Thursday, October 16, 2008

1:45 AM

October 14, 2008
Sorry for the lateness of this posting! The past two days have been a hectic and emotional rollercoaster. We woke up around 6:30 so that we could eat and be ready to go by 8:30 for our helicopter rides!!! We drove a small ways out onto the tundra and waited for them to arrive. It was an enlightening sight watching four of the helicopters flying over the seamlessly, never-ending horizon. I was excited to video tape all of them landing around our buggy.

We were given instructions, put into groups, and boarded our helicopters. My pilots name was Chopper Chuck! By far the ride was the most thrilling experience of my life. All the beauties of the tundra were unleashed by the aerial view. We swooped down over boat wrecks and even flew threw some snow flurries. We arrived at the maternity den (our destination) early so Chopper Chuck did some incredible helicopter tricks. He did 360's which made me feels like I was on a rollercoaster. It was unbelievable.

We were all excited to touch solid ground for the first time in five days. Ironicly the surface that we landed on was far from solid. We touched down on a mossy patch of lichen, which surfaces over layers of water and soil. When we jumped out of the aircraft the moss acted as a trampoline and we bounced all over, attempting to have a snow ball fight with less than an inch of snow.

We were led in groups to an abandoned maternity den, which was created last year by a pregnant female polar bear in search of a safe place to give birth. We got to go inside to explore. It was very damp and dirty but it was incredible how this structure was carved out of a hill side by a very pregnant, dedicated mother bear. We even got to taste test some wild berries (which were approved before we ate them).

We flew back to the tundra buggy and waved goodbye to our pilots as they motioned the helicopters in a waving motion in reply. We rushed back to the lodge for a video conference with my school, St. Mary Academy Bay View. All of the Arctic Ambassadors answered the questions asked by my Environmental Science class. It was a great success. I was most surprised when my parents came on stage. I was almost moved to tears when they told me how proud they were of me.

To my surprise, so I have been told, clips from the video conference and an interview with my parents was on the local news in Rhode Island. This was very exciting news considering that my job of spreading my stories, my message, and my hopes has already begun even before I return home.

We all met in the lounge to discuss our forward action plans after we return to our homes. We practices our 'elevator pitches', which is a sort of speech describing our experience and informing people about what they can do to help, in the amount of time it takes to change floors on an elevator. The theme at dinner was a coffee house, and everyone read the poetry they had written throughout the week, and their favorite memories.

Finally, us teens put on a skit in which we all picked a facilitator, dressed like them, and chose our favorite quote of the week from that person to present to them. It was hilarious. The adults were extremely impressed and complimentary. To finish off the night we all took pictures together, facilitators, tundra buggy drivers, cooks, and ambassadors. We also had an unexpected dance party when I started taking requests from the adults. It was a beautiful end to the most inspiring, life changing experience I have ever had.

Monday, October 13, 2008

10:13 PM

October 13, 2008
Its Thanksgiving today in Canada! I woke up late this morning for breakfast duty. After breakfast we went over questions for our video conferences and finalized plans for our Team C (the best) presentation. We are also planning to throw a Thanksgiving Day Parade for the other groups.

We rehearsed for about a half hour for our first video conference until actual show time. It was a huge success and we had fun talking to the middle school students from Pittsburg. I am really excited for the video conference tomorrow with my school.

We had some special visitors today. Jim, Betty, and Parker, who are three trappers that live off the land. They completely reversed my views of fur wearing. We were taught how they lived off the land and how passionate they were about their environment. Although they kill animals they are the biggest animal lovers I think I have ever met. These people trap to have a meal at night and make money by selling the furs. And the animals are killed quickly so they feel no pain.

After this we presented our skit which went surprisingly well and then set up for our Thanksgiving Day Parade before we went out on the tundra. We boarded the buggy and traveled to Gordon Point (near Polar Bear Point where our lodge is) to do a live broadcast to Toledo because one of their reporters is shadowing one of the other Arctic Ambassadors. We all got to be on live television!

After we finished I returned to the buggy to make burgers for dinner. We were about to start the parade when the male bear that has been sleeping nearby walked right over to where we were cooking. Then, unexpectedly, another male bear came from the other direction, surely coming for our burgers. After about 15 minutes of photographing (Robert Buchanan brought the 'burger ladies' into the secret under-buggy cage where you can get up close to the polar bears) the two males began to get territorial and started to spar.

Unfortunately we had to stop watching because it was dinner time but when I went outside to replenish the burger supply I saw the original male right under where I was getting the burgers. It was magical because he just looked up at me. It was an inspiring moment for me.

I invite all of you to be part of the greatest generation of conservation!
http://www.polarbearsinternational.org/take-action/how-you-can-help-pola...

Sunday, October 12, 2008

10:01 PM

October 12, 2008
This was most definitely the most exhilarating day yet. I woke up to a young male polar bear standing right outside my window! We watched him for countless hours, video taping his behaviors and observing the natural beauty of this magnificent creature. It really made me think about what this world would be like if polar bears were to become extinct. The fact that he came to our camp was fortunate because we otherwise would not have had time to go out bear watching on the tundra today. I felt accomplished when I caught the young male on video rolling in the grass and playing with a stick. He stayed within viewing distance of our lodge through breakfast, our presentation on how to give presentations, and the talk from our guest speaker, Michael Goodyear from the Northern Studies Center.

We learned a lot from him about ring seals for example, seals use claws to dig four to six feet through ice to create a breathing hole and den which can become covered by 40 to 60 inches of snow. We also figured out that polar bears near the Hudson bay (935) eat approximately 50 seals a year (one a week during their feeding season) meaning that all together 47,500 ring seals are eaten a year. Currently there are 144,000 ring seals in this population. During this presentation, another four Tundra Buggies flocked to our camp because they got word that the male bear was here.

I forgot to mention in yesterday's blog about last night, since we blogged before the presentation by Robert Buchanan. He showed us a slightly graphic PowerPoint about the reality of polar bear endangerment and human involvement. The facts absolutely stunned me. I was in tears by the pictures, charts and information.

After lunch and an intense polar bear watch from the lodge in which the male polar bear crossed from one side of the lodge to the other by passing underneath the girl's dorm buggy. Next we enjoyed the presentation by group B with was hilarious!!

And finally, before dinner and blogging we enjoyed a talk with one of the facilitators, Julie, made a spectacular presentation on animals in captivity, she being a zookeeper at the Oregon Zoo. She taught me a lot of useful facts about captive animal behavior and naturalistic enrichment.

As I am typing this blog the male polar bear from this morning, which hasn't left this entire day is still resting right outside my window.
At dinner we sang karaoke. After we had a presentation by our genius facilitator Dr. Tim Foresman on the Digital Earth for Sustainability Epistemology. Hes really smart and uses big words ï .

And guess what happened after that? NORTHERN LIGHTS!! They were dim at first but after about 45 minutes they got brighter and began to curtain. It is the most beautiful thing I have ever witnessed in my life. The image will be cemented in my memory for the rest of my life. It was incredible.

Saturday, October 11, 2008

6:37 PM

October 11, 2008
Oh what a beautiful morning! We were awoken by Robert Buchanan singing this song, extremely out of pitch, but it was still a beautiful morning considering it's the first day it hasn't rained. We began with a delicious breakfast and a brief meeting with Bill the biologist which I found extremely interesting. We also heard from many of the facilitators their 'close call' animal stories which were incredible. Bill, for example was charged by a bison and survived by acting like a matador and throwing his jacket over its eyes, distracting it, giving him an opportunity to run away.

We had a short break and then returned; forming groups for our 'Impacts of a Warming Arctic' presentations. Each group was assigned two chapters to creatively present to the rest of the groups. My group (the incredible group C) are presenting on arctic vegetation zones being likely to shift, causing wide ranging impacts and on the many coastal communities and facilities facing increasing exposure to storms.

Right before lunch we spotted our first Arctic fox! At first it was a good distance away but it seemed that ever half hour for about two hours the fox re-appeared getting closer to the buggy each time. I got several excellent pictures of him (we named him Freddy). After lunch we were informed by another buggy that polar bears were spotted so we boarded our buggy and headed out on our one and a half hour drive to where they were. On the way we saw a flock of about 15 ptarmigan, a handful of snow buntings (which can be compared to an oversized sparrow) and approximately four Arctic hare.

When we found the bears we realized that it was the mother and two cubs (nicknamed mc²) from yesterday. For about an hour we observed their behavior, much of which involved sleeping. The reason that the bears are so inactive during this season is because they have not eaten since the ice last broke up. The bears are forced to fast for longer periods of time because the ice is breaking up earlier due to global warming. One activity of one of the cubs that amazed me was that while its mother was sleeping it repeatedly nudged her side trying to get her to turn over in order for it to feed. We had to wait a long while to drive back to the lodge because when the polar bears woke up they walked very slowly along the roadside.

Something that disturbed me greatly was when one of the cubs started playing with a piece of trash that it had found. This kind of put the problem in perspective for me and made me think about why I am really here. As troubling as this was, it was also an eye-opening experience. When we returned to the Tundra Buggy Lodge Freddy, our Arctic fox friend was waiting for us nearby.

Friday, October 10, 2008

9:48 PM

October 10, 2008
BEARS!!! Today was incredible and lucky in the sense of spotting wildlife. In a span of about two and a half hours we saw and photographed five polar bears, three ptarmigans ('arctic chickens'), one snowy owl, and one arctic hare. We saw what we think were two male polar bears together, and then later on we saw a mother bear and two cubs. At one point one of the cubs was actually up on its hind legs leaning on our Tundra Buggy. When photographing the cubs and mama bear we were approximately only 10 feet away from them! We got to see a variety of polar bear behavior as well. We witnessed them playing with sticks, running, sleeping with their mother, and sparring (play-fighting). It was one of the most exhilarating experiences of my life. When we spotted our first bear (one of the males) my heart jumped and I scrambled through the crowd to get my pictures.

We officially began the day at 4:15 when we woke up to catch our 6 a.m flight to Churchill from Winnipeg. We boarded the small plane from the ground which I found thrilling. We took off at sunrise which was a breathtaking sight. When we stepped off the plane in Churchill it was a balmy 30 degrees with 65 kilometer per hour winds (it was bone chilling) We walked around the town visiting the post office to get our passports stamped, Parks Canada Visitors Center, and Gypsy's, the restaurant where I ate the best hot lunch I have ever had on a freezing day. We also went to D-20 (what the media refers to as the 'polar bear jail') but it's really a place where polar bears are held when they are in danger of human contact. Later on we visited L-50 which is an old building where a man, Dr. Watts, performed, in the name of science, some experiments on polar bear physiology. He coated their fur in oil, in an attempt to prove what would happen in the event that they were ever exposed. As a result, three polar bears were unfortunately killed due to them trying to clean their fur by licking off the oil. As ill-fated as this experiment was, it provided evidence that the Hudson Bay area should be free from drilling because catastrophic things would happen to the bears in the event of an oil spill. It was an eerie feeling going into the building and seeing the remains of his lethal experimentation.

The rest of the day was devoted to traveling across the tundra and moving into the Tundra Buggy Lodge where I will be living for the next five days (without touching the ground once). A fun quote stated by Robert Buchanan referring to the flat, wide-open tundra was 'it's so flat that you could watch your dog run away for three days!' I hope you are enjoying my experiences as much as I am. Check in tomorrow!

Friday, October 10, 2008

9:01 PM

Oct 9, 2008
I woke up around 5:30 a.m to catch my 7:15 flight out of T.F. Green to Chicago. Honestly, I was nervous about navigating my way through the Chicago airport alone. When I arrived at the gate to Winnipeg I found it had been far easier to find that I had previously anticipated. I had about an hour to spare so I waited for two of the other Arctic Ambassadors who were assigned to be on my flight. Surprisingly we ended up with a total of five PBI campers on the same flight. I sat next to the other Molly from Buffalo. We got through customs without difficulty and were warmly greeted by Carolyn Buchanan who is one of the friendliest people I have ever met. She and her husband, Robert Buchanan, are the Director of Development and President (respectively) of Polar Bears International.

We met some fascinating people at our 'ice breaker' dinner meeting. One of these people who truly touched me was Robert Taylor. He is a friend of Robert Buchanan, and of polar bears, and a famous wildlife photographer here in Canada (www.polarbearphotography.com). He showed us the absolute beauty of Churchill and its tundra although it can sometimes be viewed as a desolate frozen plain.

I learned so much from him about photography, as well as the wildlife and vegetation I will be seeing for myself in the next week. I was so moved by the beauty of his pictures I sometimes found myself on the verge of tears during his presentation.

Along with Mr. Taylor we met a handful of PBI camp alumnae, one of whom attended the first ever Polar Bears International camp five years ago.

Before we went to bed we were surprised with a gift from PBI. They gave each of us our own Polar Bears International Canada Goose down jackets. They are the most beautiful coats I have ever seen ï . I have to go to bed now because it is currently 10:19 Manitoba time (11:19 Rhode Island time) and I need to wake up at 4:15 to catch our flight to Churchill. Stay tuned for exciting adventures from the great northern bear country!