The team phoned in to report that they were happy to be relaxing in their tents all day long. Reading, sleeping, eating, and chilling out were the order of the day. This was especially easy since the weather was very overcast with flat light and moderate wind in the morning. A perfect day for sleeping in!
The team had drifted south 2 nautical miles overnight, putting their position at N89.58. Their plan remains to be picked up tomorrow by helicopter and flown back to the Borneo basecamp and then onwards to Longyearbyen. Hopefully the weather will cooperate!
There were a couple of questions that came in the last few days that the team wanted to answer:
Q: How do you navigate? Is it all by GPS?
A: Yes, we navigate mostly by GPS. At least we get our bearings that way. Oftentimes once we verify which way is north we will turn off the GPS and navigate by sun or wind. This is very easy to do. You just keep the sun at a certain angle to your direction of travel (such as at two o'clock) and use it as your guide. The sun travels across the sky at a certain speed and if you have a watch you can easily travel north just using the sun all day long (of course this doesn't work so well on overcast days). The wind is a little less predictable because it can shift, but in general if you know the wind hits your left cheek as you ski north you have a very good indicator of direction. When we got close to the pole we relied on GPS 100%. Even with the GPS it wasn't easy to find the North Pole! We can only imagine how difficult it was for the early explorers who used sextants and nautical almanacs to plot their positions. That would be very cold on the fingers!
Q: What happens if you get to the Pole and it is in the middle of water?
A: We are so glad that didn't happen! But if it did we would just have to hope that the ice would drift enough so that in a given amount of time 90 degrees North would again be covered by ice so we could at least stand at the very top of the world and celebrate.
Q: What is your main source of food and drink?
A: We are eating very well. Lots of fatty foods like cheese, butter, and for those of us that eat meat, sausage and bacon. Mmmmm... For dinner we usually start off with soups to rehydrate, then we have bagels fried in butter with cheese, or tortillas fried in butter with cheese, followed by our main course which is a dehydrated dish, but a very good one! Then on most nights we have a special dessert brought by one of the team members. Our lunches are generally energy bars or candy bars packed with nuts and chocolate as well as some other high-energy snacks. Everything we drink comes from collecting snow from around the campsite and melting it over our camp stoves. We are carrying an assortment of hot drinks (coco, tea, chai, coffee, etc.) as well as some cold drink powders like lemonade and electrolyte replacement mixes. Overall, the food is very good. But that could be the hunger talking!
We didn't receive an audio report yet, but if one comes in we will be sure to post it. Check back again tomorrow for another update from the team!
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| Chilling in the tents. Thinking of ways to pass the time. |
The team had drifted south 2 nautical miles overnight, putting their position at N89.58. Their plan remains to be picked up tomorrow by helicopter and flown back to the Borneo basecamp and then onwards to Longyearbyen. Hopefully the weather will cooperate!
There were a couple of questions that came in the last few days that the team wanted to answer:
Q: How do you navigate? Is it all by GPS?
A: Yes, we navigate mostly by GPS. At least we get our bearings that way. Oftentimes once we verify which way is north we will turn off the GPS and navigate by sun or wind. This is very easy to do. You just keep the sun at a certain angle to your direction of travel (such as at two o'clock) and use it as your guide. The sun travels across the sky at a certain speed and if you have a watch you can easily travel north just using the sun all day long (of course this doesn't work so well on overcast days). The wind is a little less predictable because it can shift, but in general if you know the wind hits your left cheek as you ski north you have a very good indicator of direction. When we got close to the pole we relied on GPS 100%. Even with the GPS it wasn't easy to find the North Pole! We can only imagine how difficult it was for the early explorers who used sextants and nautical almanacs to plot their positions. That would be very cold on the fingers!
Q: What happens if you get to the Pole and it is in the middle of water?
A: We are so glad that didn't happen! But if it did we would just have to hope that the ice would drift enough so that in a given amount of time 90 degrees North would again be covered by ice so we could at least stand at the very top of the world and celebrate.
Q: What is your main source of food and drink?
A: We are eating very well. Lots of fatty foods like cheese, butter, and for those of us that eat meat, sausage and bacon. Mmmmm... For dinner we usually start off with soups to rehydrate, then we have bagels fried in butter with cheese, or tortillas fried in butter with cheese, followed by our main course which is a dehydrated dish, but a very good one! Then on most nights we have a special dessert brought by one of the team members. Our lunches are generally energy bars or candy bars packed with nuts and chocolate as well as some other high-energy snacks. Everything we drink comes from collecting snow from around the campsite and melting it over our camp stoves. We are carrying an assortment of hot drinks (coco, tea, chai, coffee, etc.) as well as some cold drink powders like lemonade and electrolyte replacement mixes. Overall, the food is very good. But that could be the hunger talking!
We didn't receive an audio report yet, but if one comes in we will be sure to post it. Check back again tomorrow for another update from the team!
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