Nightswimming in the Arctic

Trip Start Jun 26, 2007
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Trip End Ongoing


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Monday, July 9, 2007

For the remaining few days i stayed closer to Longyearbyen. Taking 2 day-hike into Longyearbyen glacier. This involved getting wet feet when crossing the river and when i have wet feet which become sweaty from all the walking, my socks really do stink. Which was not appreciated by fellow campers in the kitchen.

I  was also lucky enough to meet two English backpacker from Lancashire (Marie and Dave) where we dared each other to do swim in the arctic waters under the midnight sun. For some reason Marie picked a nice shallow bit of water that not isolated from the sea by a small stony beach but still believed to contain the arctic ocean. This however was not the case when we entered the water on the stroke of midnights, wearing only underwear, trainers and my smelly socks tired around my ears (they had some reindeer antlers). Yes it was cold, but within 10 seconds i realised we were not in the ocean but a pond or lake formed by the melted ice and some sea water. I could tell this by the smell of the mud in the pond which smelt of eggs (hydrogen sulphide) when the silt was disturbed. This smell was very familiar to my Winograsky experiment in Environmental Geo-science at university where organic material were allowed to rot in undisturbed water. Now starting to feel abit nauseous i and the other 2 got out that water very quickly much to the enjoyment of the crowd. Definitely feel dirty after swimming in there but i can now say i have swam in Arctic water and survived!!!

when i find a suitable computer i will upload some comical photos.
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