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Hello world! We are all now safe back from the Youth Expedition. Ina and Franzi in Hamburg facing the German Media. Rebecca, Amelie Doriana and Shona getting ready to board their flight back to Canada. Keith and Jess back in the classroom at Frome and Kidbrooke. Last night at Heathrow we had group photos, a poem from Hayley, tears, laughter and very fond memories of a fabulously successful expedition
Walking through Central London this morning I was thinking to myself there can’t be many people around me who have just returned from steering a sailing ship at night through Arctic waters in such great company
Cape Farewell Youth Expedition 2007 rocks! This is not the end but the beginning!
Look out for more blogs photos and videos when we’ve all had a chance to catch up on our sleep
Thanks to everyone. Good luck to the Greenland Expedition!
Deepest thanks to Capt Gerd, 1st mate Barbara, 2nd mate Renska, Cook ( shouldn’t that be chef?) Anna, Guide Christian and that beautiful life changing boat the Noorderlicht
Love and changes
Colin
It’s been a fantastic trip with all the students, the way they have worked together as a team and individually! Not easy saying goodbye, lots of tears from all. It’s a pity that there is not more time for them to meet and talk through their experiences with the next crew who fly in this afternoon. They’ll meet briefly at the airport as they fly out on the plain the others fly in on. Think that we will stop one night across the bay from Longyearbyen then leave tomorrow for Greenland, it’s going to be some crossing, hope that the technology works and that we can keep updating this site.
Tears on the ice!!
It’s our last day and we are currently in Longyearbyen Skole, one of the teachers -Hilde- has kindly let us in!! We are waiting to be picked up and taken to the airport and our flight leaves at 2 ish. I have had the best time ever!!! I have learned so much and had so many amazing experiences that it’s going to take months to write it all down and create all the art that I have been inspired to make! The students have been totally awesome, from getting great Amy love to learning about Canada from Shona, Amelie and B. They worked so hard on all their projects, group and individual, science and art, they were fantastic!!!!!!! As were the crew and the education team, I feel priviliged to have worked with all these fantastic people!! Yesterday T4 filmed us coming into port at Longyearbyen after a long night sailing down here from Ny Alesund it was a very rocky sail and no-one got much sleep!!! My watch (team 3 superstars Shona, Jethro and Franzi) contemplated mutiny and sailing off into the sunset so we never had to come home, our plans included cabin boys and sirens on deck and night raids on Longyearbyen for food and supplies!!!
We have left the ship and said our goodbyes but are currently all still together, I know there are going to be lots of tears when we all split up at Heathrow! I am REALLY going to miss all these wonderful people and this wonderful land, Svalbard is a fantastic place, really beautiful – the reality of what we are doing to the planet and how fragile it really is, we are damaging it so badly and have lost our respect for the balance of nature, we all need a wake up call before its too late!!!
Will post lots of photos on my return, have loads and loads!!!!
See ya, Jess xxxxx
This is goodbye to Svalbard.
Speeding up and down the River Thames seems like years ago, I remember meeting everyone for the first time in London and nobody knew anything about anyone else on the trip. Now it’s completely different, it seems like everyone has known everyone for ages, it’s so relaxed. All of the wildlfe here has been amazing, we’ve been lucky to see a polar bear and we’ve seen seals, a puffin some walrus’ and reindeer.
It’s going to be strange going back to Frome, life is so different, I want to stay here for a little longer so I can try to see everything but unfortunately I can’t so goodbe to Svalbard, I’ll see everyone soon.
Jethro
This will be my final post since we are leaving today for London. It has been an incredible adventure so far. We have learnt so much…and I have enjoyed every minute of this amazing journey (even the cold nights). Our trip from Ny Alesund was quite rocky….someone left the bar fridge open and all of the pop cans rolled around the ship for hours on end….i thought the entire kitchen fell apart.
After hours of rocking back and forth….the ship settled and we rolled into Longyearbyen just after breakfast. We had one last night in Longyearbyen with the school kids…we played football for a few hours and had a blast.
The crew of the Noorderlicht arranged a really nice dinner for us…and we danced until the wee hours of the night.
We will shortly head for the airport and then we are off to London…this is the end of our climate change adventure….until next year.
