Polar Bear Dip and more hiking

“Oh wow, definitely!”

That was more or less my first thought when I heard and signed up for a Polar Bear Dip planned for this past Sunday.

“What have I gotten myself into?” was my second thought.
 

Starting up the bonfire, so we'll have something to warm up to after our dip in the ocean.

The experience was incredible though. Cold as fuck, but I probably didn’t need to tell you that. There were about 30 participants, with around another 40 personnel coming out to watch those crazy enough to participate.

Just before we ran into the Arctic Ocean. Unbelievable experience, and not one I'm planning on doing again anytime soon.

We boarded buses on station at 1345 on Sunday, July 22nd, and travelled north from base to the tip of the airstrip, 3.5km away, where there was a massive bonfire waiting for us. After shedding off our outer clothes, those participating in the polar dip did a quick role call, followed by a few more minutes standing around to allow our bodies to get acclimatized to the air temperature (it makes the shock of the cold Arctic Ocean a little less shocking, which that afternoon was a frigid -2C).

There were 3 rules for this event; don’t spend more than 60 seconds in the water, don’t dive into the water (too shallow), and don’t swim out to an iceberg (they can be as sharp as broken glass, and you’ll be too cold to notice you’re hurt/losing blood).

Us polar dippers were split up into 3 groups, with one group going into the Arctic Ocean at a time. For better or worse, I was in the last wave. My original plan was to go in fairly deep, then dunk myself underwater. The other two waves had just went, and it was our turn now.


Warming up by the bonfire.

The Doc blew the whistle, and we all sprinted our way into the ocean. Sprinting quickly turned into wadding when the water reached our knees, and by the time it got to my waist I jumped forward and swam out. But the cold hit fast, and it hit hard. I got about 3 breaststrokes in, and had only been in for about 15 seconds, but couldn’t feel my feet. I stood up (it was around chest height), and started looking around at everyone else nearby. Most had also stopped continuing onward, and we all just kinda chilled there (pun intended).  By this point my main thought was “MUST GET WARM” or something along those lines, so dipping my head underwater wasn’t even on my mind.

Getting out was an even more interesting sensation than going in. From neck down my entire body was numb, and I was pretty much walking on instinct. My hands felt heavy, as if I was carrying 5 pounds in each, and having only a swimsuit on in the breezy Arctic air suddenly felt fine. The bonfire helped bring feeling back to me though, but it was still another 10 minutes or so until my body could realize just how cold I really was. Myself and everyone else dried off and changed, and hot beverages were served to help bring out body temperatures back to normal.


Large variety of moss, at the base of a mountain ~10km from base.

This week’s military plane that arrived yesterday afternoon delivered more personnel than usual, including the new CO who will be here the next 6 months. To celebrate this in part, dinner this evening was steak and crab. I actually had just come back from some pretty extensive hiking today, and so was pleasantly surprised when I got into the mess hall. The hike itself wasn’t very noteworthy; we went to places where caribou and muskox are common sights, but failed to see either. Funny enough, when looking for muskox we travelled along Caribou road, which is known as the longest road on Ellesmere Island. And we went to the end of it. I don’t know for sure how long the road actually is, but the end of it is off any map I can find on the base.
 

A common terrain this end of the world. You can just barely see our red truck parked off in the distance.

After an unsuccessful attempt at finding muskox past Caribou road, we went to a small hidden valley between the twin peaks of Crystal Mountain, where I’m assured caribou roam. We didn’t see any when we hiked up into it though, which was a bit disappointing.


On top of Crystal Mountain again, looking southwest.

I did see my first wolf the other day; while driving back from the lab, we came across the wolf right on the edge of the base, just walking around not giving a single fuck. I didn’t get pictures but I will whenever I see the next one. I also saw an arctic fox early last week, a few dozen meters from the back entrance to the GAW Lab. I took a few pictures, but they’re pretty shitty. I’ll save the bandwidth that would otherwise be wasted by posting them :D

I'm having some trouble uploading larger pictures, but I'll try to get some of them up in the next bit. Till then, make do with what's either here or whatever I've posted on facebook. Cheers!