Jökull - 31.12.2001, Qupperneq 72

E. Lyn Lewis
went to bed at 17:00 and arose at 00:30 on day nine.
A cold clear night with crackling tent and frozen
fingers. Hard snow, good going and by 07:30 we had
reached Grímsvötn and were camped at the southern
edge of this caldera, which was íilled with mist. Later
on it cleared and far below we could see lakes of vary-
ing extent kept open by volcanic activity beneath the
ice. A glacier flows downwards towards these lakes;
from crevasses issue plumes of volcanic smoke - not
a place to enter. The ridge of the tent was festooned
by airing sleeping bags, drying socks, etc. Inside we
were shielded from the sun but were very hot; outside
we needed all our clothing to protect us. Volcanic ash
was deposited on irregular areas all over the Vatnajök-
ull, having two immediate effects on our operations.
The grit on the snow surface made the sledge far more
difficult to pull and where the surface was dirty with
this deposit the enhanced radiation absorption caused
abrupt changes in level (Figure 3). The sledge had
to be lifted up 30 cm, occasionally 50 cm, from dirty
onto clean snow surfaces.
Crossing the ice cap had shown us another
deficiency in our sledge design. We had attached the
load to the sledge deck piece by piece, with a cover to
keep off rain (Figure 4). Occasionally things fell off
as their ties became undone. In one instance we lost
the tent this way and had to retrace our steps to reco-
ver it. A later design had a long canvas coffin-shaped
“bucket” lashed to the deck, forming an integral part
of the sledge. This bucket had sewn up sides and fold
over flaps with ties on top and contained all the items
to be transported. A year or two later a tragedy on the
Greenland ice cap taught another lesson. Three men,
camped on the ice in a high wind, were deprived of
food and equipment when their sledge blew away and
ran into a crevasse. They died just before reaching
help. Not only was our equipment much improved for
Svalbard two years later, but the main guys of our tent
were always attached to the sledge!
Weight was of critical importance to us. The three
weeks’ food required two carries to the ice cap; the
remaining 2.5 weeks supply could then be placed
on the sledge. We reckoned that one weeks’ food
would remain after leaving the ice, a reasonable back
pack load and enough to reach Mývatn. We had to
provide some form of insulation on the tent floor, but
air mattresses were too heavy and lightweight foam
plastic pads did not exist in 1956. A piece of heavy
duty wrapping material, consisting of two layers of
heavy brown paper separated by tarred butter musl-
in, was cut to fit the tent. Between us and the snow
was the tent floor, this composite sheet, then a layer
of our outer clothing beneath the sleeping bag. One
“dived” onto the floor from the tent doorway to make
the proper indentation in the underlying snow to fit
one’s hip. It was wonderful to lie in the tent, protected
from the sun, but much moisture was produced. At
night the tent would be folded up, not rolled, because
the frozen condensation had made the fabric rigid and
much heavier. We needed plenty of drinking water to
cope with the heat and dehydrated foods, but fuel for
our little kerosene stove was limited and with some
success we melted granular snow by placing it in a
plastic bag on the sledge to absorb sunlight.
On day ten we arose just after midnight finding
heavy mist, but got away by 02:30 on a compass
course for Bárðarbunga (2000 m), the second highest
point of the Vatnajökull. “Point” is a mis-nomer as
Bárðarbunga has such gentle slopes that the summit is
difficult to determine. We camped in the mist which
did not clear until after midday so we spent day eleven
in camp, estimated 8km south of the summit, gett-
ing up at 22:00 to find mist and wet snow. At 00:00
the snow was not frozen but “enough is enough” and
we decided to get out. Travelling north by compass
we must have passed very close to the summit and at
14:00 on day twelve (9 August) we reached Kistufell
(Figure 5) on the northem edge of the ice cap after
17 hours of activity. We spent many of these hours
struggling through breakable crust, a condition where
the surface of the snow freezes leaving a soft layer
beneath. On each stride this crust breaks beneath the
weight of the booted man hauling a sledge, destroy-
ing all rhythm, the secret of stamina. Looking north,
we could see the edge of the ice cap stretching from
east to west, a contour that was repeated in the sky
by heavy banks of cloud. In the intense sun on a
white surface we saw the dull black of the lava desert
beneath its cloud cover and wondered if it was here
that Tolkien had first imagined “The land of Mordor,
70 JÖKULLNo. 51