Longyearbyen 78° 13'N

I went to check out of the hotel to catch the train to the airport this morning at 4am. My phone was off by three hours, so I went back to bed until 7.





The flight from Oslo to Tromso was spectacular. Snow-covered mountains, fjords and a blue blue sea. It closed in after that and was -6C (21F) and snowing when we arrived in Lonyearbyen and met up with Richard Donovan , the organizer, and the rest of the motley crew.









Longyeabyen has an operating coal mine, but the big business is tourism. The main street wasn't too busy at 4pm.



Interestingly, the world seed vault is here.


The entrance is by the airport. All the countries in the world send their seeds here for preservation.






The entire group met, had a quick briefing, packed our gear for the flight at 9am tomorrow and headed to the airport again to get briefed on the camp at the North Pole.

The airport was busy. Borneo, the north pole camp, opens on April 1st, so a BBC crew arrived today, as did Richard Attenborough, Prince Albert of Monaco and Zinedine Zidane.