‘The cold side’
31 July 2017
Torrential rain taking off from Oslo (glad all my stuff is in dry-bags) then brilliant sun, then cloud. Very sure Svalbard would be in cloud and I wouldn’t see anything, or was on the wrong side or whatever, but my calculation with the setting sun was right, so the RH side was better. And wow. Just wow. Cloud cleared just as we got to Svalbard and I saw incredible glaciers, mountains, low cloud, rock – absolutely stunning and I got off the plane grinning from ear to ear. Andy there with Jakob (Danish glacier scientist). Andy proposes a drive since the light is so good. Ended up doing half a tour of Svalbard: town, whalebone in river-bed, Methane Explosion camp with caravan that looked like it was abandoned in the 50’s (apparently a couple of weeks’ ago?). Barnacle geese, red-throated divers, reindeer, lots of dog camps, coal mines, satellites and then most of the way up a mountain. It is broad daylight at 1pm. My mind definitely does not want to go to sleep.