The Last Degree / Years 2004, 2005 & 2008 (part 1/2)

24 pictures posted on the 14.05.2010

You spend all your time looking carefully for the best path through the hummocks.

You spend all your time looking carefully for the best path through the hummocks.

© Alain Hubert

  • The Antonov 74 is a Russian cargo plane designed based on the Antonov 72. It is sturdy enough to fly in all weather conditions and is equipped to assist the Arctic logistics teams.
  • Manpower is the rule out there.
  • It's nbot just tourists who fly to the Barneo base. Scientists also take the opportunity provided by this temporary drifting platform to conduct scientific experiments up there once every year.
  • Once we landed on the ice, all we had to do was unload the sledges from the aircraft (helicopter).
  • Because the sledges had been packed before leaving, we were able to start our trek immediately.
  • Just one final thing to do before departing : collect the fuel for the stoves. It's always the strongest in the group who gets trapped for this job.
  • Almost every year, the Russian Barneo base has to be moved a few meters away because of the many dangerous cracks that appear in the pack-ice at the site.
  • Would YOU be prepared to do all this ? If you would, then we'd like to hear from you...
  • You spend all your time looking carefully for the best path through the hummocks.
  • Fighting the ice all day long; even if we only spend five days out on the Arctic pack-ice.
  • The ice pressures are moving all the time, gradually forming these strange landscapes...
  • White and white again: nothing else but a white circle all around us.
  • If the ridges are not too high, you can keep your skis on to cross them.
  • And sometimes, you get stuck...
  • We would stop every 90 minutes, for a short break. Then we'd drink hot tea and usually eat something (energy bars or chocolate) to replace the energy lost.
  • We recommend good discipline in the group.
  • One of the moves you have to learn in these conditions is how to handle the sleds you are hauling behind you.
  • When then ice is thin, it can ofet be broken. But you soon get used to the familiar process of going round the small leads.
  • Pulling the sledge : everywhere and in all conditions...
  • A long walk that gives you the time to think about all sort of things...
  • At the end of the day, around 5pm, we would usually stops and prepare to set up the camp for the night.
  • A typical view of the camp site, we set up every night in the middle of nowhere. The pyramid-shaped tent is the mess tent.
  • Everything goes faster when you help each other. You also prepare yourself for doing it right when the weather is bad and windy.
  • Our tents after a small storm.