of Greenland, St. Patrick’s Day, Equinox, and the coming of Spring. It’s funny today that much of Canada is having a heat wave and we are still minus five degrees here in YYT. Good thing too-I still have lots of training to do.
As I’ve been sorting out what to leave on the website, what to change, and what to highlight, I’ve been flooded with lots of images and memories of past expeditions. I usually spent a lot of time reflecting on my last climb when embarking on the next. I realized that I never posted a summit picture from my last country high point: Mount Hillaby, the highest point in Barbados. It is my warmest and easiest country high point to date and I smile at the fun we had that day. The Newfoundland flag I am holding in the photograph has been to the top of nine country and six continental high points. I’ll be taking that same flag to Greenland in exactly three weeks.
Each day I work a bit on gear or electronics or my website or recruiting schools for outreach during the expedition along with training, I’m filled with a growing anticipation for the adventure ahead. My new SPOT device will enable me to send off daily location updates that you’ll be able to track on google maps and I’ll call off an audio dispatch each day too! Four schools have signed so far to be virtual explorers along side me and my student assistant Taylor is working hard on curriculum support materials. It’s going well as I look both forward and back.
Dr. TA Loeffler is an adventurer, author, and professional keynote speaker from St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador. TA is currently on her “Go for Greenland” expedition which includes a 250 km crossing of the Greenland Ice Cap culminating with an ascent of Gunnbjørn Fjeld, the highest peak in Greenland and the entire Arctic region. The route is thought to be a “world’s first” and should hold many adventurous moments.
The expedition runs from April 14 when the team flies to Constable Point Airport in Greenland to May 16 when the team is picked up in the Watkins Mountains by ski-equipped Twin Otter. Check the current weather in Greenland by clicking here and view a map of the entire route here.
TA invites you to follow along on this expedition by reading her blog entries and expedition dispatches below. You can send good wishes or messages of inspiration to TA by commenting on any of the expedition dispatches and they will be relayed to TA. Schools or classrooms wanting to become virtual expedition members can email the expedition communications coordinator, Taylor Marsh, by clicking here. See all of TA’s expedition dispatches about Greenland in one spot by clicking here.
One morning when I was training for a climb, a guy in a truck roared up and said, “do you want me to call you a tow truck?” I wasn’t quick enough that morning mentally because about half way up Signal Hill I thought of the perfect response, “I am the tow truck.”
I love this clip. It speaks volumes of what it is like to be on the precipice of a new experience, wanting to let go and let the skis ride, and the challenge of doing that. A brave nine year old role model for all of us!
TA Loeffler's Adventures that Move 