Spitsbergen
Spitsbergen. What, why, and how.
Spitsbergen. Voyage. Longyear
Spitsbergen. Ymerbukta
Spitsbergen. Esmarkbreen
Spitsbergen. Nansenbreen. Borebreen
Spitsbergen’s weather god definitely enjoyed its play with us.
The weather in the morning of April 24 (morning is the time when we waked up independent of the time on the clock) was not perfect: -5C, light snow, and the visibility definitely can be better.
Last snatches of sunshine were visible on the other side of the fjord, in Adventdalen.
Around as we saw only unpleasant grey substance.
Time spent with breakfast didn’t help to improve visibility. So we went up along Borebreen by feeling and looking for the turn to Kjepasset.
After a couple of hours, we got a complete whiteout. Around us was pure empty white space without upper and down parts, without terrain, without any orienting points. Absolute white emptiness likes one in movies where a hero suddenly appeared in a non-finished virtual space. White nothingness and we were in the middle of this nothingness.
It is absolutely impossible to move at such conditions, so we set the tent and fell asleep.
In the morning of April 25, the visibility improved a little bit. Some orienting points became visible. Not all, not pretty clear, but at least something.
We went to the pass. The snow was very deep, the visibility was bad, the pass was endless. Actually, via this pass, we wanted to move to Wahlenbergbreen glacier and go up along it.
The ascent took 4 hours and we made 4 km. Fabulous speed.
Finally, we were on the top, looking on a vertical cliff under our feet. Later we found that it is a feature of many passes here: nice smooth glacier on one side and vertical drop on the other side. With a corniche, of course. This one also had a nice huge corniche.
As it was not enough the glacier below the cliff was thoroughly covered with huge crevasses.
We definitely didn’t want to go on this glacier. However, we couldn’t understand was it our aim so bad or this whiteout brought us to the wrong place. There was a chance that we took too to the right. So we decided to go back a little bit to the point where we can see the orienting points. As soon as we were back to this point, the total whiteout visited us again. We couldn’t see anything, and as a result, we couldn’t do anything, because any moment some crevasse or cliff can suddenly appear under our feet. Only we can do is set a tent, so we did.
After a couple of hours, I looked outside. The world didn’t exist.
There was only cold and wet nothingness, and we were in the middle of this nothingness. And this was not a first time. Solipsism would be accepted willy-willy.
All reports about ski travel on Spitsbergen in previous years that we read talked about the constant sun, hard snow, and other winter charms. We have only snow, snow, and SNOW. Everywhere – on the ground and in the air. The air was saturated with snow. Nothing existed except snow. It was terrifying to go far from the tent. If it also disappeared, nothing left except snow.
All of this continued till the morning of April 26. Actually, it continued in the morning also. The snowfall was over, but everything was covered with heavy fog.
Finally, we checked our exact location. We came on the correct pass, but it was unpassable, and the glacier behind it also. So, we decided to check the left passage, and if it would be unpassable also, go back to Borebreen and try its upper part. However, we need visibility. Without it, we not only couldn’t understand anything but also easily can fall in some crevasse or from a corniche.
Some clearness appeared near midday. Hoverer it was only around us, on the top, everything below us was still in the dip fog. By the way, we were on the altitude around 600 meters. It is enough hight for Spitsbergen. The hights mountain of the island is 1700 meter, and it is on the east part of the island. Here, on the Oscar II land, the mountains are around 1000 meters.
In the hope that clearness would expand we dressed up and went to the pass.
As soon as we started to move, the fog rose up again and covered everything. At the same time, it was sunny, warm, but completely milky around. We skied to the end of our traces, waited a little bit, and returned to the tent.
April 27, 28. and 29 were spent at the same place, in the same fog.
At April 28 we moved our tent on couple meters aside. Footwon snow stoped to perform its moisture wicking function, and it became very wet in the tent. Wet automatically means cold. Also, we made an icy hole under our bed by the warm of our bodies with a cold pool on the bottom. So, the movement was a necessary thing. During the movement process, we also had the possibility to dry out our sleeping bags that significantly improved the quality of our sleep (that is very important when you sleep several days in a row).
We had the impression that we will be staying here forever. Anyway, the other world doesn’t exist, disappeared in the fog.
To be continued…..
