Life here is brilliant, as brilliant as Arctic dwelling can get in fact, might not compare to a few weeks sailing around the coast of Southern Thailand, but within its genera, its pretty dame good! My only compliant is that I still haven’t seen an animal of any kind! (Sorry Hector soon as I do I will get picture up for you.) The weather has been overcast the past couple of days and a nippy wind has picked up making it feel a little colder (or ‘brutal’ as the Canadians would say), but this hasn’t stopped the work. We have been beavering away with a multitude of home improvements, worthy of any mid morning TV show.
The latest instalments have been; a new kitchen with sink built into the worktop, a shower cubical with changing area, coat rack and boot area, fuel bund with dispensary taps, and an external home for the generator (with chimney for the fumes). Last night we even put up a dining table, found a few old plates and I made us beans on toast … who could ask for more!
Even with all these luxurious home comforts we have surrounded ourselves with, life isn’t quite like being at home, there is always a longer process involved in receiving the end goods. The shower for example. If you decide you want to have a shower you must first collect a bucket of snow, leave it by the heater for several hours to melt, then fill the bag with nozzle attachment with the water and put it up on the top shelf over the shower, then leave for several more hours for the water to warm in plastic bag. We purposely built the shower right next to the heater hoping sufficient hot air would rise to the roof of the porta cabin and heat the water sufficiently to take the Arctic chill off it. Tarka is about to try the first shower this evening so we will see…! Another example, Charlie pointed out to me the other day as he came in laughing at the randomness of cold weather living, was when he could hear sawing and wondered in to see what I was creating next, only to find that was in fact sawing away with the large wood saw, but what I was desperately trying to cut through was the weeks rashen of cheese!
I even managed a short run this morning up and down the runway, my poor lungs were the only thing to suffer, with every freezing inhalation causing a deep burning pain. Couple more days and I am sure they will have got the gist.
We are working on the video of camp but having a few technical issues…will keep trying.
