Great Progress

The heaving sea ice on the way into the North Pole river. Photo: Garry Tutte/Arctic Return

Made great progress. In all, we travelled 28 kilometres. We started out from our camp just shy of the North Pole River, to then head toward the river’s mouth. There, we encountered two or three hundred yards of really bad ‘rubble ice’ which meant we were forced to drag our sleds over the hard-frozen scrabble one at a time. Once we’d overcome that, we did manage to find smoother ice again and move on until we set up camp just off the bare ice on the East side of the North Pole River.  A full day!

Highlight: We visited an important historical site today — what remains of Rae’s stone house (1846). Unfortunately it was covered in a snowdrift with only a few rocks showing above the snow surface. A few locals from Naujaat, who originally had come out to the house the day before, with the good intention to meet us there (see Saturday’s post) were kind enough to mark the exact spot where the house is situated, with a ski-pole. Only the very tip of Rae’s house protruded above the snowdrift and it would have been very difficult to find in the vast white landscape had they not provided this assistance. Thank you!  

Team Update: Unfortunately, due to a nagging foot injury that made it inadvisable for him to continue the rest of the way it was decided that team member, Garry Tutte, would unfortunately leave the expedition and head back to Naujaat,  then back home to Ontario. We are sorry to see him go. On the brighter side, the day really felt like we were travelling in the footsteps of Rae. 

The weather continues to hold. Heading North. Now we are three.