Arctic Marine Geology Cruise

Rosie, Sarah, Ailsa and I were all lucky enough to go on a week’s cruise on the Helmer Hanssen above 80° north as part of our Arctic Marine Geology module. 

Map of cruise sites

 We spent most of the time hiding in the fjords doing multi beam, seismic surveys and taking gravity cores due to the high waves further out which made everyone sick. We first sailed to Rijpfjorden, in Nordauslandet which took us over a day and a half, so had lots of time to kill........most of our class have now mastered how to knit and play chess.

We didn’t get much sleep onboard due to hitting quite a few big icebergs which threw you out of bed (Rosie didn't even wake up!!) and as we were surveying constantly we had to get up and do watch for 2 hours each during the night, so was a great chance to do some more knitting!!   

Through the week we had lectures (often cancelled due to people being sea sick), worked on the sediment cores and then each group presented their cores and preliminary interpretations to the class.

Apart from that not alot went on apart from stunning views, polar bears and walruses…oh yeah and more knitting and playing chess!! So here are a few pictures to show you what we got up to……

Rosie & I getting one of many knitting lessons.

One of many card games.

Can't believe they let me loose with a power tool!!

Core logging.....mud, mud....and more mud!!

Foram & lithology analysis.

I'm on a boat!!

Hard at work on watch!!

The scenery was amazing but the photos just don’t do it justice at all!!

Can you spot the polar bear?!?!

 A walrus chillin' on an iceberg

 We got back to sunny Longyearbyen and got told by Riko our lecturer that the cruise wasn’t over till the cruise meal was over. The tequila was flowing and finished the night off in Huset the nightclub with some awesome dancing from Bill Austin who also joined us on the cruise.