Photo Credit: Alexis. View from the school yesterday (at about 2:00 PM). See how there's some light on the horizon? It's terribly exciting. There is now 23.5 hours of darkness a day and .5 hours of darkness plus some color on the horizon. Also notice the layer of ice on EVERYTHING.
Photo Credit: Alexis. My barrack (red one on the left), looking towards Longyearbyen.
Photo Credit: Alexis. The inside of UNIS (my school). It's super funky cool and the floors are perfect for running and sliding. The tilted walls and ceiling aren't a camera trick.
Photo Credit: Wes. Me jumping through sea ice as part of the safety course (wearing a heavy snow-mobile suit). I then pulled myself out with metal spikes. COLD and PAINFUL is an understatement.
Two flat-mates and I after seeing the best northern lights yet. We were rather excited (and cold).
The closest thing I've seen to a live polar bear. There are more bears than people on Svalbard, and everything we do has an element of bear safety, but 24-hour darkness means we don't see them often.
View of Longyearbyen from the top of Longyearbreen (a nearby glacier that I skied up). Other than that tiny speck of light, there's not much else to see in the dark, other than distant mountains with an eerie white glow from the moon and stars.
Where I spend my free time when I'm not in class, skiing, swimming, or hanging with crazy Europeans.
... I'll try harder to publish my photos with stories in the future. Thanks to Alexis for letting me steal a few shots. Check out his Svalbard photo site at: http://www.longyearbyen.sitew.com/#Home.A
4 comments:
Great pics of your area. I look forward to others.
poppi
thanks poppi! more to come soon...
Wow no way! They made you jump through ice and haul yourself out? Crazy.
Well, ice jumping aside it looks like a ton of fun there, I'm envious :-). Can't wait to read more blog posts.
Kiya, so excited to pictures. It looks intense, but very cool! Hey today was the 30th anniversary of Nearly Normals. Dave and I went in for a nearly nasty burrito and chocolate cake. How's your food situation?
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