I Am A Polar Explorer

Goodnight and Good Luck

Friday, January 9, 2009

Location: Greenland

Temperature: -25 degrees (-45 windchill)

We left the hotel at 5:45 am to take our bags to the airport, went to catch a quick breakfast, then got a police escort back to the airport.

The plane took off around 7:30 am. Almost exactly 24 hours later, I got back home to Nashville. The trip back consisted of three countries, six states and 5,000 miles. The whole thing was an indescribable adventure. I remember thinking on the plane, as I saw the sun for the first time in two weeks, that it seemed like a long, vivid dream.

Airport Control Tower Karoke

Thursday, January 8, 2009

Location: Greenland

Temperature: -20 degrees (-40 windchill)

Last full day. We gathered together and got to go into the airport control tower. Awesome.

Later we went back to the TOW Club where they had a little presentation. The base commander, Col. Peppard, thanked us for coming and gave us Thule coins.

We spent the rest of the night singing karoke at the club before going back to the hotel to try to get some rest before our 5 am wake up call the next day so we could make our plane.

Jeremy sings Snow Patrol, I believe.

Daughtry sings Daughtry!

And, in one of the most moving experiences of the night, Jerry and Anderson sang Whitney Houston's version of "I Will Always Love You."

As far as I've been able to tell, my karoke experiences have went without photo documentation, which is probably for the best.

Thank you Greenland

Wednesday, January 7, 2009

Location: Greenland

Temperature: -20 degrees (-40 windchill)

Visited the Thule Heritage Hall and saw a lot of old equipment and pictures from the 60 years the base has been around.

Sunnier times.

After the museum and a trip to the Danish post office to get our passports stamped, we gathered at the TOW Club for our last show. It was a bittersweet occasion.

Darryn doing his thing.

Adam doing his thing.

Sweet moves.

The audience got onstage to help us sing "Purple Rain," the last song of the trip.

Friends.

Stuck on a mountain at the North Pole

Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Location: Greenland

Temperature: -20 (-40 degree windchill)

Susan Powell had been helping us out through our stay at Thule, and today she was leading us on an expedition to see an abandoned Inuit village about 20 minutes off base. As we were leaving I saw a twilight over the mountain. It was as light as I ever saw it in Greenland.

The band piled into two Tahoes and followed Susan up the side of a mountain. At the top, we had an almost 180 degree of the frozen bay with icebergs and the mountains on either side. It was just light enough to see with the twilight and a bright moon. Not light enough for pictures, unfortunately. We then pulled up to the abandoned village.

We decided to drive down another road deeper into the village. The Tahoe had other plans as it sank into the snow. In the Tahoe shortly after getting stuck:

This is what we were trying to make it through.

This is the snow plow coming to save us.

And...the truck that towed us out.

It was a crazy situation, but ended up being fairly peaceful just sitting for a couple hours on the side of mountain with that view in Greenland.

Even after all the madness of the day, we still brought the rock.

Me doing my best Johnny Cash.

Anderson doing his best Tom Petty.

And Brion doing his best Prince.

Chaos

Monday, January 5, 2009

Location: Greenland

Temperature: -15 degrees

After a night of little sleep (apparently the weird magnetic field at the top of the world can screw with sleeping patterns as much as it does compasses) we were off to tour the base's weather station and missile defense facility.

Here we are under a 50 foot satellite that tells the Weather Channel what the weather is going to be like.

This is what the outside of the satellite looked like, but my breath got in the way of the picture.

Security's incredible tight around here, so not many pictures. It was awesome to see, though. We even got to go inside the radar that watches to make sure nobody's shooting anything at anybody else.

When we got back, we headed over to our new friend Morgan's dorm where she had made us all dinner. She cuts hair on the base and is from Knoxville and made us a full on Southern meal with fried chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy and corn. She even had sweet tea, which was great for me as I'd been going through withdrawals.

Anderson provided the dinner's entertainment with an ad-libbed rendition of "Everybody Hurts." I think some Hootie may have been involved at some point, too.