Today, I have wittily described by exact location in the title of this blog post. I'm guessing you already know this but I'm terrible at writing titles for blog posts. Looking back I've had more than my fair share of them: Polar Bear, Half Way, Almost There and North Pole... You see my point.

One of the problems is that I usually write these posts at night after a long day... You guessed it... ON THE ICE (that one is almost my book title). I'm generally exhausted and just want to sleep which means punching out these words can be exhausting. There have many times when I've fallen asleep while typing.

While many of my titles may be the same, my sentiments regarding similar situations many times. In flying here, I had a front row window seat and was able to watch the amazingness of Svalbard pass by. Every minute or so a new ice berg, glacier or snow covered mountain captured my attention which meant getting out my camera and taking another picture. I assumed the man sitting next to me thought it was my first visit here, but in reality, I've been to Longyearbyen six or seven times. And each of those times, I am impressed by the expanse and variation of the ice.

My sleds, skis and gun had arrived early and the other few Granite Gear duffels arrived in short order. I loaded the whole mess onto a local bus and a few minutes later I was dropped off at my hotel where I proceeded to load all my gear onto my sleds and push it effortlessly to the door. If only airport floors were made of hard packed snow... Traveling with my polar gear would be a breeze.

I spent the rest of the afternoon, doing a little shopping and getting my sleds I order. (A huge thanks to polar guide Doug Stoup who is lending me a sled for my trip.)

By the time I got done the sun had sunk low in the sky and the clouds were rolling in. The magic light was gone but I still walked down to the ocean to smell the Arctic sea.

Image: My gear is finally on snow!