Expedition report:

We successfully reached Verlegenhuken at 80 degrees North latitude on April 27.

Across Svalbard, we went through glaciers, valleys, icecaps, moraines, mountains, and sea ice. We had incredible scenery throughout, but skiing through the South Spitsbergen National Park was my favorite. While skiing on the sea ice there, we were surrounded by icebergs locked into the frozen sea, and tall and wide glacier fronts were around us. Glacier-covered mountains and one that looked like the Matterhorn were also in sight. Absolutely breathtaking landscape to ski through. It was also one of the challenging sections as we skied through the knee-deep snow. Our sled felt like an anchor and it required so much more power to move forward but logged much less distance. It was also the area where we got stuck in a tent due to a severe storm with a gust of wind that went up to 33 m/s, shaking our tent like an earthquake.

The northern part was not walking in a park either. So many uphills, some steep and some moderate, lasting for 4-5 hours sometimes. Åsgardfonna was a beast, very cold, super windy, and lots of big and small sastrugi were scattered everywhere.

From this year, science and adventure expeditions in Svalbard are required to do the polar bear watch every single day. We were rotating 2 hours shifts – so we had 6 hours of choppy sleep and 8 hours of full sleep every other day. Did we love it? Hell no, lol. It for sure ruined our recovery sleep. But it just became a part of the daily routine and the fantastic landscape and experience made it all worth it ❄️😁