Team leave Kugluktuk on kayaking journey
Hello this is Glenn with the first Arctic Voice blog entry of 2008. We left Kugluktuk about four days ago after a flurry of preparations. We had a lot to do with getting food ready and provisioning for the expedition. We’re now after a few days of travel about 50 miles east of Kugluktuk. Our position is 67 degrees 40 minutes 49 seconds North, 112 degrees 55 minutes 05 seconds west. We’re camping on the mainland next to a little island. The winds have been very variable; we’ve had some quite cold winds and some very hot southerly winds – unusually hot.
The seas have been good – we’ve had a slight chop here and there but generally speaking the conditions have been good. We’re quite tired today because every day we’ve had it’s been like paddling across the English Channel in terms of distance and it’s quite tiring, but we’re bedding in quite well. A few days ago Alison had a tough day because she took some dairy produce amongst the mashed potato that we’re eating so we’re being a bit more vigilant with the diet. And yesterday I had a pretty tough day as I think I picked up a virus that was going around in Kugluktuk, but on the whole we’re going well.
We’ve heard there have been a lot of wolves here in Kugluktuk. We didn’t see them ourselves, but we have seen seals. We’ve also heard that there’s been a woodpecker at Baker Lake which apparently is extremely unusual and may be another illustration that animals are moving further north. The temperature changes have been quite dramatic – I’ve mentioned the wind – the southerly wind makes it very hot and then you can turn towards a northeasterly and be very cold. There’s quite a lot more fish in this part of the Arctic as we’re going east and we’ve met a lot of fishermen out on the waves, some of them with their grandchildren – the Inuit elders with their grandchildren. Some of them recognise us from last year when we talked to the schools. Anyway, we’ll be back with another update in a few days about how we’re getting on. Love to everyone back home.
