Cape Farewell Greenland Voyage 2007

These days at sea run together. Combined with the acute sense of seastupidity that now plagues the entire crew, we’re having a tough time collectively recalling one day from the next. It’s now Saturday night as I write, and even yesterday is hard to distinguish from today and the day that preceded it. A couple of highlights that do stand out:

— Waves rise as walls, aside the vessel, gathering and folding over themselves, flashing in a fleeting moment an iridescent tropical blue hue-the only touch of warmth in our cold, damp, dreary surroundings.

–A bunkbed discussion with Liam about what our friends back home in Brooklyn and Manchester respectively are up to, it being Friday night and all. We conclude, with some certainty, that they are likely having a better time than he and I, cooped up in our “zero gravity” cabin. We then figure that many of those Friday nights will be forgotten, but this one will likely be remembered for a lifetime. (We then agree that I’ll be visiting him in Manchester after the trip, and that we’ll be getting a proper drink on.on solid ground.)

–Dinner. Once again, Anna has outdone herself. One of the special treats of the 6-8 watch is that we are called inside a few minute early (again prompting pangs of guilt in myself and my watch-mates) as dinner is being served. Tonight it was a pasta carbanara. Were I not on a boat in the middle of the Greenland Sea it would’ve been delicious. Being on said boat, it was a true taste of heaven.

–Oceanography. I’m learning a lot about water. Amazing how little most of us humans know about this feature that covers the vast majority of our home planet, and is entirely unique to it. I won’t flaunt my newfound knowledge now, but if you ever care to lose an hour to talk of salinity, water density and thermaclines, buy me a beer and ask me about the North Atlantic currents.

–Route update: Not a highlight, per se, but a development. We’re unclear of the ice cover at the entrance to the sound. Nobody is really ready to think about what it’d mean if we couldn’t make it in, as we’ve been given some pretty enticing descriptions of the place (see next point). And while I’m sure that the fjords just south of Scoresby Sund will be equally mind-numbling and awe inspiring, there seems to be a magic to the place that no one wants to miss out on.

–Ko’s lectures: Ko has been doing a series of talks about Greenland-the history, the ecology, the sociology-and it has me (and all others who huddle into the lower salon to watch the captivating Technicolor slideshow) awfully excited to get to Scoresby Sund. This is, he has said again an again, a real adventure, traveling by schooner to one of the last outposts of traditional arctic life. For our sake, hope for southerly winds up the east coast of Greenland, to help push that icy barrier back north where it’s retreated of late.

Representative quote of the day: “Nope, something’s wrong-this is where we were yesterday.” –Marcus, relieving our watch at 8am, upon looking around at the nondescript sea surrounding.

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