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Fieldwork in Northwest Spitsbergen 20th of April to 18th of May, 2009

The 2009 Icebound field campaign in one of the most alpine areas of Svalbard, - the spectacular Northwest Spitsbergen, became another successful campaign in this National Park. Despite a high amount of mechanical and technical problems this year we managed to bring lots of beautiful rock samples home and we also widened our working area and took samples more evenly distributed than the previous year. Working in this exceptional beautiful mountain area is a great privilege. The stunning combination of steep mountains, fjords, ocean and the large glaciers just has to be experienced. - And the best of it all; - we have the area for ourselves.

• Read more:Fieldwork in Northwest Spitsbergen 20th of April to 18th of May, 2009

Fieldwork in the Atomfjella mountain area, march 2009

After crossing the Lomonosovfonna Ice Field we got a tremendous scenic approach to the Atomfjella Mountains in low sunlight, shortly after the return of the sun. Snow covered alpine peaks painted in red and purple colours as far as the eye could see were smiling to us. These snowy peaks all surrounded by glaciers, remained us on what we were here for; gain our knowledge on whether these mountains were fully or just partly covered by ice during the last ice ages. While driving on the Veteranbreen glacier we were following tracks of a polar bear and a polar fox. On an elevation of about 1000 m a.s.l. this tolled us that the polar bears can climb pretty high. Probably these animals learn the shortcuts over the glacier plateaus from one coast to another when they are pretty young.

• Read more:Fieldwork in the Atomfjella mountain area, march 2009