SCA’s Claes-Göran Erson has crossed Greenland for the fourth time. In mid-August, 60 years old, he reached the northernmost point of mainland in the world, Cape Morris Jesup.
When a low-pressure front sweeps across the incland ice, it often produces a white-out. The warm air results in a thick fog that dissolves all contours. Everything is as white as milk, with no points of reference.
On skis and with a heavy sled in tow, Claes-Göran Erson covered roughly 5,500 kilometers over Greenland’s inland ice in his four trips there. But his dream of one day reaching the northernmost point of mainland in the world never died. With a start in Qaanaaq in mid-May, the idea was for him and Björn Leander to ski to Cape Morris Jesup and back, a total stretch of 3,300 kilometers.
Storms and snowfall raged at the start, and the expedition was seriously delayed. Warm weather meant that skis and sledges sank deep into the snow.
“Then right at the edge of the inland ice, more surprises awaited us,” Claes-Göran recalls. “It took us several days to carry the sleds and equipment down the steep slope.”
Back on the mainland, they discovered that the warm weather had melted the ice on the lake they had to cross. Faced with the choice of breaking off the expedition or trying to use other means to cross the lake, their solution was to rent a helicopter that was available nearby.
The weeks on the ice are extremely simple: walk, eat and sleep, day after day, in complete harmony with your body and with nature.
Once they made it to the other side, they could cover the final 350 kilometers of the expedition, traversing rocky terrain and fording many deep crossings in the ice-cold glacier water. They traveled through a landscape where no one had ever gone before, encountering only the occasional musk ox.
“The physical toil gave me great inner peace,” says Claes-Göran. During the night of August 9/10, exhausted after their hardships, they reached the windswept pile of gravel known as Cape Morris Jesup at 83 degrees north latitude, just 700 kilometers from the North Pole. “A fantastic feeling,” says Claes-Göran reverently, 14 kilos lighter after the 70-day expedition.
Claes-Göran’s previous Greenland expeditions
- 1994. From the east coast to the west coast, 650 km, 29 days.
- 1997. Swedish Thule expedition. From Gunnbjörn Fjeld to Thule Air Base, 1,600 km, 52 days.
- 2004. South-north expedition. From the southern tip of Greenland to the northernmost cape. Had to be suspended after 2,000 km and 80 days.
- 2008. Top of the world. From Qaanaaq to Cape Morris Jesup. About 1,500 km, 70 days.
Text: Mats Wigart
Photo: Claes-Göran Erson and Björn Leander