Today we are having the big ski test. You might not believe this but for Felix it is the first time ever on skis in his entire life. We ski on slippery ice and all of us fall down on the hard frosty ground at least once. When Mike asks us how our experience was, Felix just answers: "Painful!" What an excellent start!
We are in Resolute Bay, above the Arctic Circle where the Inuit kids play outside until midnight since it's light 24 hours a day. Strolling around the little village (215 inhabitants) we discover a curiosity. There, next to a small house is hanging a polar bear, shot only a couple of days ago. This animal is one out of 20 bears the community is allowed to shoot per year. It's a regulation that tries to compromise between ancient traditions and wildlife preservation.
We are learning many important lessons from Mike and the team. Their stories are about polar bears, dangerous crevasses, frost bites… We are sucking up everything we hear and learn – it will for sure come in very useful once we are out on the ice.
As usual, large groups that travel all seem to have one or two hick-ups, but luckily for Mike Horn and the Young Explorers, they were not two serious. Chinese YEP, Felix and New Zealand YEP, Rick both had flight delays which meant a late arival in Ottawa. Luckily however, they still mnaged to meet up with Mike, the team and the other Young Explorers the following day, just prior to their departure for Resolute, Nunavut, in the northern territories of Canada.
Not a minute to loose. With one evening in Ottawa, Mike was able to begin the thorough check of all the Young Explorers equipment, the trying on of shoes, checking for sizing of skis, boots etc, all crucial for an uneventual expedition to the Magnetic North Pole.
Team Photographer Dmitry Sharomov had the time to send us these few photos. Looking forward to some more news tommorrow after the groups arrival in Resolute.
Early Friday morning the YEP's Luana, Tirza, Tiziana and Michelle were excited to meet in Basel. Today's mission: Spread the Pangea Message in two short presentations at EUforIA (Europeans United for Informed Action).
EUforIA is a huge exhibition where more than 800 young adults gathered and learned how they can get active. They coudl discover different workshops and presentations and it was our task to motivate them to do something for a better world!
So we introduced them to Pangaea: Who is Mike Horn? Why is Pangaea Expedition simply the best thing that can happen to you? How can you be the change you want to see in the world? What difficulties do you meet before, during and after an expedition? Why is it totally worth to face these challenges? About these and more questions we talked at a time 15 minutes. We gave our best to show our enthusiasm for our planet and the project. Hopefully some got infected with “YEP-fever” and will become part of the Pangaea family!
The contact to get the chance to do this we established at the 5th YEP-Meeting in Basel: Waiting at the train station for the last Yep’s to arrive, Jeronimo Calderon, the founder of EUforIA, asked us what we’re doing. Since Pangaea exactly fits in this programm he invited us to promote Mike Horn’s vision at the “EUforIA – STEP into Action”-Event. It’s amazing how easy you get in contact with people who support your ideas – Try it out too by being active ☺ !
As Mike and the Young Explorers prepare for the PANGAEA BORNEO ACT PROJECT in Malaysia, yet another group of Young Explorers are preparing for the PANGAEA GEBERIT ACT Project in India.
Back home in Château-d'Oex, Switzerland the Mike Horn Team are examining all the recent applications for the Magnetic North Pole Selection Camp.
As Pangaea waits patiently in the Sutera Habour Marina in Kota Kinabalu, 6 youths prepare their bags. This time Mike Horn and Pangaea's crew set forth on a new adventure – to set up CSR solutions on the islands around Borneo, Malaysia.
The youths will join Pangaea on the 13th of January and during 12 days will search for and establish a programme that will enhance the beauty of the region whilst preserving the natural habitat and ecosystems of this amazing region.
The following Pangaea Ambassadors and Young Explorers will take part of this project event:
Hayden Cockburn has teamed up with five students from around the world to join widely acclaimed South African international explorer Mike Horn on an expedition to the Kamchatka Peninsula on Russia’s north-eastern coast.
“This is not the end, it’s just the beginning” Mike told us as it was time to say goodbye. The beginning of a journey of diverse involvement in our environment and communities together for each other and for our planet. I said goodbye to all members of this awesome team that all did their part in making this expedition the great experience it was. We Young Explorers stood in a circle, group hug and heads together, and reflected on the fact that we actually all had quite different personalities but every one of us was needed to make us succeed as a team. We learnt from each other and had very intense days that nobody can take from us. Lots of “D and M’s” standing for deep and meaningful conversations and many good laughs. We agreed that we had a bond for a lifetime. You try to find the right words to say goodbye, tell the people that they have won a part in your heart, say thank you for all the work they have done for you, that you appreciate them for who they are but sometimes it’s really difficult to put in words what you really feel.
As the whole team left to Moscow at noon Dmitry and I went to Yelizovo’s school. We were in an empty classroom waiting for the kids to arrive and I was trying to think of a sentence to start with. But I couldn’t. “Well if I can’t think of something now how will I know what to say once they all sit down and look at me?” I stood in front of about forty Russian kids from 13 to 16 and started. I caught their attention by asking a little boy if he could point with his finger on a big world map where Greece was. The country of each Young Explorer followed and they knew them all. I was surprised. I told them that I had no idea where Kamchatka was before I heard about it thought The Young Explorer’s Program. After showing them a Moose Cut they were really excited, laughing and one after the other raised their hand and had a question. Which one was the hardest expedition, mabe there been any Russian YEPS, what did you like about Kamchatka, what animals did you see, must I know English, does that mean I don’t have to go to school, and so on. They wanted to see more Moose Cuts and came up with more and more questions. When I asked who would like to go on an expedition with Mike Horn you could see the whole classroom filled with hands up in the air. The principal said that there was no more time. At the end of our talk a little girl came up to me and asked me for an autograph. More kids followed and I gave the first autograph of my life. I was quite amazed but it made me realize once more that I am in a very fortunate position and probably would have done the same thing at that age.
I told them about the dog sledding and about the project we are getting started to support the native people of the north and push eco tourism. Right away a girl wanted to know how we were doing it, another one where these dogs were because she wanted to go there and try it out herself.
Today made me realize how easy it is to spread the Pangaea message and that this definitely is the beginning of my journey of the acting part. I am already looking forward to the next time I will get to see one the team members!
Today we set off on a 4 hour bus trip to North-West of Petropavlovsk, the capital of Kamchatka, to arrive at the thermal hot springs. Along the way we stopped on the side of the road to eat a traditional Russian snack called Piroshky which was basically a bread roll filled with meat, eggs and onions, potatoes or berries.
Mike begins to tell a story that has all of the young explorers captivated. The realism and the importance of our future and the survival of the planet was now present, the great discussions continued into the night in the hot pool, these topics include what our ideas are for a more sustainable future and how we as individuals can make this happen. We have begun to explore this as we have a new project lined up for early next year which focuses on three main aims, sustainable tourism, bringing back old traditions of the local community and working against alcoholism in the native tribes of the north of Kamchatka who have throughout the years lost their focus and hope. I have really enjoyed the education side of this expedition-there`s always an opportunity to learn something new from the amazing team surrounding us.
As the expedition is drawing to an end our reflection process is increasing and we have had lots of time to talk and bond as a group. Spending time with this incredible group of people I believe we have grown stronger as a team and became such good friends-friendships that will last forever.
We spent another night in a circle around the fire in the jurt next to the dogs. It was raining all night long and none of us slept through without getting woken up at least once. But the sound of a rain storm out in the nowhere of Kamchatka is one of the better ones you can have accompanying your sleep. In the morning we sat together with the owners of “snow dogs” and had a little meeting. We made plans for a project with the ultimate goal to reintroduce old traditions to the native people and to further push sustainable tourism in Kamchatka. We are planning to do this by setting up a website for their dog sledding eco trips and raising funds to support their organization that helps the native people in the north of Kamchatka. Mike gave us good tips on how to realize an idea, set up a goal and define the necessary steps. It’s a wonderful place and after having breakfast and saying goodbye we had a nice morning trek through the rainy birch forest to get to the paved road.
Arriving in the capital of Kamchatka it felt a little awkward to be back in civilization. The misted window hid the view but there was quite a lot of traffic, lots of old buildings and slushy snow was lying on the streets. After being out in the open for so long, it felt very strange stepping into a shopping mall where the shelves were lined with shiny products and there were people everywhere (and clean people at that…) We all felt a little bewildered by this drastic change of pace and although we appreciated the familiarity of a city I think the others would agree that we were already longing to be back out in the quiet snowy wilderness. Lena, our great cook that has been with us since the beginning of the expedition, made sure we got lunch and we did what you usually do on rainy days: we went to the museum of Petropavlovsk. Our guide was an elderly Russian woman, Lena translated and we heard some interesting facts on Kamchatka. And we had fun trying on the traditional clothes.
In the evening we got the opportunity to go and soak in hot springs again! It’s been a week since we were last in the water and we were all really excited and screaming as we went down the slide in a long chain face forward holding each other’s feet. Great fun!
The rain pounds down on our yurt roof and walls. We are back at the dog-sledding base, Snow Dogs. The weather has taken a turn for the worse and once again Mother Nature has reminded us who is boss. All around me clothes are hanging up to dry and I feel as though I am sitting amidst a rainforest made of wet pants and dripping gloves. I haven`t brushed my teeth in about a week. I`ve been wearing the same underwear for 5 days and showering or washing my hair is a distant dream that I left behind in the hotel in Yelizovo on day 1. Now multiply that by 13, the number of people on our team, add a good rain-soaking and you get some sense of what this rainforest smells like!
The bad weather is here to stay and the sudden downpour and rise in temperatures meant that we couldn`t attempt to summit Avachinsky again and so we opted to hike the 27km back down to our yurt.
The hike was incredibly beautiful. We passed over the same route we took up with the dogs but things looked rather different on foot. The rain had changed the landscape a lot and there was less snow and a lot more ice and slush. Along the way we stopped and saw bear tracks and ate some delicious red berries that were growing all along our path.
As I walk I look around at the landscape. Having a chance to move more slowly through it, the utter beauty of it all hits me yet again. The contrasts: icy white landscape and skeletal trees. Puddles of still water that shiver as drops of rain bounce up off them. Red berries, black branches and snow.
The rain is here to stay and so are the “warm” temperatures and so no one is really sure what the next few days will hold. Whatever it is I can be sure that, as every day in Kamchatka so far has been, it will be another opportunity to be stunned by nature, push myself, feel tiny and insignificant and yet feel so alive and happy.