The Dolomites

Well, 14 hours after getting back from Greenland, Emilie and I headed off on a flight to Venice - but not for a romantic city break like most, but for a week enjoying the mountains, sunshine and via ferratas of the Dolomites!! And what a week...

Whenever I think of the Dolomites, I have an unfortunate recollection of "Cliffhanger," the entertainingly bad 90's film with Sly Stallone and ... er ... some other people. Needless to say, the Dolomites were far better than the film (which was a relief) and we were out all day every day in gorgeous weather and had a suitably exhausting holiday after my season on the ice.

My first visit, and definitely not my last, the mountains blew me away. Stunning. That is the only word to describe them. Huge Limestone cliffs towering over lush green valleys with quaint little villages (in which you can find lots and lots of very good hot chocolate and local ice cream!!)

And the views on the road weren't bad either (alebit from a very gutless fiat panda which eventually made it over the 61 switchbacks to Arabba)

Some old fortifications overlooking the Marmolada

Via Ferratas were originally built to help alpine military units move around the mountains in the First World War - troops lived and fought on the highest tops of the area as the war between nations ensued. Travel to and between the fortifications built on the ridges was protected by cables which you could hold or attach to, along with tunnels, bridges and ledges.

Hand built tunnels and bridges

The idea has stuck, and they have developed recreational via ferratas all over the alps as part of the outdoor tourist industry.

They are basically climbs of various grades which are protected by a cable that is attached at intervals to the rock. When the climbing is difficult they also add metal steps and other ingenious ways to help you up that difficult bit. Of course, you can also pull on the cable!

You wear a normal climbing harnass and use a Via Ferrata shock absorbing set to attach. This does what it says on the tin and has two flick gate carabiners that you can move one at a time. This means you should always be attached by one and therefore safe as houses.

Clipping on the next cable

It's a brilliant way of climbing mountains whilst still being able to fly with Ryanair! All you need is a harnass, helmet and a VF shock absorber. It's also worth wearing a pair of cycling gloves to protect you from any frays and sharp bits on the metalwork (and bring a torch for the tunnels)

OK, I will happily admit, after spending the whole summer in a tent and then snow cave, camping was well down the list and we booked a lovely B&B for the week. And what a great decision it was too! After 6-8 hours on the hill each day it was just brilliant to come back to a freshly made bed, hot shower and have to go out for dinner again! Not to say my camping days are over, but you have to treat yourself once in a while.

And so the onslaught of ferratas begins. As with any mountain trip, things are pretty much weather dependent but this usually works both ways. You want good weather to get out and about, but also expect, and, deep down (as it's a holiday) would cope well with bad weather for a lazy rest day. The bad weather never came, and the rest day never materialised.

Mustn't grumble, it was only 5 days but we were nicely tired by the end. Based in Moena, in the Val di Fassa, we climbed mostly nearby in Fassa and Arabba and found some spectacular routes, with the help of the Cicerone guidebook. Routes sometimes go straight up mountains, sometimes take exposed traverses and traverse beautiful ridges.

Most of them have a reasonable walk in and out to make it a whole day. Sometimes you have the route to yourself, and sometimes it's amusingly busy, with queues building up behind difficult steps or slow people. There is some etiquette involved and if it's not a major jam people will let you pass and vice versa. Sometimes, however, there are large groups and things slow down. We even rushed ahead of one on the walk in just to not get stuck behind.

A large group that we sneaked ahead of!

So, five days of via ferratas, all grades, some topping out on 3000m peaks in the area, some busy, some deserted. A brilliant week and we'll be back next year! And here's a bunch of photos to prove it.

The approach paths were as spectacular as the climbs

The route here actually traverses straight over this pinnacle

Even though we were at the end of the summer, there was still an abundance of wild flowers including edelweiss which is somewhat of a rarity (and, like us, also a lover of limestone!)

Emilie wasn't very happy when I pointed out that it's actually her head that's wonky and not the helmet...

Some of the airy traverse paths are not protected so a head for heights is useful!

On most of the routes there are refuges - we didn't stay in any (we will next year) but they also act as little mountain restaurants and do a mean slice of cake and hot chocolate!

And some of them have a loo with a view to say the least!

My legs are so hairy they resemble alpine pastures apparently...

And there it was, the final descent into the valley ready for a last supper and to make a plan of attack for creative packing of 20kg of stuff in the 15kg Ryanair allowance... The icing on the cake, though, was that after 5 days of great weather, we woke on the Sunday ready to drive back to the airport to find torrential rain outside. Perfect!

And a VERY BIG thank you to Emilie for letting me take incessant photos all day every day in order to gather my largest selection of bum shots yet... ;-)

Greenland Flight film

A 1 min 30 short of the flight down from NEEM camp down the west coast of greenland to Kengerlussuaq. Hopefully some more video to come!

Gorgeous Greenland

Well, it's been a while since I've posted anything because I've been in the middle of nowhere freezing my *arms* off, for a change. My 5th Summer in Greenland.

For those of you that don't remember, NEEM is an ice core drilling site at 78 ° North in the middle of the Greenland Ice Cap. This year was a momentous occasion in the project as, after 3 seasons drilling, we hit bedrock. And that's after taking 2537.36 metres of ice core! (for those of you who didn't realise how much ice there is in Greenland) Yes, more than 2 and a half kilometres deep. Crazy when you think about it.

Dorthe, the project leader, holding aloft the last piece of ice from 2537.36 metres

We fly in and out from Kangerlussuaq, a strange and quirky ex-US air force base in a beautiful spot. Most Greenlandic towns are quaint, beautiful and on the coast. Kanger is none of the above, but grows on you the more time you spend in the area! The most spectacular aspect of the town is the gigantic river that flows down from the Russell Glacier past town. In winter it is a dry valley, but in summer it's a raging torrent. It's also the site of some of Greenland's rare orchids due to it's unusual microclimate and the stunning Russell Glacier which is a short trip by 4x4.

The Russell Glacier River in full force

A beautiful, rare orchid which I can't remember the name of...

The C-130 that takes people in and out from camp

My job around camp is difficult to describe really. A bit of everything. Field Assistant is the technical term on the contract, and "surface man" is written on the board in camp, but I heard two amusing ones this summer as well. A TV crew interviewed me on film and introduced me as the "snow manager." Snow is probably more difficult to manage than Amy Winehouse, the phrase "Herding Cats" comes to mind.

There's a lot of snow to manage...

The one that made me chuckle the most, however, was "camp photographer" (part of my work there involves getting images for the web diaries and press releases.) This is always lost on other nationailites.

Camp is a word with only one real meaning in other countries. However, for those international readers who are confused or want to improve their English (Emilie...), the definition of "camp(adj)" in a UK Dictionary is: "deliberately behaving in a way that some people think is typical of a homosexual" It sort of conjures up an image of me in a tight t-shirt, touching everyone's arm as I mince around taking photos of people in their "gorgeous polar clothing darling". Perhaps I should move to Brighton?

Me out there camping it up...

I would like to point out that working at NEEM is actually work, (and I enjoy most of it!) and to be honest I don't take many photos whilst working as I'm either too busy, or the subject (a pallet of cargo or my shovel perhaps) isn't that interesting photographically. This means that, as many people tell me, most of my photos are of people looking like they're enjoying themselves and having fun (as this post will no doubt confirm)

Perhaps they are? The Project Leader, Dorthe, is keen that people have an enjoyable experience and encourages people to have fun. If you're working in a trench at -20 degrees for 11 hours a day then surely you should have some fun inbetween? Sometimes I get asked to make some things to "facilitate" some fun. Sometimes I just do it anyway. This year I was asked to build a snow bar for a Saturday night party and pulled out all the stops!

The Polar Bear Bar
Polar Bear Courtesy of Fernando, below in full sculpting mode...

Before (above) and after - after using the piste bully to make a long pile of snow and letting it sinter (sit and set) for 24hours, we used the snow blower, shovel and saw to sculpt the bar.

Could making a outdoor volleyball court when it's -20°C be a good idea? Perhaps some ping pong in the sunshine after dinner? Perhaps it would be good to build (and move in to) a snow cave so we can have an amusing pre-dinner G&T venue on a saturday night? "Another hard day at the office" comes to mind, but, seriously, I do work hard there doing lots of boring things too!

My snow cave

Playing volleyball in the 24hr sunshine

Round the table ping pong killer!

One of the unique things about the camp is that are 14 different nationalities involved, and each nation sends staff. It means therefore that it's a crazy mix of enthusiastic people from all levels of science, with a bunch of us non scientific staff thrown in for good measure. There are phD and masters students cutting slices of ice next to the top Climate scientists in the World.

At dinner you might be sitting sharing a table with a Korean, a Swiss, a French, an American and a Japanese, invariably laughing at the differences between your countries - the british obsession with tea, the french with baguettes and the japanes with sushi. Unique in so many ways and where else in the world do you get such a social experiment that wasn't being filmed!?

Henri Ruffli, a Swiss semi retired ice core engineer and general polar ice core legend. He has a great story for every occasion and is a pleasure to work with.

Obviously it's not all play. The camp was set up to drill an ice core to bedrock and also to process and analyze some of the ice on site. To be honest, I feel sorry for the ice in some ways, it is treated in a way that could make a horror movie. It is drilled from the ground using razor sharp cutters and then cut up into pieces...

...electrocuted...

...and shaved...

and melted - and all in all has a pretty hard time. And the bits that aren't tortured on site get bagged up and left in the freezer. And just when they thought it's all over, they're boxed up and strapped to a pallet and flown out (to various institues around the world)

Ice core boxes on a pallet being loaded onto the C-130

And that's basically what the camp is for - to drill, process and fly out the longest ice core climate record in the Northern Hemisphere (somewhere in the region of 130,000 years)

There's up to 39 people at camp working, and then sometimes we get visitors - VIP's, press, educational visits and occasionally birds. This year was particularly interesting as we had a young Peregrine Falcon stay with us for a few days. We consulted some falcon experts and the decision was made to feed it for a few days and then stop - giving it energy and then motivation to fly away, which seemed to work!

We also had a visit from F Paulsen (a Danish Billionaire) and a team of scientifically interested rich people. They had chartered a twin otter from iceland and gave us the use of it for a couple of days to drill shallow cores in remote locations in return for visiting camp. Not a bad deal all in all!

And this is it, the rock at the base of 2500m of greenland ice. A small piece of pink granite (that blunted many sets of ice cutters!) marking the fact that we're into the basal sediment layer and therefore deformed ice - meaning that the climate record in this ice is deformed also and therefore useless. Last time when analysed, the basal ice had pieces of willow in it so it will be interesting to see what this one contains.

And now I think it's time for a bunch of photos and none of the chat. NEEM's always work hard, play hard, and the crazy mix of people always makes it's a great season.

A saturday night pinada

Polar Bear on the court...

Indoor sports

BMLH! (Big Man, Little Head)

Snow Angels



My perfectly groomed runway!

Julia, our resident musician

This is how I spent my "60th" Birthday (a camp joke!) - Ski kiting in the afternoon and eating cake in the evening. There are worse things to do on your birthday I assure you!

I have to say Nerilie's BAS issue sunglasses were very useful on a number of occasions!

The weather's not always nice and sunny of course, you can't forget where you are in the World, one of the harshest places in the northern hemisphere. We had more storms this year than the last two put together - the winds blow up to 40knots and there was a massive amount of snowfall for a summer. All good fun for photos though!

Returning from the Food Tent with supplies

But when it is good, it's time for me to get an old drum and make a Bar-B-Q

Or piste the runway a little more after the storm. This is Gunner, the Icelandic Gentle Giant mechanic waiting for me to take my turn driving up and down in straight lines grooming the 4km runway in the Piste Bully. And then I go a little crazy and make a winding skiing track around camp to practice my skate skiing!

The Polar Bear gets it's Winter Fur

So all in all another great season. LOTS of photos in one hit this time, hopefully you made it all the way to this bit without falling asleep. And next? A little trip to the Dolomites coming very soon, watch this space!