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| Newtontoppen |
Living on Svalbard, in a periglacial environment with permafrost, surrounded by glaciers means living on the edge. Infrastructure and humans are very vulnerable in such an environment and it takes a lot of effort, knowledge and also some luck to make life worth living here. Nevertheless people leave the safe place in Longyearbyen to go out in the wild to explore the beautiful landscape, knowing of course, that everything is working very much on the edge and a lot of bad things can happen. Most of the time all is well, but sometimes, some higher forces come into play, making things quite hard. The curse of Lomonosov hit us on our trip and it hit us hard.
The plan was to drive to Atomfjella, a very alpine mountain range, consisting mainly of granite, 250 km north of Longyearbyen. There, we wanted to set up our basecamp and ski the mountains. We heard about crazy and steep colouirs, just waiting to get skied and named after our moms later on. But, we did not even reach Atomfjella.
The German scooter club + Matt joined us on the trip up to Newtontoppen and the first problem occured already in Helvetiadalen, when the trailer hatch of one scooter broke and Espen had to pull the sledge. Everything went well over the ice in Tempelfjorden and we made our way through Gipsdalen. I abandoned my scooter there and jumped on the backseat of Espens two seat scooter to drive to Atomfjella. His rear suspension was already a little bit fucked which made the trip over Lomonosov fonna one hell of a ride. Lomonosov fonna is a big icecap, over 1000 m high, measuring about 60 x 40 km. Quite impressive to drive over this huge icecap, knowing that bad weather, cold temperatures and wind could turn the beautiful landscape into a deadly trap. But we made our way over the icecap as suddenly Matt crashed into Espens scooter, while he was turning around, checking for the scooters behind him. The damage was just a cosmetic one, but still something to worry. 500 m further, with a big bang, the rear suspensions of Espens scooter said goodbye and he suddenly had a nice Lowrider. But of course undriveable for two persons and a sledge which meant that the trip was over before it even really began. And we needed the Germans to help us drive back to Longyearbyen, so their trip was also over.
But as we were already quite far, we stupidly decided to check out Newtontoppen, the highest peak on Svalbard with 1717 m. It was just around the corner, so we left Espens scooters, jumped on other backseats and drove up the Nunatak. Not the way to do that normally, but whatever. On top of Svalbard, a breathtaking view in every direction was at least a little reward. This was one of the nicest views I ever enjoyed but it also made me realize in which landscape I am actually living. Its different rocks and ice and it looks quite peaceful and harmless in nice conditions but it is not. Due to no wind and the sun, we did not feel that the temperature was far beyond -30 degrees on Newtontoppen. As we wanted to leave the top to drive back to Espens scooter, two scooters did not start anymore and we could not get them started at all. Suddenly this trip became quite serious. 7 people standing on the most remote spot on Svalbard with just 3 working scooters, two of them one seat scooters. So we decided to pull the broken ones down the mountain and abandoned them on the foot of Newtontoppen. Than we started our rescue mission by sitting people on the sledges, driving one on one up steep slopes, going down again and driving the sledges up and so on. It took quite a while and a lot of sweat and effort to get everyone and all the equipment over the icecap back down on the solid ground of Gipsdalen. From there, my scooter was also available again and we progressed very slowly back home. Matt was sitting all the way home (150 km) on the sledge!
At 3 in the morning the trip was over, but everyone was in healty conditions and that is the most important thing. Still, two scooters are standing on the glacier next to Newtontoppen. Wheter we get them somehow down, or the glacier will do it for us. But this will take a couple of thousand years, or maybe the glacier starts to surge.
What's left is to think about what went wrong on this trip. We definitely should have turned around when Espens scooter broke down. Also, the scooters and sledges are pretty much on the edge in this cold conditions and students normally do not have the newest and best stuff, so for really long trips this can be a problem. But otherwise we were on the safe side, had enough spare seats in the beginning and no matter what, we could have survived easily a week, because we had enough food, stoves, tents and sleeping bags and even mobile coverage on Newtontoppen. So even though it was scary some times, it was never life threatening.
In the end, we were on top of Svalbard. Newtontoppen, checked!
The plan was to drive to Atomfjella, a very alpine mountain range, consisting mainly of granite, 250 km north of Longyearbyen. There, we wanted to set up our basecamp and ski the mountains. We heard about crazy and steep colouirs, just waiting to get skied and named after our moms later on. But, we did not even reach Atomfjella.
The German scooter club + Matt joined us on the trip up to Newtontoppen and the first problem occured already in Helvetiadalen, when the trailer hatch of one scooter broke and Espen had to pull the sledge. Everything went well over the ice in Tempelfjorden and we made our way through Gipsdalen. I abandoned my scooter there and jumped on the backseat of Espens two seat scooter to drive to Atomfjella. His rear suspension was already a little bit fucked which made the trip over Lomonosov fonna one hell of a ride. Lomonosov fonna is a big icecap, over 1000 m high, measuring about 60 x 40 km. Quite impressive to drive over this huge icecap, knowing that bad weather, cold temperatures and wind could turn the beautiful landscape into a deadly trap. But we made our way over the icecap as suddenly Matt crashed into Espens scooter, while he was turning around, checking for the scooters behind him. The damage was just a cosmetic one, but still something to worry. 500 m further, with a big bang, the rear suspensions of Espens scooter said goodbye and he suddenly had a nice Lowrider. But of course undriveable for two persons and a sledge which meant that the trip was over before it even really began. And we needed the Germans to help us drive back to Longyearbyen, so their trip was also over.
But as we were already quite far, we stupidly decided to check out Newtontoppen, the highest peak on Svalbard with 1717 m. It was just around the corner, so we left Espens scooters, jumped on other backseats and drove up the Nunatak. Not the way to do that normally, but whatever. On top of Svalbard, a breathtaking view in every direction was at least a little reward. This was one of the nicest views I ever enjoyed but it also made me realize in which landscape I am actually living. Its different rocks and ice and it looks quite peaceful and harmless in nice conditions but it is not. Due to no wind and the sun, we did not feel that the temperature was far beyond -30 degrees on Newtontoppen. As we wanted to leave the top to drive back to Espens scooter, two scooters did not start anymore and we could not get them started at all. Suddenly this trip became quite serious. 7 people standing on the most remote spot on Svalbard with just 3 working scooters, two of them one seat scooters. So we decided to pull the broken ones down the mountain and abandoned them on the foot of Newtontoppen. Than we started our rescue mission by sitting people on the sledges, driving one on one up steep slopes, going down again and driving the sledges up and so on. It took quite a while and a lot of sweat and effort to get everyone and all the equipment over the icecap back down on the solid ground of Gipsdalen. From there, my scooter was also available again and we progressed very slowly back home. Matt was sitting all the way home (150 km) on the sledge!
At 3 in the morning the trip was over, but everyone was in healty conditions and that is the most important thing. Still, two scooters are standing on the glacier next to Newtontoppen. Wheter we get them somehow down, or the glacier will do it for us. But this will take a couple of thousand years, or maybe the glacier starts to surge.
What's left is to think about what went wrong on this trip. We definitely should have turned around when Espens scooter broke down. Also, the scooters and sledges are pretty much on the edge in this cold conditions and students normally do not have the newest and best stuff, so for really long trips this can be a problem. But otherwise we were on the safe side, had enough spare seats in the beginning and no matter what, we could have survived easily a week, because we had enough food, stoves, tents and sleeping bags and even mobile coverage on Newtontoppen. So even though it was scary some times, it was never life threatening.
In the end, we were on top of Svalbard. Newtontoppen, checked!
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