We last left you as we were all basking in the sun outside of our super secure tent. What a turn of events can transpire in 24 hours.
As we were stepping into bed around 8pm, the wind started to churn. By 9, Angus and Scott were outside resetting two of our poles (out of 8) that had been pulled out of the snow by the now 30-40 knot winds. At midnight, Frank, Angus and Scott were building a snow wall and resetting our other poles by burying hiking poles and snowshoes to secure the guy lines. At 50 knots around 2am, we had to lower the roof and hold it down while the snow wall was being built higher. All in all an adventurous night with very little sleep but the tent didn’t tear and no one was hurt. We’re told we have now truly earned our polar chops. The silver lining is that Angus got a brief glimpse of the Aurora. Always amazing.
Starting today again around 7am, we were all anxious to exit the tent so skipped breakfast, broke camp and headed out. As our starting point was Summit Lake, you can surmise that or trek was downhill from there. While we were blessed by the Irish to have the wind at our backs we were humbled by Mother Nature in that the wind was far more than comfortable. The high winds blew much of the snow off the frozen river leaving us with a glass ice surface to traverse… and when the conditions allowed, to lay on our sleds and slide a bit down the river.
En route, we met a lovely Inuit man traveling by snow mobile with his komatik in tow carrying a walrus carcass as he was heading home to Qik.
9k in total today to reach Mount Thor. we’ve now settled in for a much more restful night (we hope).
