Børge Ousland

It has been a demanding day. Conditions are difficult, with thin ice, lots of screw ice and small leads slowing our pace. But we have also been lucky. Thanks to the cold temperatures, we were able to cross a lead that had been two kilometres wide, because the sea ice had just frozen thick enough to support us. We did swim once today, even though it wasn’t temping in this miserable weather. There is a harsh westerly wind, 10–12 metres per second. The snowdrifts that form must be a couple of metres thick. It’s cold, too, with temperatures at –20° last night.

We put 10 km behind us today, but unfortunately we’re going to lose some of that due to the southward drift.

The wind is turning into a northwesterly, the worst thinkable direction. Everything seems to be the opposite of what it should be, what it usually is. And usually there is minimal wind, it’s colder, and the Arctic ice floes are drifting northeast. We don’t understand what is going on, really, and it’s very strange that conditions are like this. The southerly drift is particularly frustrating, because it cancels out much of our progress and costs us valuable time. We’re managing to walk the distance we should, our form is good and our equipment works well. We strive on, determined not to give up.

Our position this evening is N81°50’6.3”, E103°53’6.2”.

Here are the ice conditions that challenge Børge and Mike. Fortunately, these three ice floes were pressed close enough to ski across.

A “bear trap” is rigged outside the opening of our tent – with a signal gun, ski pole and tripwire. It helps us sleep more soundly at night.

This entry was posted on January 31st, 2006 at 8:02 PM and is filed under North Pole 2006. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.