Life Trove: The Arctic

Showing posts with label The Arctic. Show all posts

10 August 2022

Some lovely photos of me in the Arctic taken by Richard

23 July 2022

Our Arctic adventure: An overview

Our team from left to right: Gavin (teacher), Graeme (photographer), Richard (filmmaker), Tanya (writer)

How our Arctic adventure came about

Ever since my dear friend, Sue Wight, visited the Arctic in 2007, and I saw her photos and listened to her animated stories about a wondrous world of ice and snow, I have fantasised about traveling to the far north to experience and photograph its wilderness and wildlife.

Imagine my ecstasy, then, when one of my closest friends, Gavin McCormack, phoned me to say there was an opportunity to go to the Arctic with him and a small team to put together a series of videos, filmed on location, that will form part of a unique series of lessons for Upschool that educates children all over the world for free about the wonders of the Arctic and the importance of taking care of the planet. As photographer, my role would be to take great photos for use in the the Upschool blog, media articles and lesson resources. It was a dream come true.

To make this project a reality, we've partnered with Aurora Expeditions, a wonderful, friendly and dynamic Australian company that specialises in small ship expeditions to the remotest parts of the planet. They too are passionate about sustainability and conserving the world's wild places, and have been nothing short of amazing in all the help and support they have given us to make it all possible.

Highlights of our expedition

We arrived back from the Arctic just a few days ago and it was even more mind blowing than I hoped for. Here are just a few of the highlights...

7 unforgettable encounters with polar bears, including a mum and its cub.
Getting within metres of walrus and puffin in our zodiac.
Sublimely beautiful icebergs, sculptured by nature, that were veritable works of art.
Waterfalls cascading from the ice cliffs of the world's 3rd largest polar cap.
Breaking our way through sea ice that extended as far as the eye could see as we travelled further north than our expedition ship had ever been.
Being blown away by the exceptional calibre of the experts on board and getting to interview them as part of our video lessons.
Discovering that my photographic hero, landscape extraordinaire Peter Eastway, was one of the expedition crew on the ship and getting to photograph thousands of kittiwake with him while lying on our backs under a bird cliff.
Aurora's amazing expedition ship: the ultimate combination of extreme functionality and maximum comfort.
Lazing in the jacuzzi on the ship's open deck, watching the Arctic scenery pass us by.
Taking a team plunge into the arctic ocean, just 1100 km from the north pole, with chunks of sea ice floating nearby.

A slideshow of our Arctic adventure

Enlarge the slideshow in the bottom right corner.

Posts related to our Arctic adventure

22 July 2022

Some Arctic photos to whet the appetite

Clowns of the sea that make you laugh with delight

Guillemots that fly in a perfect V

Vistas that make your soul expand

Close encounters with great white bears

Sea ice as far as the eye can see

A barren land of snow and ice

A history that is testament to the most heroic of journeys

Works of art sculptured by the ultimate artist

Massive cliffs of ice that make you feel small yet exalted

Arctic flowers celebrating the brief summer sun

The love of a mother on full display

Vast backdrops to life on centre stage

18 July 2022

Our Arctic trip is in the news

Our story featuring some of my photos appeared in the New York Post, The Australian and News.com.au today. Very cool.

New York Post

See the article

On News.com.au and The Australian

The Australian article

News.com.au article

16 July 2022

Arriving in Longyearbyen, gateway to the Arctic

Exploring the town at the top of the world

The capital of the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard, Longyearbyen is the world's northernmost town and the Norwegian gateway to the Arctic Circle. Being so far north, Longyearbyen has bragging rights for the world’s northernmost kindergarten, school, university, church, post office, museum, commercial airport and gourmet restaurant.

Longyearbyen is situated in the bottom of a valley with impressive mountains on all sides. Once a small mining settlement, Longyearbyen has evolved over the years into close-knit, self-sufficient community that is very much in tune with the richness of its past and the pristine nature of the environment.

As we soon discovered, in Svalbard, people remove their shoes when entering many restaurants, hotels and public buildings like museums, the hospital and the library and leave them near the entrance. This tradition goes back to the old days when people removed their shoes to avoid spreading coal dust everywhere. Many places have preserved this tradition and you can either borrow slippers or bring your own. In any case, it’s a great way to feel at home!

As the land of the polar bear where polar bears outnumber people, Longyearbyen residents are extremely aware of the presence of these powerful creatures. In fact, according to section 30a of the Svalbard Environmental Protection Act, you aren’t permitted to leave the settlement without at least a 0.308 Win calibre rifle to protect against polar bears.

While there is a small graveyard in Longyearbyen (which we came across on our explorations), no burials have happened here for over 80 years. This is down to the fact that the icy conditions and the permafrost prevent bodies from decomposing.

We stayed in Longyearbyen just one night but we managed to explore much of it and take in its unique atmosphere.

Some highlights of our time in Longyearbyen

The extraordinary views of Arctic mountains and glaciers from the plane as we flew over the south of Svalbard.
The stuffed polar bear at the airport: our first polar bear sighting!
The chill in the air as we left the airport - although it wasn't as cold as we expected. Actually lovely and refreshing after humid Singapore.
The hotel where we stayed - very warm and cosy with a lovely bar and restaurant, and yet another stuffed bear in the lobby.
Discovering to our delight that SAS airlines had definitely not cancelled their flight into Longyearbyen (on which many of the Aurora passengers were booked) as originally planned due to striking pilots and that our expedition would be leaving on schedule.
Walking into town to find food. We started off in the wrong direction, but this helped us get a great idea of the architecture of the town - multicoloured buildings all made of wood. There were inactive snowmobiles everywhere which is the primary transport in winter. The roads had no names: only numbers.
A cosy restaurant in town that did great pizza and other dishes - although not exactly cheap! Norway is certainly not a place for a cheap holiday.
Our first experience of the Arctic silence. In Longyearbyen, there is no underground, ring road or traffic noise. Bliss actually.
Our first experience of non-stop daylight. We left the restaurant at 11 pm and it was still bright outside. In fact, at this time of year, the sun never sets. Thankfully the hotel had thick blinds but this caused me to oversleep and miss breakfast!
A lovely exploratory walk with Gavin in the morning to the outskirts of town to an old graveyard on the slopes of a mountain. We climbed the slope for awesome views over the town.
A tour organised by Aurora that took us to Camp Barentz where we cuddled friendly sled-dogs and tucked into the world's most delicious wrap, and visited the Svalbard Museum where there were yet more stuffed animals and some fascinating information to add to our lessons.
Being dropped off at the port after our tour and embarking for the Greg Mortimer, our expedition ship, by zodiac. Needless to say, our excitement was palpable!

Leaving Oslo for Svalbard

Departing Oslo airport

Gavin and Richard united by the same vision: Empowering children to change the world

Flying to Longyearbyen

Gavin wearing his Norwegian beenie to get into the Arctic spirit

Our first wondrous sighting of the Arctic from our plane window

Rugged, wild and stunning

Arriving at Longyearbyen airport

After an epic journey, we are in the Arctic at last!

14,647 km from Sydney!

Our first walk around Longyearbyen (in search of food!)

Bicycles may be useful to get around in summer...

... but in winter, snow-mobiles are king of the road

Norwegians are understandably very proud of their Arctic pioneers and explorers

Our first drink in The Arctic

It was late at night but look at the light streaming in from outside!

Our first sightings of polar bear (all of them stuffed!)

In fact, there were polar bears wherever we looked!

Furry toys, ornaments, chocolates...

...and even a polar bear in the playground!

Gavin and I go for an exploratory ramble on the outskirts of town

We crossed a river draining from a glacier...

...to discover a little graveyard on the slopes of the mountain.

Like the intrepid hikers we are, we climbed the slope...

... for great views over Longyearbyen

Our first sighting of tiny Arctic flowers

Gavin's first video in the Arctic

Tour around Longyearbyen

Awesome scenery from the bus window on the tour organised by Aurora

Polar bear warnings!

More polar bears than people in Svalbard!

Warming ourselves in the cosy hut at Camp Barentz to hear stories about Longyearbyen's past

A great museum where we found fascinating information for our lessons and yet more stuffed critters to whet our appetite for the live sightings to come

Beautiful sled dogs

The dogs were very friendly and allowed us to pet them.

Embarking for the Greg Mortimer by zodiac

Needless to say there was great excitement all round!

All excited about embarking

We got to the ship by zodiac - our first zodiac experience of many

And thus began our Arctic adventure!

Our Arctic adventure: A list of posts

15 July 2022

Introducing the star of our Arctic expedition: The Greg Mortimer

The ultimate polar expedition ship

The Greg Mortimer is Aurora's amazing polar expedition ship that took us on our Arctic adventure. The ship was launched in 2019 so it is still very new. It was designed and custom built for polar expeditions and icy conditions. It is a beautiful looking ship and apart from being highly functional, it also provides a high level of comfort and luxury. To say we were spoiled is an understatement!

Who is The Greg Mortimer named after?

The ship is named after Greg Mortimer – a famous Australian mountaineer (he was the first Australian to climb Mount Everest) and explorer who, along with his wife Margaret Werner, was the founder of Aurora Expeditions. They no longer own the company but Greg is still a trusted advisor.

A specially designed bow that cuts through waves and ice

The Greg Mortimer is the first expedition cruise ship designed with the Ulstein X-BOW. This streamlined bow cuts through the swell rather than being lifted by the waves so you feel fewer vibrations and disturbances. Thanks to this, I never felt sea-sick once on the ship and I can be very susceptible to it.

The streamlined bow also allows the ship to cross oceans more efficiently with lower fuel consumption and lower air emissions and means the ship is amazing at breaking through sea-ice as I will show in a video in a future post.

The bow also allows for virtual anchoring which means the ship can float anchor-less while launching the zodiacs without disturbing delicate sea floor areas.

Observation decks, platforms and lounge

The outdoor top deck allows for 360 degree views. It brings you wonderfully close to the environment for stunning views of Arctic scenery passing by and sea birds flying past.

The ship also has an indoor observation lounge with unobstructed panoramic views and bottomless coffee. This was one of my favourite places on the ship to chill and where I edited most of my photos.

The ship also features unique hydraulic viewing platforms which fold out for unobstructed views of passing marine life and seabirds. Gavin did one of this lessons on this viewing platform as you can see in the photo below.

The spacious observation deck in the front of the ship

The observation deck wraps around the side of the ship to the back where there is another large deck, thus offering 360 degree views.

Observation lounge where I hung out a lot

Gavin doing a lesson on the hydraulic viewing platform.

Lecture lounge

The ship features a modern lecture lounge. We met here every evening for a recap of the day and an introduction to plans for the next day. There were also some fascinating lectures by the ship's experts on topics like polar bears, glaciers, Svalbard's history, glaciers, marine biology and photography.

Elephant bar

Every night at 6 pm there were cocktails and canopies served in The Elephant Bar next to the lecture theatre. After a rather boozy Singapore, I drank very little but it was a very social place to come and meet other passengers.

The boys at The Elephant Bar

Cabins

The ship accommodates up to 132 guests in 76 cosy, comfortable cabins with en-suite facilities. On our trip, there were only 80 passengers and 100 crew! All cabins have a view of the ocean and 85% of cabins have their own balcony, as ours did.

A view from our balcony

Zodiac launching platforms and mud-room

The ship carries 15 zodiacs, which we were able to board via four dedicated, sea-level launching platforms. These platforms made boarding the zodiacs quick and efficient. When the zodiacs are launched, the ship's hydraulic system allows the ship to lean to one side, thus making the zodiac platforms more accessible. Very ingenious how it works.

The zodiac platforms enter into the ship's "mud-room". This is where our life jackets and boots were kept. For expedition landings onto the shore, there were also special buckets for us to clean our boots so that we didn't spread germs from one environment to another.

Zodiac platforms along the side of the ship.

The mudroom where we put on our boots and life jackets before getting on the zodiac

Ship library

A library stocked with a wide range of fascinating books on the geography, biology and history of all Aurora's remote destinations.

Restaurant

Ah, my favourite place on the entire ship! We ate like kings. Breakfast and lunch were buffets with a wonderful spread of options including lots and lots of dessert! Dinner was ala carte with a starter, main course and dessert and "always available" sides like chips and grilled vegetables. Dinner also included alcohol if we wanted it.

One of the highlights of the restaurant were the staff. They were so friendly and always happy to provide an extra dish (dessert!!) if we wanted it.

Dining room

Serving station for breakfast and lunch buffets

"So Graeme, what are you going to have for dinner?"

Gym

This was our least used part of the ship. Richard did one work-out and the rest of us zero!

Jacuzzis

Now this is a part of the ship we did frequent on an extremely regular basis! There were two jacuzzis, one on each side of the ship. What a setting and so lovely to luxuriate in lovely hot water, protected from the Arctic chill. Of course, it was decidedly chilly to get out which just encouraged us to stay in for longer until our fingers were prunes. The jacuzzi was the perfect place for watching the scenery go by and a lovely place for deep conversations and telling of stories.

What a setting !!

Wellness centre including a sauna

The Wellness Centre provided massage and other treatments but we didn't make use of this.

The sauna, part of the Wellness Centre, was another of our favourite places to heat up after chilly zodiac cruises, often before having a jacuzzi. Even the sauna had a great view of the passing scenery through a big window.