The first thing I noticed about Churchill, is the way people talk about the temperature here. They dont bother using the word “minus”, and they tend to talk in windchill temps, rather than air temps, because, as any one who’s ever been in -35C/40kmh wind will tell you, windchill temp is the temp that really matters. So when i got off the train in Churchill on Saturday, I was told the temperature was, simply, “58″. By which they meant -58C. Sunday was 43, Monday 38 and today, everyone was saying how warm it was because it only hit 33, and the air temp was actually an incredibly balmy 17. Its funny how quickly your perspective can change, I actually caught myself thinking how warm it was today (and it really was!).

The next thing I noticed was the ice. As we expected, the sea ice here is a fair bit rougher that in James Bay, and it is extremely jagged close to shore, partly due to the immense tides here (4.5m!) but seems to flatten out offshore some distance.

Ben arrived today, looking like he’d slept about 5 hours in the last 48, so we took the sled out on rough ice in 40kmh winds to wake him up a bit. Seemed to do the trick for a while, but he flopped very badly at dinner, and is now sleeping it off.

So we’re both finally here, with all our gear, provisions etc, in one piece! Neither of us can quite believe it!

The plan at this stage is to head off tomorrow or the next day, weather permitting, to discover what conditions are really like out there on the bay, and to hone our up-wind technique for a run up to Arviat (approx 200km north). 

Wish us Luck!

Dave