Coordinates: S 89 degrees O3.871 by W 83 degrees 20.446

The team’s campsite

The team is promoting beadonor.ca throughout the trek

We woke up this morning and all of us were feeling the acute effects of the significant altitude. Even though we’re not as high as you might think of when climbing other areas or being in other areas of altitude, because the air at the pole is thin/stretched, it behaves much higher.

It’s safe to say everyonefeels like we’ve been hit between the eyes with a sledgehammer.  Almost everyone at camp had a headache and some of us also had nausea and vomiting.

It made for a challenging day but we got going. We were able to accomplish about five miles today over five hours. The weather was not ideal; it was -25 degrees Celsius and the wind was coming in steadily from the north-east.

Dale and Polar Explorers guide Keith skiing

It was very overcast and at times we could not actually discern where land ended and clouds began and it made for a very vertiginous feeling. Nonetheless, we pulled into camp around 3 p.m. this afternoon and set camp up. Everyone was a little shattered after the day.

The guides had a special surprise for us. They built a group tent and we actually had cheeseburgers – I think the only way to think about it is cheeseburgers in paradise. We had a long and wonderful talk in the group tent over cheeseburgers, fries, potato chips, and chocolate.

Michel and Dale refuel the gas cans for the stove

We’re getting ready to head to bed. Tomorrow we’ll try to do a little bit further but know that we have lots of time to get the pole and to make sure that everyone goes at a speed that will help them acclimatize

I did hand around the oxygen probe at dinner and everyone’s oxygen saturation is fine.

On a final note, a big shout out to Sandra. It is Diego and Sandra’s 11^th anniversary today. Happy anniversary!

Take care everybody.