Jan Mayen: arrival

Fri
4 Jul
2014

2014, 03rd/04th July Of cour­se it was quite a reli­ef to reach Jan May­en after this crossing. As we went clo­ser to land, the move­ment of the boat decreased and heads pop­ped brief­ly up to get the first glim­p­ses of Jan May­en and Bee­ren­berg, which was towe­ring abo­ve the clouds. We ancho­red in Kval­ross­buk­ta on Thurs­day in the late evening, almost at mid­night. The shel­ter of the bay made life much more enjoya­ble again, some­thing we all app­re­cia­ted great­ly. None of us had enough ener­gy to go ashore. It was gre­at to get some food again, a need that had lar­ge­ly been igno­red for seve­ral days, and Sigur­dur was quick to put some­thing very enjoya­ble tog­e­ther, which chee­red ever­y­bo­dy up great­ly.

Some had to dis­co­ver that things often don’t stay dry on a small sai­ling boat in bad wea­ther. It was not nice to arri­ve at Jan May­en with wet stuff and damp slee­ping bags. More water­pro­of bags would be on the list next time.

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

After a good cou­ple of hours of well-deser­ved rest and a hear­ty break­fast, it was time to go ashore. The hours went quick­ly by sort­ing gear out, dry­ing wet things, car­ry­ing per­so­nal belon­gings, tents and all the rest of it from the beach to the camp, coll­ec­ting tons of stones to secu­re the tents … I don’t think I had ever car­ri­ed so many stones befo­re in my life.

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