April 5, 2014
Day 22. Anchors Away!
The wind dropped enough and the sun was out so we sat on our sleds during our soup break/lunch for the first time in over three weeks that either one of us has sat on anything even remotely resembling a chair.
It was exquisite. In one quick act, we've transcended our Neanderthal ways and have become modern human beings... More or less.
You see, its been so cold that compressing our clothes while just sitting makes us cold, so lately we've just crouched behind an ice block for warmth (I know that's just all kinds of wrong).
The other difficult part is finding my mouth with the spoon from my Stanley food jar. I caaantt take my goggles off or they'll frost permanently for the rest of the day and with my frozen nose beak hanging down I can only see things about four inches away and farther. So I balance some food on the spoon, open my mouth and hope for the best. The other day I couldn't figure out why I could smell soup all afternoon - that is until I discovered a few noodles frozen in to the fleece of my nose beak!
It felt like we were just dragging anchors across sand today. The soft snow from yesterday was piled in drifts and spread across the surface - both meant every single step was an effort. Every single step. I switched from skis to my MSR snowshoes for the last shift in lead for the day and that gave me a lot better traction but it was still an anchor that I was pulling.
At times, it felt like I would pull all the stitching out of my Granite Gear harness but it held no problem. I've had this same harness for nearly 10 years and have used it on three South Pole expeditions, two North Pole expeditions, all my polar travel courses and dry land tire pulling. Talk about quality craftsmanship!
At some point in the afternoon we must have come close to an open water lead because an ice fog descended over us and it was nearly a whiteout, but eventually it cleared up and we finished the day totally exhausted but pleased with our effort.
Distance traveled: 7.9 nm
Image: Ryan and his anchor.
It was exquisite. In one quick act, we've transcended our Neanderthal ways and have become modern human beings... More or less.
You see, its been so cold that compressing our clothes while just sitting makes us cold, so lately we've just crouched behind an ice block for warmth (I know that's just all kinds of wrong).
The other difficult part is finding my mouth with the spoon from my Stanley food jar. I caaantt take my goggles off or they'll frost permanently for the rest of the day and with my frozen nose beak hanging down I can only see things about four inches away and farther. So I balance some food on the spoon, open my mouth and hope for the best. The other day I couldn't figure out why I could smell soup all afternoon - that is until I discovered a few noodles frozen in to the fleece of my nose beak!
It felt like we were just dragging anchors across sand today. The soft snow from yesterday was piled in drifts and spread across the surface - both meant every single step was an effort. Every single step. I switched from skis to my MSR snowshoes for the last shift in lead for the day and that gave me a lot better traction but it was still an anchor that I was pulling.
At times, it felt like I would pull all the stitching out of my Granite Gear harness but it held no problem. I've had this same harness for nearly 10 years and have used it on three South Pole expeditions, two North Pole expeditions, all my polar travel courses and dry land tire pulling. Talk about quality craftsmanship!
At some point in the afternoon we must have come close to an open water lead because an ice fog descended over us and it was nearly a whiteout, but eventually it cleared up and we finished the day totally exhausted but pleased with our effort.
Distance traveled: 7.9 nm
Image: Ryan and his anchor.