Blog #5: Practicing Winter Skills

The Anonymous Butter

But first … some Caribou trivia provided by Griffin Schneider:

What do Caribou herders say in Lapland?

a. Woo-hoop b. Lets go c. Piko dooka d. Muaski mulaski

* Answer is provided at the end of the blog*

Griffin of the Caribou

We left Heartbeet on the morning of Tuesday, February 25th. Before we left, Misha split us up into groups of two and assigned us chapters of The Old American to read together on the 10ish hour-long drive up to Manoir des Sapins on the Gaspe Peninsula. We were sad to wave goodbye to Hannah and Oliver. Oliver especially was hard to leave behind as he had been with us since semester start, over a month ago. 

On the van ride up we read, ate, napped and observed the world changing around us: deciduous trees disappearing, being replaced by larch, jack pine, cedar...

Crossing the border was surprisingly easy. We parked and walked into a small building to get our passports checked. The lady at the front desk was really nice and asked us all about our expedition. We didn’t even need to show our travel documents; all she asked for was our word on it. Meanwhile families of other ethnicities were stopped, questioned, and made to wait. Why is our so very global world so stuck on diversity as a factor of exclusion or placement? The difference in border crossing experience seemed too painfully obvious not to mention in discussion. We need to constantly recognize the privilege we are granted in our society - and use it to mold the world into a more inclusive, welcoming, and safe place. 

Perhaps, after all, the nice lady at the border shouldn’t have let us through. For it wasn't long before we were creating a war zone of snowballs at the first rest area in Quebec! We stopped along the St. Lawrence River just as the sun was setting. Attired in our breathable ankle height sneakers, we went running into the deep snow and jumping off a wall to reach the miniature icebergs in the water. On these ice islands we played the high-stakes game of 'how many semester students can you fit on one ice chunk without losing one to the frigid waters below?' We all won the game – there were no losers, especially considering that the sunset was gorgeous, like a melting pound of butter over the ice-sprinkled oceanic water. We found ourselves in one of the only places in the east coast where you can watch the sun set and sunrise over open water, if you’re up to turning to face the other direction. 

Snowball fight on the way to Gaspe

Kai on the floating ice of the St. Lawrence

Tired of being cooped up in a van, we reached Manoir des Sapins and were greeted warmly by Aurelie, Didier, and Claudine, the owners of our hostel. We felt right at home and hope we didn’t make ourselves too comfortable! The place was so cozy and obviously well loved. We had a good night’s sleep before driving to the Parc National de la Gaspesie the next morning. 

Our home at Manoir des Sapins

Pele and his harmonica

The first day of expedition was so ridiculously warm - with the sun beating down on us and a long uphill - that shirts came off and we started to get our tan on! We were glad to be on skis. Suddenly 10k passed by pretty fast, especially considering we were staying in cabins and didn’t need to carry our billowing wall tent and titanium stove.

Little Cabin in the Woods

We sped along the trail. We had the chance to learn how to ski up and down and on all kinds of terrain.

Katarina the Great

Zoe's graceful wipeout

We got plenty of practice following stream beds, which will be our method of transportation in Uapishka. The tricky thing with streams is that they are sneaky little buggers that do what they can to trap you in holes of snow. Here ice and water reign and hold onto you for as long as possible. Sometimes there are weak snow bridges that crumble under your feet, other times the precarious placement of skis sends one tumbling into the depths below.

Calla in the 20-foot hole she fell into

And while it is neither fun nor ideal to fall in, we now know how to handle it. Since we are traveling in a group we have each other to rely on and to help pull us out of a rock and a hard place, sometimes literally. 

Eliza's snow dance

Out in the Snow

Julia Danko

Out in the snow

Out on the trail

15k we go

Through white puffs big as hale

Spruce all around 

Fresh air in my lungs

Red-cheeked face in the ground (twice)

Grateful there is no food to lug

Despite painful feet 

and falling a lot

Gaspe is a great treat 

The day is just what I sought

Julia on the edge of open lead

We have also worked on our navigation skills – going out on group and solo navigation assignments almost every day. Streams are often difficult to find when covered in snow, while many others aren’t marked on the maps. The land in general is disorienting when thickly disguised with evergreen boughs and snow. This then becomes a savior in itself – a blessing and a curse, as you need it to retrace your tracks to come back home. And luckily everyone did just that: came back.

Late night embrace for returning food drop party

Pow

Rachel Foucher

We ate powdered cow

Before hitting the fresh new pow

Shredding up and shredding down

We met some folks from our part of town

Lic and split along Lac Cascapedia

Then we stopped and were met by Misha.

Rachel breaking trail

Otter Slide

In our cabins we read Where The Rivers Flow North by Howard Frank Mosher, solved ridiculous math problems, taught each other about winter adaptations, weather patterns, geology, and continued our French lessons with Zoe, and wilderness first aid with Jo and Misha. Each night a few of us built a snow cave or igloo to sleep in.

Sarah the artist

Sydney the snow mason

Snow caves are always better on the second night after the ceiling has had a chance to ice over and no longer sheds snow! Snow caves are places of slight claustrophobia as the smaller they are the warmer they are. The lack of room in them makes getting in and out of your sleeping bag quite difficult. On top of that, because of the colder temperatures your body goes through polyuria and tries to expel as much fluid as possible – not indifferent to how some insects survive the winter.

Igloo builders

For us it means getting up many times during the night to urinate. So imagine this tight, low ceilinged snow cave, packed with three people and one small tunnel-like exit. Imagine the course of the night, a few hours of sleep until one person has to squirm out of their bag to pee. In order for this to happen they not only need to exit their own cocoon but also have to squeeze themselves over the sardines next to them. Once they’ve returned and settled down you’ve got maybe another hour or two before someone else has to get up – a real great sleep! 

Audrey sends her greeting from Santa's mines

Maybe we didn’t always sleep the best, but we now have something greater to live for. You may be thinking: the mountains or expedition or community? Yeah, these are important but now, thanks to Misha’s method of winning us over, we have Sala (salted pork) to live for, Russian chocolates, and warm sweetened condensed milk. All of these strangely amazing Russian foods were whipped out of his pack as if he were a magician and we were the audience eagerly awaiting magic. The Sala particularly was a new exotic food for most of us, and while not every one of us took to it, most did. Misha had a brick-sized block of it, in all its white buttery glory, in his pack and would slice off slivers for us to suck on. 

The pinnacle of our journey was summiting Mount Logan. We stayed at La Nyctal cabin for three nights waiting for the right conditions. A nor'easter hit us and we lived in whiteout conditions for those two days! On our third morning at La Nyctal the skies cleared out and we took our chance.

Mount Logan

For all that Mt. Logan had hung over our heads, it wasn’t particularly difficult and the view at the top made every stress dream worth it. You could see all the Chic-Chocs, the plateau drop off into the rolling hills below, and the St. Lawrence.  We sang loudly, danced around on our skis, and Sarah yodeled. In that moment up there in the early morning light we were truly high on life. 

Elijah, a brave mountaineer

Mikaio Silván

We set off as Parmesan cheese started to fly,

How we are crazy enough to do stuff like this I don’t know why. 

We met some guys at the top of the hill, 

Their comical comedy just surfaced at will.

Down the back slopes we shot like rockets, and some of us seemed to take to the sky.

Flying Jo

Mont McGarrigles in the background and Chic Choc Plato below taken from Peak Aube

I am truly sorry I cannot share with you all the details of our expedition; it could take years and wouldn’t be right. I can tell you that we had all sorts of fun encounters: moose, grouse, Québécois, New Hampshirites, Whiskey Jacks, along with just having an amazing time in the deep snow of the Chic-Chocs. We are getting ready to head off tomorrow with Thomas and Jo to Uapishka, further north and inland, where we might get the chance to experience -40, where degrees Celsius and Fahrenheit meet to freeze the toes of the weary. I would like on behalf of all the students, to thank all those special people that sent us letters and food. The freshly baked cookies were especially salivated over. 

Mountain Ash snack

Gaspe Expedition completed! Village Grand Nature Chic Choc

Moose Poem

Sydney Harris

Elusive moose

Oversized dog horse

Chewing up the trail with your big hooves

My envy of your ease 

To tour the dense trees 

Has made me eager to meet you

Stomping on la neige

Les nuages floating through

Thank you for leaving us the gift of your poo.

Elena, the snowgirl

Now I would request that you practice your mathematics without calculators to keep your minds as sharp as your ski edges:

Problem One

Rachel and Audrey are sent to pick up food. Rachel is sent on a 10k route and with an empty pack she travels at 5k per hour, however half her route is uphill slowing her down to 3kph and the downhill speeds her up to 8kph. If she gets to the food drop first she takes 2 out of three of them and is allowed to go back via the flat 5k route. If she gets there after Audrey she takes one bag and goes back over the mountain. Audrey is a tired and inexperienced skier so Jo, Misha, and Zoe take pity on her and allow her to take the 5k route there and back. Audrey travels around 4k and hour on the flat for the first hour then slowing down to 3kph. Assuming that Rachel doesn’t wipe out, both keep traveling at a consistent rate, not being slowed down by food, and all three food bags are collected, who arrives back at the cabin first with how many bags?

Problem Two

There are ten moose in Gaspe that slowly force the 100 caribou out of their habitat. The three bull moose eat five caribou each, the cows eat 7 each and the two calves three per day. The Caribou eat 15 semester students per hour causing them to multiply 1.5 times. Each piece of moose poop that a semester student eats causes them to multiply 4 fold over a span of 15 minutes. How many caribou and semester students are left after one month?

Problem Three

Misha Golfman lines up 3 wanigans. Inside 2 of them is enough polywhey to spend the rest of the semester varnishing in the farmhouse. The last one contains a sustainably grown Patagonia homunculus to carry your expedition pack. You pick a wannagan, then Misha opens a different one and reveals that it’s full of polywhey. He then asks if you want to change your choice. Should you, to maximize your chance of getting the homunculus?

Caribou trivia answer:

d. Muaski mulaski