Distance traveled:
March 28th: 26 km
March 29th: 25.5 km

Position: N69°39'11.2 W126°29'06.4

Two days have passed, two more days of skiing; at least, we are making good miles and the ice has finally flattened enough to allow us to kite once the winds pick up. Still, it's a good thing that I enjoy skiing, as it was only meant to be a secondary method of travel on this expedition. My muscles are definitely not such a fan of four straight days, but it gives me time to think, listen to music, and, admittedly, sing, but only if Sarah is safely out of earshot.

Today was overcast with low visibility, and my ipod was out of batteries, making it a perfect day to reminisce about how this all started, that is, how a thing called Pittarak came to be.

Growing up, Sarah and I took part in several family expeditions together, you know the usual various hikes, dog sledding adventures, a crossing of Greenland, and a trip to the South Pole. Eventually we felt the urge to leave the nest, which is where the first Pittarak expedition, a 2,300 km crossing of the Greenland Icecap, stemmed form. It was during this time that we became embassadors for a foundation that that became known as the Outdoor Nation. While I would love to introduce them, I will pass on the honor to Stefanie.

Eric

What is Outdoor Nation?

by Stefanie Michaelson

Outdoor Nation is the place where a young person's passion for the outdoors sparks a wildfire. Technically, it is an initiative of the Outdoor Foundation made to foster connection between youth and the outdoors. But that might not mean much to a lot us. Let me tell you what Outdoor Nation really is...

It's a movement led by us, youth who love the outdoors. It's a movement that empowers us to share and protect the outdoors. It's a movement that rewards us with outdoor gear just for doing what we love - sharing our passions and inspiring our communities.

We're supported by a diverse coalition of partners who believe in us. Through them, we're able to host 1,500 youth across the U.S. this year in regional summits discussing outdoor issues, barriers, and solutions. We also offer grants for campus clubs, leadership tools and a community of passionate and friendly young outdoor enthusiasts.

Recently, Outdoor Nation launched a new website to help our community connect, recruit and mobilize in meaningful ways. I urge you check it out and learn more. www.outdoornation.org.

[Via Pittarak: Northwest Passage Expedition]

Distance traveled:
March 26th: 7.07 km
March 27th: 19.67 km

Position: N70°04'52.8 W126°59'31.8

The air reeked of sulfur as the smoke wafted out of the hillside, blackening the ice with a layer of ash. Green and yellow chemicals oozed out of the black cliffs. Our map proclaimed these the smoky hills, an area first discovered by John Franklin during his 1826 expedition. Although to be fair, the Inuit in the area had long before known that such a place existed.

It was as if we had entered another world; scenes of Mordor, from the Lord of the Rings, came to mind. Here, the hills were actually burning. The cliffs, composed largely of coal, are said to have caught fire by autoignition, and have been burning continuously for centuries. And it's believed that they will continue to burn for centuries to come, if not longer.

By 5pm, we were still no further than a kilometer from our previous camp site. We had spent all morning trying to find a route down the hundred foot cliffs onto the ocean below. Once we had accomplished that, we were met by our next challenge: the Arctic Ocean ice was heaved up against the shore in mounds of ice. Impossible to kite, and even difficult to ski.

We instead decided to travel along the ice foot, a smooth corridor that ran between the burning cliffs and the ice that piled up in twenty foot mounds. We are not alone to take advantage of the decent travel: tracks of polar bear, fox and one lone wolf littered the ground. Needless to say, we will sleep with one eye open.

Sarah

[Via Pittarak: Northwest Passage Expedition]

Distance traveled:
March 24: 32.5 km March 25: 16 km M/p>

Position: N 70°17'48.5 W127°17'22.4

Its been a rough two days, no doubt about it. The winds have been consistent I will give them that much: we have been out here a week and without fail they have blown every day except one. But that is as far as our luck has extended.

My knees and, well, to save naming them individually, every leg muscle are devastated; the consequence of two days battling upwind to get out of Liverpool bay and into Franklin bay. Like any sailing vessel we have the ability to tack into the wind, and with the right conditions and light sleds this can be quite efficient. But conditions have been less than ideal: yesterday, we kited through rubble ice that would catch sleds and skis, and today, our course took us along the winding path of a river. When the river valley became too narrow to navigate, we took desperate measures and headed North-East on a tack that would circumnavigate various hills and land us quickly into Franklin bay where we could resume a South-East direction. Little did we know this was not to be the case. We arrived at the edge of land only to be greeted by a vast view of rubble ice dissipating into the horizon. The view was provided by our vantage point: 100-foot tall cliffs that took another two hours to navigate a way through. Oh, and the cliffs are literally smoldering, but more on that in our next update.

Eric

[Via Pittarak: Northwest Passage Expedition]

Distance traveled:
March 22: 54 km
March 23: 56 km

Position: N70°05'23 W128°25'26

Lately, the winds have been in our favour. Yesterday, we kite-skied into the night and enjoyed an amazing 1 AM northern light show before heading to bed. Today, the winds were light, and we worked hard for every km gained. With no light show tonight, Eric is lost in his book about Amundsen's expedition through the Northwest Passage.

Here is what our friend John Huston, an adventurer and history buff, has to say on the subject.

Roald Amundsen's leadership and genius is a beacon for me. I'm drawn to his exhaustive approach to planning and his humble, self-critical passion for innovation and learning.

Amundsen is perhaps the most successful polar explorer of yesteryear.

In 1907 he and a small, highly skilled, team of Norwegians completed the first ever expedition to fully navigate the Northwest Passage. Before Amundsen, it had been an unsolvable puzzle. During the 19th century hundreds of sailors and explorers starved and froze to death in the Northwest Passage. Unlike previous expeditions, Amundsen's team learned to live and to drive sled dogs like the Inuit.

A few years later he took these skills to Antarctica where he led the first expedition to the South Pole.

In the spring of 2005, I was selected to join the team of Norwegians that restaged Amundsen's 1911 expedition to the South Pole. This meant 1400 miles of dogsledding and cross-country skiing for 72 days on the Greenland ice cap, fueled by a vintage diet, using historically accurate gear.

We dined on seal meat and seal blubber. Our menu was restricted to foods consumed on Amundsen's expedition, so we ate a lot of both. The meat tasted like a blend of beefsteak and fish. The calorie-rich blubber fueled our bodies for exertion in the cold. We couldn't get enough.

John Huston
Forward Expeditions
www.northpole09.com

[Via Pittarak: Northwest Passage Expedition]

Days 2-3
Distance traveled:
March 20th: 62.2 km
March 21st: 15.2 km

Position: N 69°33'27.9 W 130°51'21.9

Yesterday we woke up to the sound of our tent flapping in the wind and to the hiss of blowing snow. A quick jaunt outside confirmed the expected, the winds were in our favor.

We hurried to launch our 9 meter kites, powerful for the wind conditions, but a necessity with our heavy loads and hills to climb. And there were hills, despite what our map may have illustrated. But all in good jest, the hills added a pleasurable challenge: you have to accumulate speed to tackle them, slow to a standstill at the summit to plan a route down that will not send you cascading off a cornice, and then race your pulks to valley floor.

The series of ridges and lakes is only one of the landforms typical of this area; the other is pingos, obscure miniature volcano-like hills that are formed entirely out of ice. Over many years the permafrost accumulates, forcing the ground above it to rise. This process takes time, most pingos growing only several cm a year. The Mackenzie Delta has over 1,300 pingos making it one of the best places to see them.

We skied today, making our 15 km well earned. We passed through a web of lakes, contouring finger-like peninsulas to finally arrive on the other side of the Tuktoyaktuk peninsula; the vast Arctic Ocean sea ice. Sadly, we have said goodbye to our last pingo.

Eric

[Via Pittarak: Northwest Passage Expedition]