Epic. That’s really the only word for it. Epic in every sense—a long journey into the unknown, rich with unexpected adventures, and building to a climactic moment that knits all the themes and threads of the voyage together into a glorious crescendo.
Our day began as early as possible, on the stroke of midnight, when our expedition reached its primary goal. Better still, we arrived at this point exactly at a unique conjunction of time, geography, and the great turnings of the sun and moon. Lisa called us at midnight to confirm that about 20 minutes later we would reach 80˙ N, 4,800 nautical miles above the Equator and only 600 miles short of the North Pole! Very soon the bridge was full of excited travelers, eyes and cameras focused on the GPS displays, waiting for the exact moment when 79˙59.99’ ticked over to 80˙00.00. A burst of shutter clicks and a round of spontaneous cheers echoed through the bridge and our captain gave a long loud blast on the ship’s horn–we made it!
Outside the bridge windows the wide waters of Eureka Sound were glassy calm, mirroring the midnight sun that sat perfectly on the northern horizon, ahead of our ship. At the same moment a huge full moon at perigee (popularly called a supermoon) rose in the south behind us, lighting the golden tundra on the western slopes of Ellesmere Island. Arcing over us, the sky shaded from brilliant orange in the north to a soft pearlescent purple around the moon. It was an amazing time, an amazing place, an epic moment.
Later this morning, after a bit of sleep, our adventures continued with a landing on Ellesmere Island and an opportunity to kayak in Vesle Fiord. Vesle means ‘small,’ and so it was, but only by comparison to the wider waters of Eureka Sound–as our Zodiacs brought us to shore the ship dwindled into the distance, allowing us to appreciate the real dimensions of the place. We landed on a sandy beach and set out on a true expedition hike, a walk up into the hills surrounding the fiord where none of us had ever walked before. In fact we could be quite certain that with every step across the soft tundra we were setting foot where no one had ever walked before!
Short, long, and medium, all the hikes had wonderful highlights. There were many tracks of muskox, wolves, and snow geese showing clearly in patches of sand and mud along the beach and the small streams. We found a single reindeer antler, covered in dense layer of lichen, which let us know that it had lain there on the tundra for at least a century. On the slopes above us two large groups of muskox rested in the warm sunshine and an arctic hare, brilliant white against the golden sandstone, sat calmly and groomed its big feet while we approached.
80 degrees North, hiking untouched tundra, midnight sun, and a full moon, our epic journey has hit some incredible high notes. Now we cruise south, with much more to come.
