Missed yesterday’s post? Click here.
Got up at 4:45am from my rest period. Accidentally woke up Mike along the way. Then intentionally woke up Karts, as agreed, as I needed him to switch the WiFi on from his and Leven’s cabin. This accidentally woke Leven up.
“JUST OFF CALL WITH PETER”
When I was finally logged in at 4:59am, I was eager to get the call with my client over and done with, as my fingers were starting to freeze stiff. But no such luck. At 5:11am I saw a WhatsApp message pop up “Hi”, then, at 5:14am: “Just off call with Peter.”
CHEERFUL PETE
Cheerful Pete is another freelance consultant with a different skill set to mine, whom they employ. He rents two desks at a fancy office space sharing centre in the City, employs a good looking assistant. Apparently, that justifies a direct open line to the client’s chief executive and a cool £125 more per day from the client over a grumpy consultant with no assistant and no rented office space. At 5:30am I woke up Karts once more, as agreed, and asked him to kindly switch the WiFi off again. What a hassle. Now I owed my fellow team-mates favours and apologies, all for a conf call that never took place.
9/11
Spent a minute thinking about 9/11. At the time it had happened, I had been working at the office of a client just outside Munich. Terrible, highly unprofessional place. For example, I remember the Client Director nodding with his head towards his very very big-hearted, short-skirted, brunette, 22-year old assistant right in front of her, while he was chatting with me during tea break. “Tina is really good with the clients. Really good. Gives them all they want.” He winked at me and rolled his eyes lustily at her cleavage.
STARING AT THE SCREEN
When the news broke, my desk neighbour Tim happened to have the news running on one of his two screens, and the rest of us all gathered around him. It felt entirely unreal and no one talked much.
TRAUMATISED COLLEAGUES
Fast forward six years, and I was working for a commodity brokerage firm in London whose Manhattan office had been in the floor of the South Tower into which one of the planes had crashed. The 9/11 anniversaries at that place, even in their far-away (far from New York) London office, were a huge affair each September. So many of the longer-tenured colleagues had stories to tell how they were scheduled to be at the Twin Towers at the time, but they had missed their flight, not found a taxi on time, or whatever it was. So many of them had lost dear friends.
“THE DAY TODAY”
And then I thought of Chris Morris’s The Day Today episode making light of 9/11 shortly after the event. It is about a reporter called Peter O’Hanraha-hanrahan (based on actual BBC reporter Frank O’Hanrahan or similar. He is supposed to report from the World Trade Conference at the top floor of the North Tower, which are taking place at that very moment. However, he has slept in and simply calls audio-only from his hotel room to the studio, pretending to be at the conference. He is entirely unaware of the events that had started to unfold in New York that morning, a few minutes before he went on live television.
THE PLAN
The current plan is to start a 48h 40-mile push tomorrow morning, to get ourselves within reach of Paulatuk based small fishing boats. Hopefully one of those boats can then pull Hermione to Paulatuk and take us onboard.
For tomorrow’s post click here.
HIGHLIGHTS OF THE NORTHWEST PASSAGE EXPEDITION
22 July – LHR to YCB
2 August 2024 (Cambridge Bay to Starvation Bay)
4 August 2024 (Starvation Bay to Wellington Bay)
12 August 2024 (From Wellington Bay 6h further Westward)
15 August 2024 (53mi/96km from Botany Island to Richardson Islands)
18 August 2024 (from Richardson Islands past Marker Islands)
22 August 2024 (23mi/37km Westward from Miles and Nauyan Islands past Lady Franklin Point – extremely tough conditions – ‘MISSION IMPOSSIBLE’)
23 August 2024 (Dreadful 10 miles – 12mi/19km – that felt like 100 miles to Douglas Island; welcome committee of two dozen seals)
25 August 2024 (An easy 19mi/31km from Douglas Island to Lambert Island; MS Fridtjoff Nansen passing)
27 August 2024 (An easy 7mi/9km along Lambert Island; yacht Night Owl passing by us)
28 August 2024 (STARTING OUR 64MI/104KM PUSH EARLY; passing Hanseatic Spirit, MS Roald Amundsen, yacht Honshu)
29 August 2024 (Arriving at Cape Hope after 64mi/104km – new team best)
30 August 2024 (EMERGENCY BEACHING at a bay next to Cape Hope)
31 August 2024 (CABIN FLOODED; LEAK FOUND)
Mike’s Poem about our Northwest Passage Expedition
3 September 2024 (REPAIRING HERMIONE)
DETAILS OF LEVEN’S MASTERPIECE: THE PRELIMINARY REPAIR and preparation of the re-launch of Hermione
4 September 2024 (A LOT OF DIGGING and another unsuccessful attempt to refloat the boat)
5 September 2024 (REFLOATING HERMIONE, MOTORING TOWARDS PAULATUK; MILITARY PLANE PASSING)
6 September 2024 (BACK TO ROWING AFTER EMERGENCY MOTOR BREAKS)
8 September 2024 (my 50th birthday; ALMOST CRASHING THE BOAT into rocks; Skynet; a pod of whales)
12 September 2024 (starting our last big push before Paulatuk; RUNNING AGROUND 3X; BIOLUMINESCENCE; Northern lights)
13 September 2024 (ALL HELL BREAKING LOOSE – ALMOST CRASHING INTO CLIFFS)
NORTHERN LIGHTS, 15 September, near Paulatuk
15 September 2024 (REACHING PAULATUK)
16 September 2024 (eating proper food; shower; the good life)
19 September 2024 (flying back home; 5 flights; Breakfast Club at Inuvik Airport)
Stefan will be rowing the Northwest Passage this summer – A little Q&A
Northwest Passage Expedition – Kit List
Trevor’s Travel Trivia IX – The Northwest Passage
My home town’s newspaper, Burghauser Anzeiger, has published an article about the Expedition
Post-expedition Q&As – Coming back from the Arctic after two months
