Day (-2) - Camera or Extra Shoes?

Heading out today on a two-week trip to Ny-Alesund (pronounced "New Oleson") Research Station on the island of Svalbard in the Arctic.

Starting off here with a short lesson in geography!  - Svalbard is a Norwegian archipelago east of Greenland that is located well into the Arctic Circle. Svalbard is the northernmost permanently inhabited settlement of humans, and Longyearbean, the capital of Svalbard, is the northernmost city in the world! Other fun facts about Svalbard can be found here - https://www.lifeinnorway.net/svalbard-facts/

For me, the most exciting fact is that Svalbard is home to one of the largest populations of polar bears (about 3000) in the world and we are hoping to get a glimpse of at least one of these awesome creatures during our time there. 

I fly out of Washington and go through Amsterdam and Oslo to get to Longyearbean. There, I will meet up with my colleague and we take a 25 minute flight to Ny Alesund Research Station. We will be on station for about 2 weeks where we hope to collect Pteropods ("Sea Butterflies") from the bay, and study these organisms using videogrammetry. More on the research later.

All morning was spent doing multiple iterations of weighing luggage, eliminating stuff, and reweighing because we have a strict weight limit (between the two of us) of 50 kg for our research equipment and personal belongings. So, between my camera and an extra pair of shoes, guess what got eliminated!

More in my next post when I get to Longyearbean.