Tom FrenchAuthor | Mountaineer | Skier

I decided to head to Greenland this March to compete in an event called The Arctic Circle Race. Billed as “the world’s toughest cross-country skiing race,” it covers 160 kilometers, (100 miles), through remote glacial valleys, over the course of three days. Colin McNay and Lisa Ide, friends from my Dartmouth Skiing days, were doing it, along with an extended group that they do things like this with. I leapt at the chance to join them. The timing was a bit tricky, as it came right on the heels of a long-planned ski trip in British Columbia, but it was doable. I went to work on the travel arrangements. 

I also went to work on my training. As has become routine, Jill and I spent much of the winter in Vermont, and I spent a lot of time there cross-country skiing. New England was one of the few places in the US that had good snow this winter. Conditions were great, and I got in a lot of kilometers. Ten days ago, it was mid-March and time to head to British Columbia. The destination was a “cat skiing” lodge in the Monashees that I have grown to love. I was going with four friends and our son Will. This same group was there last year, and we were blessed with the kind of powder skiing that I had previously experienced only in Warren Miller movies. This year, things were different.

The trip was problematic right from the start. A major storm system disrupted travel across North America. After 14 hours in the Toronto airport, a red eye with a 3:00am aborted landing in Kelowna, an unplanned 4:00am landing in Calgary, a five hour bus trip through the mountains to Revelstoke, a 26 kilometer school bus ride on a snowy logging road, and an hour-long snowcat ride up into the mountains, we arrived at the lodge. The Monashees were one of the few places in addition to New England that got good snow this winter, and there was tons of it. The lodge staff reported that the recent skiing had been outstanding. This began changing the moment we arrived. A heat dome had settled over the U.S. west and was generating record high temperatures. An “atmospheric river” was sending drenching rainfall from Hawaii toward the Pacific Northwest and British Columbia.

We woke the next morning to above-freezing temperatures. After routine avalanche rescue training, we headed out in the snowcats to see what the conditions were like. Down low, the skiing was sticky but manageable, allowing some runs that looked like this:

Higher up, the snow was drier but visibility was poor . We spent lots of time battling whiteouts that looked like this:

The next day, things were even warmer and wetter. Poor snow conditions and high avalanche risk shut down the usual ski program. Happily, we were able to use alpine touring gear and get out of the lodge between rain showers for a tour:

As we approached the top of a ridge, our guide’s radio crackled with a report. The forecast for the next two days was for torrential rainfall. If we wanted to leave the lodge early, we needed to be back in two hours for a snow cat transfer out to the main road.  We did, and we were. After getting dropped at a muddy parking lot, we drove south to Kelowna while searching on our phones for last minute flights home. Will and I spent the night at the Comfort Inn near the airport. Our morning flight out of Kelowna was delayed, causing missed connections that blew up our new flight itinerary. We ended up flying from Kelowna to Vancouver to Seattle to Salt Lake City to Boston, which included my second red eye in four days. So much for this year’s British Columbia ski trip.

The good news was that I had an extra day to pack for Greenland. In retrospect, I needed it. Three days ago, Jill dropped me at Logan Airport for my week’s third red eye. Getting to Greenland isn’t easy. As it is an autonomous territory of Denmark, (at least in the eyes of most), the best connections are through Denmark. So I flew from Boston to Reykjavik (Iceland), Reykjavik to Copenhagen, Copenhagen to Kangerlussuaq, (a remote outpost with one of the few airstrips in Greenland that can accommodate a commercial jetliner), and finally from Kangerlussuaq to Sisimiut: the small town on Greenland’s west coast where the race starts and ends. It was less than a direct route, but it got me there. Note the Arctic Circle Race call-out at the check-in desk in Copenhagen:

As we crossed Greenland’s east coast, the views out the window confirmed its wildness. It reminded me a lot flying through Antarctica’s Ellsworth Mountains en route to climbing Mount Vinson:

From the small Dehavilland propellor plane that took us from Kangerlussuaq to Sisimiut, we had an introduction to the kind of terrain the race will pass through:

It was 6 degrees F when we landed in Sisimiut, with strong winds blowing snow sideways. No heat domes or atmospheric rivers here, (at least at the moment). Sisimiut has, to say the least, a rugged feel to it:

Today, we checked in at the race center, staffed by local volunteers. The whole town throws itself into putting on this race, and the warmth of everyone’s welcome is striking. Then we headed out for a short ski near the start area. Here is a photo of some of our group celebrating our success in getting here:

We have one more day in Sisimiut before the race starts. Tomorrow afternoon, villagers and racers will walk together to the local church for a traditional event blessing. On Friday morning, we will start the first of the race’s three legs, each around 35 miles. The Friday and Saturday legs end at a tented camp in an isolated valley. Duffles bags containing our sleeping bags, dry clothes, and freeze dried food will be delivered to the camp by villagers on their snowmobiles. Then, on Sunday, the final leg of the race will take us back to the finish line in Sisimiut.

The weather forecast is decent. Continued cold, but winds dropping for at least the first two days, with no major storms expected. I am really excited about getting out there and moving through surreal arctic mountain beauty. The trick will be to stay warm and avoid frostbite.

After the race, I will post an update on how it went. Continued thanks for your interest!