Wednesday 5, September 2012

Return: Mountain Views. (Photo: Max Heikenfeld, Alfred Wegener Institute)After eight weeks on "our" island we yesterday said goodbye. The last days were once more stressful because we had to do so many things before leaving.

We needed to ensure that our field measuriement equipment was ready for the long polar winter, both regarding the power supply and the memory cards, so that they would hold out until the arrival of the next expedition team next spring. In addition, of course, we needed to pack the boxes for shipment back to Germany and do a very thorough inventory of what was left to the station for the the coming year.

 

On our last night, the island was once again at its best: the now already autumnal gold Tundra was dipped from a beautiful sunset in a golden light. For most of us, it offered again a good opportunity for a longer or shorter walk across the island.
We were notified of our departure later in the evening: the ship that would take us the next day back to Tiksi planed to our coastline and chimed in nicely timing the sound with the diesel generator of the new research station.

 

Waldemar looks at our logistics, Samoilov. (photo: Max Heikenfeld, Alfred Wegener Institute)The next morning we all quickly loaded the remaining cargo on the ship. Unlike recent departure scenes where other people still remained on the island, this time there was really no one we could wave to - execpt the station dog Grey, who remained on the island.
The five hour boat ride back to the mainland passed unexpectedly quickly. We drove through the main channel of the river Lena, which once offered beautiful views of the islands and the adjacent mountains. Upon arrival, we dragged the duffel bags and boxes to the truck that was waiting for us and drove a bumpy road back to Tiksi, from where we had left almost eight weeks earlier.

At this point I would like to express a very big "Spasibo" ("thanks") to Luba who stayed here in Tiksi, for the culinary treat over the several weeks. For everyone else there was still a little more travelling before getting back home to St. Petersburg, Berlin and Hamburg.

We are gradually getting again used to the "normal life" here in Tiksi, like having bills in our hands or listening to the news, which have been almost completely absent form our lives in Samoylov. I'm sure I have missed out of a lot of things that have taken place back home this summer.

 

But before I take a closer look at the newspapers, I will finish one of the last expedition postings under the northern lights making my first expedition experience in Samoilov complete.

 

Greetings

Max