Yesterday was all about sledge hauling. We moved from Patriot Hills to a camp about four hours away. We are just four tents in a vast valley; the scale of everything here is hard to comprehend! The hauling was fine until we encountered a sizeable hill, how sizeable wasn’t obvious until we got half way up and couldn’t haul any more. We anchored our sledges, put two people onto each sledge and relayed up for well over an hour. Although exhausting, it felt good to be physically active again after all the sitting around waiting to fly.
Today we walked to the other side of the glacier we’re camped on (a walk of about an hour or so) and continued to hone our scientific techniques. I’m working as a field assistant to Ruth whilst taking weather obs and we’re getting the hang of doing science in pretty extreme conditions now.
The main problem here is that everything takes so long. Getting up, getting dressed, boiling water for breakfast/drinking water and packing the rucksack/sledge takes about two hours! For breakfast I have about quarter of a pack of muesli (with a dairy milk on top it’s delicious!), a cereal bar and a chocolate bar, lunch is more cereal/chocolate bars, peanuts and haribo, dinner is boil in the bag meals (spag bol tonight) with pemmicam (don’t ask!), more haribo and drinking chocolate. The diet is fine at the moment, but I feel after four weeks it could get a little repetitive!
Overall I’m beginning to feel more comfortable in my environment. I feel safe, I feel I have the right kit and I’m able to look around and appreciate the experience much more.
If you have any comments or questions then please e-mail them to me (I cannot see comments on the blog – although please do make them so other readers can see them and respond). The e-mail address is dannyboy@bullexpeditions.com (make sure my name is in the subject line).