Back in Svalbard!

Hey guys/gals!

Firstly, I have updated the previous post so that it now has pictures!

I've been back in Svalbard for two days now I think. In case I didn't mention before, I'm up here helping out in the field school that I attended last year. Sean and I (Sean is another survivor of the field school last year and was in Oslo and Stavanger with me) arrived on Friday night. Unfortunately the views weren't that great, well for me anyway. It was pretty cloudy so I was denied the fantastic views of the sea ice and southern Spitersbergen that I got last time I was here. I stepped off the plane, into the Arctic, in my shorts so I can now say I have worn shorts in the Arctic. It seems much the same as when I was here last year - perhaps with a little less snow (it's slightly later in the year) and with a few more new buildings!

Perhaps the one good photo taken on the flight..

On Saturday the attendees of this years field school were on a permafrost excursion in the morning so Sean and I got to have a lie in and recover from our busy few weeks. We then went down in the afternoon to meet up with Elise (the organiser of the course and the one who paid for our trip up here) to see exactly what we are doing, sorting out internet access etc. We even got given an office! It's crazy, I feel important....We met the attendees in the afternoon and went off to enjoy a fantastic meal that evening.

The next day was the students day off which meant a day off for me! I should mention that all the students had already been here a week. 19 of the 25 students had already organised to go on a cruise to Pyramiden, an abanonded Russian mining town, and to see some glaciers I think. The rest of us, me, Sean and two others, instead went on a short hike up one of the local mountains - I think it's called plateufjell or something - basically just the plateau to the west of the Longyear valley. We orginally planned to walk across the plateau and come down on Longyearreen glacier, just behind where we are staying in Nybyen (converted mining barracks). However, we met some people half way along and they said the path down was pretty steep - we therefore decided to just come down the way we came. It was a nice hike though, and we had some fantastic views of the the Longyear valley. Here are some pics...

Today (Sunday), the students were back for some lectures in the morning and a botany/bird field trip in the afternoon. I wasn't really looking forward to this excursion (which was in Adventdalen and Endalen, just further down from Longyearbyen), as the topics didn't really appeal to me. They were actually really interesting though. Plus the weather was bloody fantastic so no complaints whatsoever from me! Some pics...

Sean and I are off for our rifle training (again) tomorrow and then everyone is going on a two day trip to Kappe Linne (the extreme west of Isfjord) and Barentsburg (the Russian settlement), on Tuesday, Will update when I can.

It's good to be back! Perhaps I should change the name of the blog to "my norwegian adventures"....