Ramblings & Polar Bears

Hey! It’s been a few weeks! Yeah, been pretty busy on my end, but they’re quieting down slightly for the next week or so. Don’t hate the playa’, hate the game, and all that jazz :P

I barely know where to start! Of late, I’ve been neglecting blogging, in favour of posting pictures of FB with a short description. But I have the time tonight, and some exciting things have happened on base these past few weeks that I feel I have to make another blog entry.

First, on August 1st, there was a ceremony for the incoming and outgoing CO (Commanding Officer). Originally it was going to be outside, complete with marching parade, but due to weather conditions it was held in the big gym. It wasn’t mandatory for us civies to attend, but I wanted to see the ceremony regardless. After all, it only happens every 6 months. It kinda blows my mind a bit that I’ll have seen 4 different COs here by the time I’m all done (I saw the 1st for my first month here, and I’ll see the 4th for my last).

Hiking these past few weeks have been greatly rewarding in terms of scenery, though ironically a great deal of the local wildlife I see is near the base.  So far I’ve seen 2 arctic foxes, 2 lemmings, 3 arctic wolves, 1 seal, and more arctic hares than I can count (biggest group was around 20 though). Below - Lemming, Seal, and Wolf, respectively. Only the picture of the lemming was taken by me though. 

People have seen both caribou and muskox in the past few weeks, although I’ve had no such luck personally. Maybe this weekend, but it’s entirely possible they’ve all moved on south. Below are some recent pictures of them, courtesy of my co-op student.

The hikes themselves are enjoyable too, though for some of the longer hikes we’ll bring bikes(which would normally be ok with me), except in this case the bikes are for the most part in fuckin terrible shape. Most have brakes on either the front or back tire (not both), and you’re considered lucky if you can change gears consistently. Additionally, on our last hike we ended up pushing our bikes for about 2 kilometers until we finally gave in and realized the terrain wasn’t going to improve, and so we’d pick them up and push them another 2km on the way back. I’d wanted to ditch mine a lot sooner too, but I was assured the terrain would improve. I’m still a little bitter about it lol.

View of Hilgard bay on July 29th. As you can no doubt see, very foggy.

A fair ways up, but it's hard to tell. You can see iceflows down below in the bay if you look hard enough.

An interesting ice/snow formation that we found while hiking down one of the valleys back to the shore of the bay.

Our second hike to Hilgard bay, on August 5th. Same view as picture just above this, except taken one week of warm weather later. 

  

Looking North, where Hilgard Bay attaches to the Arctic Ocean.

As for life on the station right now, it’s pretty good too. All of my extra stuff came in about 2 weeks ago (ie. Graphics tablet, books, speaker system, etc) so I’ve been spending a little more time in my room than I previously had been. Still been going out Friday nights to the bar for TGIF, and Wednesday nights for pool. Even went out Tuesday night for some hot cribbage action, though I didn’t end up in the top 3 (7 of us played, whoever had the highest total score out of 6 matches won. 2nd and 3rd also got cash prizes). I did win my last 3 matches, but it wasn’t enough to get some sweet, sweet cash. It’s mostly for the fun though, and I admit it was pretty fun :D

Tuesday nights and Saturday nights are Movie Nights at our auditorium, which can quickly be converted into a movie theatre. And it’s actually a really good setup; it honestly feels like I’m in a small movie theatre. There’s probably close to 150 seats, terrific sound system, and free popcorn you can take into the theatre if you want.

There’s still a lot I want to do on base, both easy and difficult to accomplish. I’d like to gain access near the runway one of the coming weeks when a C-17 or Herc comes in, and take some pictures of it. BOXTOP, a massive supply operation, will begin near the end of September, and planes will be coming in every few hours, every weekday, for about  3-4 weeks. I’ll likely accomplish that goal then. Right now only 1 comes in a week, and it’s usually while I’m away at the lab. Below is a picture someone else took earlier this year of one of the old Hercs touching down.

I’ve already hiked a great deal farther than most on base, and anything more farther out is truthfully just more of the same. Being a civie, and a scientist with access to several pick-up trucks allows for a much greater headstart than beginning right out of the station, as is usually the case with most personnel. There is a boundary set up by the military though, as to how far you can go from base. Anything more than 4km, and you need a trip request, that needs to be signed by your supervisor (In my case, I am my own supervisor :D ), and also a signature from the SWO (Station Warrant Officer), who is basically the second in command of the station. There are a few on station who know that EC sometimes cuts it close on these boundaries, or maybe even exceeds them *cough* ‘slightly’ *cough*. But those who know, both military and civie, typically only want a spot in our truck for a ride, which we usually encourage.

Another small goal of mine was to see polar bears. Notice I say ‘was’ though. There’s a good reason for that. I SAW FUCKIN’ POLAR BEARS TODAY! I was at the lab late though, and didn’t have my radio on (it’s not required), but apparently just after 4pm someone working on the water pipeline spotted a pair of polar bears about 150meters east from the big gym, which is right on the edge of base. The station was quickly under lockdown, but me and my co-op student were 7km away at the lab in complete ignorance.

We didn’t get back until around 5pm, but the polar bears were still around, albeit farther away. Of course we couldn’t go back out and see, now that we knew the base was under lockdown, but they were still close enough to see visually (White specks travelling off along the brown coast, about a kilometre away). One guy was videotaping it all on a very high quality camera/tripod setup, so I and many others will be getting the footage off of him in the coming days.

  

First picture snapped. They were a few hundred meters from the guys who took these pictures.



Thinking of investigating the humans....Oh shit

  

Shots are fired, and the noise scares the polar bears down towards the shoreline.



Debating on whether to get in the water, or something else? They were spooked enough they weren't planning on coming back up though.

 

Swimmin' in the ocean.



Click to enlarge. There's actually a seal that jumped out of the water to get out of the way from the polar bears. You can see the ripples off to the left where it jumped had jumped and where it is. The polar bears are together off to the right.

Over on the far shore, where they stayed for a few minutes before continuing southward.



One of the military personnel, Bellhop, snapped a few pictures in a truck alongside the SWO and others, who had guns out. They successfully scared the bears off base, and into the waters, though the bears only really hugged the coast and swam ashore about 1km further south. This was around the time I got back from the lab.

There’s probably a lot of other things I’m forgetting, but I think I’ll leave that all for another day. Until then, enjoy the warm weather down south!