Frobisher Bay

Last night I dreamt I was at Frobisher Bay. I was trying to walk on the frozen sea ice. I couldn't see as my goggles steamed up and I couldn't breathe because I wore a suffocating black face mask. I tore off my goggles and mask and saw that the others were walking slowly ahead of me. They looked like astronauts on the moon wearing bulky windproof outfits, walking in slow motion on the white lumpy surface. Ahead of us were several ships sitting on the sea ice. Forlorn. They looked as if they could have been on a film set. This didn't look like the real world. We saw a sledge and some huskies tied up. My brother wanted a photograph of me by the sledge but I was struggling to walk, let alone pose. This was our first day in Iqaluit. A blizzard had meant our connecting flight was cancelled and so we had the afternoon to explore Frobisher Bay. It was like diving straight into a freezer - and staying there. My Baffin boots felt heavy and I was nervous I'd go through the ice. We were out for less than an hour when we turned back to the hotel. I trudged into my room and buried my head in my hands. How on earth was I going to manage to walk for ten hours a day in minus 25 during our trek across the Auyuittuk National Park? I later found out that there is such a condition as Arctic Shock and suspect that I was suffereing from it at that moment. As one of the novices in the group I had never been so far north or anywhere so cold. I had never been on an expedition and hadn't been skiing for ten years. Luckily, I was sharing a room with the lovely Swede, Susannah, one of our guides, who had been on previous trips to the North Pole and across Baffin Island. She said all the right things about it being 'bloody freezing' and bound to feel odd taking those first baby steps on sea ice. Before long, we were eating the chocolate out of our munchy bags and sipping some brandy - to give us strength, of course. I felt safe back in the warm, but worried that I might let the others in the group down if I couldn't somehow get my Arctic act together. Later, someone confided in me that it had been tough out there, the big white, and that it was a good thing our flight had been cancelled so we had an extra day to acclimatise. So much white, it gave me a fright. But it wasn't all bad and I have to admit that there was something alluring about the expanse of snow, the frozen sea, the blistering wind. This was the beginning of the adventure - and over the next few blogs I will recount the rest of the trip to you...