£2 CHALLENGER 



our vocal and muscular efforts. It was midnight bv this time and we spent a 

 peaceful night only to wake up and find it blowing like hell and drifting hard, 

 cutting down visibility to about 2oo yards. 

 Blew hard all day. What a country ! 



Monday, 26th February. Another wasted day as it continued to blow like 

 hell from the west and then veered to the north-west from which direction 

 the drift was much worse. Dennis and I spent a lot of the forenoon repairing 

 Henry's snow house and spent the afternoon reading. 



Tuesday, 27th February. A more or less decent day for a change during 

 which we managed to do a certain amount of work. Marlowe and I went up 

 Noazunaluk and a pretty perilous ascent and descent it was too. I had to cut 

 steps on the snow slope which was as hard and as slippery as ice and one 

 false step and one would have careened over either side and had a vertical 

 drop of about 400 feet. Observing was an infernally cold business and in 

 consequence a long one, taking three and a half hours for a job that under 

 ordinary conditions would only take about an hour. After every two or three 

 angles we had to stop and dance about and fling our arms in order to warm our 

 hands and feet. The main trouble is that one gets sweating hot running 

 alongside the komatik and climbing up the hills to the different stations, and 

 one's duffles and socks which are by this time damp, freeze in one's boots 

 and until you can get going again your feet are encased in ice. Every evening 

 when I take my boots off the duffles are frozen to the soles and take a lot 

 of getting out, and there is usually hoar frost in my socks as well, to add to 

 the gaiety of nations. Got back to camp about 1730 to find Henry had got 

 back from Nain and brought back all the odds and ends sent for as well as a 

 nice present in the shape of smoked trout from Mr. Grubb, a delicacy he 

 knows I love. 



Wednesday, 28th February. A peculiarly bloodstained day. It was blowing 

 fairly hard with a lot of low drift, but as it was beginning to cloud up I thought 

 the wind would probably drop, so we made a start. The trip out to Central 

 Island was foul, so much snow drifting that we could hardly open our eyes. 

 Having climbed the hill we were out of the drift and the wind seemed not too 

 bad until Marlowe and I tried to erect the windbreak. It was all we could do 

 to hold onto it and when we finally got it up, the guys parted, and they were 

 made of brand new stuff too. I gave it up as hopeless and, as the wind had 

 increased, went across to the island where Dennis was observing only to 

 find that he had been more lucky. His little island was more or less sheltered 

 by Aulatsevik and so he had managed to observe. I did a bit of coastlining and 

 shot up a few marks but it was a far from pleasant job as we were working 

 up wind and it got so bad that I eventually packed up at i ^ 00 and returned to 

 camp. I got the snow house cleared out and cut up the floor and re-levelled 

 it and put down spruce branches as beds for Dennis and me, as I had had 

 to send Henry to Black Island this morning with our sleeping bags and 

 deerskins, they having got sopping wet through the snow melting under our 

 bodies. He got back about 1900 and now we are most comfortable and the 

 beds feel like feather ones with the spruce under us. 



