Christmas and new year in the arctic

The Christmas vacation is coming to an end and a new semester at UNIS is about to start (8th of January with safety courses). Unlike most of the students, I did not return home, but spent my christmas vacation here on Svalbard. Here is a brief summary of my Christmas.

DogsThe main occupation during my vacation has been with the two, and later three dogs that I've been taking care of. Pernille and Tritina stayed over christmas, while Worsley arrived the 1st of January. They are all staying up at the dog yard on top of one of the moraines of Longyearbreen (<1km SW of Nybyen) and feed once a day.

The dog yard and snow scooter lights on Longyearbreen (Access to the glacier on the right side) (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

In return I have got to use the dogs for skiing around which has been a new and fun experience. As fun as it is however; sometimes it can be a nightmare i.e. when they refuse to start or stop. My hope was to use the vacation for some serious trips, but sadly there has generally been little snow and busy day. We went to Bjørndalen on a few occasions however, both with and without sledge.

Pernille and Tritina ready for the trip to Bjørndalen (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

Pernille ( Photo: Alexander Hovland)

In general there has been few and only minor problems, although a bit traumatic for Tritina when the  wind knocked over the dog house with her in it.

 

Pernille and Tritina are the dogs of Knut Ola. Worsley (after Frank Arthur Worlsey) belongs to Bård and arrived the 1st of January on the plane. Worsley has sadly been very nervous and had almost gnawed his way out of the dog yard; for now he is standing on a chain. Much calmer today however.

Worsley looking a bit sad/nervous as always(?) (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

A dog family (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

Christmas

Prior to Christmas Eve I spent some time at Bjørndalen, preparing the cabin for Christmas and doing some maintenance. I also went out with the dogs and spent a night there, returning with the sledge full of trash. Weather in general was harsh, and upon returning towards Longyearbyen the dogs absolutely refused to run against the wind, but were instead hiding behind my legs. 

Chained up at Smutthullet (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

Christmas eve came, and it ended up being me, Cara (American), Niklas (Swedish), Daria (Russian), Angelina (Ukrainian) and Dave (The-Indian-Guy from India). A Christmas-tree was brought (300NOK for Danish fir at Svalbardbutikken)  and decorated like a proper Christmas tree. Presents from back home was placed under the Christmas tree and the Pinnekjøtt turned out perfect! Even the weather cleared up during the evening and we had Christmas in the polar night with shooting stars and northern light.

2kg of pinnekjøtt ready for transport (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

The indian guy (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

Daria and Angelina (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

Between Christmas and New Year's Eve I mostly spent time racing around with the dogs, shooting and doing... Well, I did something.

New Year's Eve

A friend of mine, Mariann, arrived on the 30th of December to stay with me over New Year's Eve. I introduced her to rifle-shooting which...well. I don't think she liked it; then again cal. 30-06 is a scary caliber. She also got to try skiing with the dogs and did it impressively well.

New year's eve we went to Huset, which is a popular and the only club here on Svalbard. At 00:00 we had champagne and there were probably more rockets in the air then there are people here on Svalbard. Mariann returned home the 1st of January.

Polarnight

It has been almost two weeks since my last blogpost. My first excuse for this is that I've been just to busy, which might sound a bit strange since my second excuse is that not much have happened up here lately.

Well... Maybe some things happened. The sun went down below the horizon for the last time this year on the 26th of October. This marks a period from between 26th of october until 8th of march where the sun will not rise above the horizon.

For now it is still bright a couple of hours during the day as we experience what is called polar twillight where it is still daylight due to sunlight being reflected back in the upper athmosphere. Gradually it will get darker however, and between the 11th of November until the 8th of March there will only be a faint glow during the day during what is called civil polar night. Nautical polar and the even darker astronomical polar night is not experienced here.

The darkness opens up for some beautiful pictures of northerns light which have been quite frequent up here lately. For the most part however they occur during night when people like me are sleeping. The more eager people at our barrack however have set up the facebook-group "The Barrack 11 Northern Lights Observatory". There's also a northern light forecast available from Kjell Henriksens Observatory for those who are interested.

Chloé made us all a proper meal with Italian lasagna and tiramitsu for dessert as her sister Léa was visiting. Of course we also went out last friday. Sufficient to say; I was a bit reduced last saturday. Sunday we went up to the ice-cave in the moraine in front of Longyearbreen. However, we decided to drop it as we heard quite a lot of meltwater flowing due to the high temperatures lately. Instead I guided a group up to Platåfjellet. As we came up, they went down and I walked around for a couple of hours and tracked a polar fox for a while.

Last week was spent for the most time doing some inefficient work on my term project for AG210 which now is almost finished.

In other news:
- First proper drug-raid on Svalbard. First 9 local people were caught with narcotics and now the total number is 11. They now risk being sent away from Svalbard.
- Two youths were caught driving under the influence of alcohol on snowscooters
- Another fox with rabies was caught.
- China was accused of hacking the Svalsat radars.

Short note on my knee

Went to the doctor today and he agreed that it was probably some kind of infection in my knee. Hopefully it should go over by itself, but he prescribed me Brexidol and Orudis which both helps to mute the pain and heal the infection.

Girly girl on visit from mainland Norway

Disclaimer: This post involves a girl.

So, yeah. Where to start? This weekend I had a visit from a special friend of mine. Kristine and I meet in 2008 when we were both studying psychology at the University of Bergen (UiB). We didn't really hang around, but we would always read together and share candy. And yeah. Drink together (Because that is what proper psychcology students do). Anyway. After a year of psychology she moved to Oslo to become a teacher and I stayed back in Bergen. Since then we have not seen eachother.

It was really weird seing her again as I picked her up at Longyearbyen Airport (LYR) in the early afternoon on friday. Althought her hair was not as blonde as before she looked pretty much like the girl I remember from earlier. AND She had brought me fruit, vegetables, and writing pads from the mainland (Which are incredibly expensive here). JOY!

So. After I got her settled into my room we went for a trip up to Sarkofagen. Weather was good with temperatures just below freezing and fresh snow. The trip went fine, althought I had some problems with slowing down (as always) - I really did try thought! As always, I did not spot any grouses, but we did see quite a lot of reindeers over at Platåfjellet. At the top of Sarkofagen, we took some pictures and just enjoyed the view.

View from Sarkofagen (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

Kristine in the arctic (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

Me and Kristine (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

On our way back, we meet Knut Ola which lives in the kitchen next to me. Kristine immideatly recognized him since he also went in our psychology class. Small world and me having a bad memory since I did not remember him.

Later that evening we went to Kroa and had a pizza and a couple of beers. I think we stayed there for some hours just talking and catching up on everything. As always I displayed my lack of drinkning skills and got a bit buzzed. Plan was to to go to Friday night gathering, but since it got quite late before we left Kroa we went directly back to our barracks.

Party, party! As always there was a party going on in our kitchen. I can't really remember if anything happenend between us arriving and us playing "flip-cup" (a drinking game) and that might be indicative of how the party went. So. We got drunk and went to Huset in the blistering cold of the arctic and woke up quite late on saturday. Yes, there is something missing in between there!

After getting out of bed we went down to Longyearbyen to do some shopping. Kristine bought a heapload of alcohol, chocolate and cigaretes. On our way back to the barracks we visitied Svalbard Galleri which is located along the road in the lower parts of Nybyen. They have got a lot of nice pictures and artwork from Svalbard and the arctic. Their collection also include a really interesting series of old maps which sort of reflect the early exploration of the artic areas.

My original plan for saturday was to bring Kristine to Nordenskiöldtoppen, but weather was not the best with some snow coming in and poor visibility. Instead we went with a couple of others to explore Nye Gruve II (The new mine # II). Locally it is known as the mine of Santa Claus. The mining started in 1937 and ran until second world war when it was hit by a grenade from the german battleship Scharnhorst and the coal started to burn. Althought the fire did not go out until 1962, mining continued after the second world war until it was closed down in 1968. In 1954 a coal dust explosion killed 6 miners. Today the mine is open, but the old mine shafts are sealed.

On our way after bombing Alice with snowballs (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

Nye Gruve 2 / Gruve 2B / Julenissegruva (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

Kristine "loves" the snow (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

Insert cool caption here :P (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

A wall of ice is building up within the mine (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

Me and Mike posing as miners (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

Cans of "fire extinguisher foam"(?) (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

Some kind of working room within the mine (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

 

So we explored the mine. And yes. It would be a great place for a horror movie. Althought most of the equipment is gone, there are still a lot of neat stuff laying around. It also started to snow quite heavily and it was really cozy just sitting inside and looking out at the valley.

Cozy in the mine (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

On our way to the top with a view down the valley (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

After a couple of hours me and Kristine went back home to make dinner. We had taco (WITH VEGETABLES!) and watched Mr. Poppers Penguins which WE thought was great (So HAH! Kristian!).

Next morning we just stayed up here in the barracks, watching some movies and just talking, before Kristine had to leave. :( Sadly, the taxi driver turned up earlier then planned, so yeah. It was a quick goodbye before she left. Back. To the mainland...

Another week at Svalbard

It's been a little more then a week since I came home from the AG-211 expedition. However fieldwork at UNIS does not end before one have had pizza and beer at Kroa. Countless beers and tequila shots later I was, according to everyone else, almost crawling back home. On Facebook i posted the following:

Alexander Hovland
So drunk... still... who's fuckin' idea was it to send two drunkere idiots (Gauti and Kristian) to watch me?
Liker · · 16. september kl. 02:17 i nærheten av Nybyen

And yeah. Some pictures:

I have no idea. (Photo stolen from Gauti)

Tickle-fight in the hallway (Photo stolen from Gauti)

This was not the only fun we had that weekend. Saturday evening we made a hottub outside our barrack using pallets and a canvas. And since we (us students) don't pay for electricity we tapped hot water directly from the tap for 5 hours. However, after a couple of hours the construction failed. We all feared that this would be the end of the hottub and there were a german film crew tapping us as we tried to push it back together. Despite our fears the hottub held and we had a great evening (and night for some?) outside and the temperature was really nice.

Good times in the hottub (Photo from my camera)

 

One of the big headlines this week has been the outbreak of rabies around Longyearbyen. During our cruise a woman was bit by a polar fox (Vulpes lagopus) down by the sea. This fox was shortly after killed by a dog and was then tested positive for rabies. Shortly after Sysselmannen disposed of two reindeers who also tested positive for rabies. For now people who have been in contact with reindeers are being vaccinated, but I do believe that if more dead animals turn up, then we'll all be vaccinated sooner or later. More information can be found at Sysselmannen.no and at the norwegian institute of public health.

For now the only consequence for me is that I will probably loose my friend from underneath the barrack as Sysselmannen will kill most of the foxes living within a designated zone around Longyearbyen and Nybyen.

In other news. During the week I've bought my first snowscooter. A powerfull Yamaha RS Venture VT that will be mine for this winter. Can't wait to try it out. But first. paperwork has to be fixed...

My first snowscooter! (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

 So. Besides a couple of trips to Sarkofagen I've only been on one longer trip this week. Francesca is working on a moraine in front of Dryadebreen and asked me to assist her on a trip. At around 7 in the morning, me, Francesca and Chloé walked from Nybyen. From the map we decided to go up to Longyearbreen and follow up along the side of the glacier to the valleyopening into Fardalen between Lars Hiertafjellet and Teltberget. The terrain however consist mainly of lose boulders and is ardous to walk in, especially if you're not used to it. Because of this we never got to Fardalen. As we looked down at Fardalen the girls gave up. After a short lunchbreak in the snow we returned walking across Sarkofagen and down along Larsbreen.

Down towards Longyearbyen (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

Teltberget (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

Fardalen with the moraine in front of Dryadebreen in the middle (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

Lunchbreak in the snow (Photo: Alexander Hovland)

Hoping to walk up Adventdalen next week. On friday however, Kristine is coming from the mainland just to visit me (:

Welcome to my english blog

Upon request I will now start to blog in english. Old post will not be translated, but you can use http://translate.google.com/ if you really want to read them.

Cheers! (:

Innvandrerleir Stølsheimen

Var med som turleder for en gjeng på 13 i tillegg til meg og Arnstein fire dager med utgangspunkt i Selhamarhytta i østre Stølsheimen. Gjengen besto av mennesker av ulike nasjonaliter; Etiopia, Eritrea, Syria +++  og erfaringen med norske fjell var varierende. At dette var det første møte med norske fjell for et flertall av deltakerne var tydelig når enkelte stilte opp i støvletter, fotballsko og med koffert.

Mandag: 

Det er skikkelig gråvær med tett regn når vi kjører oppover mot Vikafjell i fra Voss. Vannet skylder på enkelte steder over veien og tåken henger tett. Klokken 12.00 har vi ett minutt stillhet for å minnes 22/7. Når vi ankommer Vikafjell er det lettere, men fortsatt regn. Taxien (Med den hyggeligste taxisjåføren jeg har møtt) slipper oss av litt ovenfor Selhamarvatnet. Det blir utlån av sko og klær til de som ikke er godt nok kledd. Vi bærer så tingene ned til Selhamarvatnet og finner frem den sammenleggbare kanoen som vi skal bruke til å frakte ting frem til hytten. Relativt kjapt innser vi at den er mer komplisert enn vi hadde planlagt og vi tjuvlåner en kano som da ligger der. Jeg og 2 andre tar da ansvar for å frakte utstyr frem til hytten mens resten av deltakerne går innover. 

Kanoen ble fort mer komplisert enn vi haddde tenkt. (Foto: Felleskamera)

Rundt 1-2 timer senere er det en våt gjeng som er ankommet Selhamar. På hytten er det hyttevaktens sønn som sørger for å innkvartere oss på loftet på hovedhytten og vi har et fantastisk middagsmåltid. Til tross for dårlig vær og "dårlige" klær var det ingen som protesterte i mot en ny kveldstur for å finne telefondekning. I mens padler jeg, en annen og hyttevaktens sønn tilbake til den sammenleggbare kanoen som ligger igjen og bærer den over fjellet tilbake til hytten. Kvelden ble avsluttet med mer mat, kortspill og historier.

Tirsdag:
Det ble en lang natt... Folk snorker og enkelte snorker mer enn andre. Neste natt skal tilbringes i lavvo utenfor. Ellers var været finere denne dagen og det var stort sett opplett med overskyet.

Turmålet for denne dagen er Raudberg (1143moh) og alle er med oppover. Raudberg er det kanskje mest kjente fjellet i øst-stølsheimen og står ut fra den omkringliggende berggrunnen(fyllitt og glimmerskifer) med sin rød-brune farge. Fjellet består av serpentin og fargen får det fra jern og kobber som ruster. Serpentin dannes ved nedbrytning av olivin ved temperaturer under 500°C og en finner også en del serpetin i området. På sør siden, går veien inn mot det som tidligere var et lite brudd for å ta ut rent talkum. På veien besøkte vi også grytebergjet hvor man tidligere tok ut gryter i fra en liten forekomst med kleberstein. Uferdige emner står fortsatt igjen og dette er en forholdsvis kjent "attraksjon" på veien mot Selhamar.

Serpentin med lokal flora(Foto: Felleskamera)

En utfordring som gjaldt hele turen var de stadige fellesbildene. Dette resulterte i at vi på vei opp mot toppen av Raudberget ble delt i to og tåken kom sigende fort. Konsekvensen var at jeg en liten stund måtte bli streng og holde gruppen litt mer i bånd enn ellers. På vei mot toppen hørte vi rop bak oss og jeg ble selvsagt litt stresset i den troen at vi kanskje hadde mistet noen i tåken. Jeg måtte derfor "parkere" min gruppe og ned og lete. Da tåken lettet viste det seg at gruppen som hadde gått fremst, hadde gått ned igjen, sannsynligvis noen meter i fra hverandre, uten at vi hadde sett hverandre. Dette var et godt eksempel på hvor skummel tåken er. 

Tåke og en smått bekymret turleder (Foto: Felleskamera)

Kvelden ble brukt i og rundt hytten med kortspill, fisking og andre aktiviteter.  Når det gjelder fiskingen var det for mange, første gang de hadde fått fiske med stang. Grunnteknikken gikk stort sett greit, men jeg var i perioder litt nervøs for slukene som gikk litt i alle retninger og på kryss og tvers. Heldigvis kom jeg og andre i fra dette uten en skramme - også fisken, for den bet ikke. 

I løpet av kvelden fikk vi i stand kanoen og lavvoen etter litt om og men. Jeg hadde da noen turer rundt selhamarvannet og de som ville fikk prøve å være i båt/kano. Også her for første gang og balansen var nok ikke helt på topp der de tvilholdt seg i rekken. Inn og ut av kanoen var også en utfordring der flere forsøkte å "hoppe" inn og ut av kanoen. Alle kom seg likevel tørskodde i land.

Det ble etterhvert ganske fullt på hytten og det var til slutt 54 stykk som overnattet i tillegg til en del dagsbesøk. Mye småbarnsfamilier, men sosialt klaffet dette kjempegodt og det virket som om alle trivdes. 

Onsdag:
Vi var tre stykk som flyktet fra snorkingen og inn i lavvoen, dette hjalp likevel når en av oss viste seg å være en aktiv snorker Jeg la umiddelbart planer for å returnere han til hovedhytten.

Søvnmangel til tross. Været var fantastisk med blå himmel og sydenvarmt (etter min mening!). Turplanen for i dag var rundt Raudbergvannet og Vassøyane. Tidligere var dette to seperate vann, men etter reguleringen med demning i sør-enden av Vassøyane er dette blitt til kun ett stort vann. Flere vandrere med gamle kart har nok her fått seg en overaskelse når de ikke lengre har kunnet krysse rett over. Resultatet er to timers ekstra gange til Selhamar eller videre østover.

Fra Selhamar gikk vi nordover mot Raudberget før vi tok av i fra stien tilbake mot Bjergane, i retning mot Åsedalen og Rappen. Her hadde vi et kort introduksjonskurs i bruk av kart og kompass og enkel navigering (krysspeiling og marsjretning). I uren, på nordsiden av Raudberget, gikk jeg og en av deltakerne tilbake mot hytten hvor en liten gjeng hadde blitt igjen pga. diverse småskader (Slitasje+++), resten gikk turen rundt. På hytten ble det da mer fisking, kortspill, kanopadling og andre aktiviteter.

Ikke alltid lett å være "hvit" (Foto: Felleskamera)

Ut på ettermiddagen kommer en av deltakerne løpende og fortalte at det var en som hadde fått litt problemer med rygg og knær. Det ble derfor en kanotur på meg ned mot demningen ved Vassøyane for å plukke opp denne personen. Fordi alle sto og vinket og skulle hilse vart det litt problemer med å finne ut nøyaktig hvor denne personen var, men til slutt kom vi oss nå tilbake til Selhamar.

Et av mine "store" øyeblikk på denne turen er forøvrig når jeg i jakten på en av deltakerne preserer å komme med setningen: "Oh,not you, you're just another black guy" hvorav jeg med min solbrente nakke blir omdøpt til "Redneck". Til mitt forsvar er folk med svart hud veldig like når man bruker solbriller!  

Middag, mer fisking, badminton osv. Fortsatt ingen fisk. Ikke for oss og ikke hos andre som bodde på hyttene.  

Ingen fisk, iherdige forsøk til tross (Foto: Felleskamera)

 Litt dramatikk blir det også på kvelden når en av deltakerne, alene, velter i kanoen midt ut på Selhamarvatnet og da selvfølgelig uten redningsvest. Hyttevakten svømte da ut og fikk hentet både kanoen og personen, men ene setet får status som savnet. Personen er selvsagt våt og får litt kjeft for mangel på redningsvest. Resten av kvelden foreløper uten dramatikk.

Liten redningsaksjon på Selhamarvatnet (Foto: Felleskamera)

Torsdag:
Denne natten foreløper uten snorking og jeg sover godt - bedre enn på... vel, de siste dagene. På morningen henger tåken tykt når vi tar en kort tur mot Tindafjell (1251 Moh.,SØ for Selhamar). Litt skuffet konstaterer jeg også at det kun ligger en sms på vent når jeg skrur på mobilen. 

Mer imponerende er det derimot når den ene deltakeren bestemmer seg for en kjapp løpetur opp på neste topp, Horgi (1028moh). Mens vi står og ser på, løper han ned 500m til dalbunnen og så opp igjen 200m på andre siden uten å slakke av en eneste gang. Om denne fyren begynner med motbakkeløp er det ikke usannsynlig at han starter "Mount Everest Opp" om noen år...

Et ikke komplett fellesbilde (Foto: Felleskamera)

Når vi kom hjem var det rydding og vasking før turen går tilbake mot Kvilesteinsvatnet. Jeg bruker kanoen og har flere turer frem og tilbake med bagasje og deltakere som ikke er i form for turen tilbake. Derifra gikk turen tilbake til Bergen med samme blide taxisjåføren som sist.

Nesten komplett fellesbilde + sønnen til hyttevakten (Foto: Felleskamera)

I etterkant virker det som om alle har hatt det gøy og at alle nå ivrer etter å komme seg på tur igjen. De fleste ser ut til å skulle delta på byfjellstrimmen eller andre fjellrelaterte aktiviteter.

En annen sak er at mangelen på solkrem har resultetert i et lite hamskifte; både på ryggen og på nesen har huden flasset av.

Da Norge mistet sin uskyld

I går, fredag 22.07.2011, var dagen da illusjonen om Norge som verdens tryggeste sted var slutt. Litt før vi skulle stenge her i butikken kunne vi lese at det hadde vært en eksplosjon i Oslo og det tok litt tid før vi skjønte hvor alvorlig det egentlig var. Vår første antagelse var at det hadde skjedd en eller annen type gass-eksplosjon; selv om det også er dramatisk nok.

Etterhvert begynte selvfølgelig bildene å komme og man skjønte da fort at det måtte være noe større og i vertfall utenlandske medier begynte fort å spekulere i hvem som sto bak. Likevel. Da meldingen om skytingen på Utøya kom, da ble det bare uvirkelig.

I dag er det vel kun de færreste som egentlig har skjønt hvor stor denne tragedien er. Det var en rar følelse å reise inn til Bergen i dag for å åpne butikken. Folk gikk å hørte på radioen og fra bybanen så jeg flere som sto å gråt.

I butikken er det rolig  - stort sett bare turister som er innom og selv de er det få av.