29 May, 2000

Greetings from Summit They call it diamond dust. Sparkling,tiny ice crystals that swirled on 15 knot winds today. It forms directly from the air vapor when it is cold enough and today obviously qualified. It danced around us all day as Dr. Steig, Dave, and I worked on hand-drilling 12 meters down from the surface at the snow pit. Up above, the same little crystals caused the sun to acquire 'snowbows' on either side and on top and bottom, called sundogs. Beautiful, hard to capture on film, they were something I had heard about and was hoping to see. I hope the pictures I took turn out for you. They will be posted after I get home.

With working outside the plan today, I took pains to use all my Extreme Cold Weather gear. I had on top and bottom long underwear, sock liners and wool socks, huge lined Sorel boots, heavy fleece pants and top, carharts (heavily padded overalls), fleece jacket, neck gaitor, fleece-lined hat, heavily padded outer jacket with fur- rimmed hood, glove liners, heavily padded mittens, and sun goggles. It takes about 10-15 minutes to gear up, but fewer minutes than that for the Arctic wind to creep in and let you know of its presence. What is really invigorating is when the heavy mittens have to come off to do detail work. Brrrrrrr. It is always so great to snuggle back into those big mittens and warm the ache out of the fingers put there by the cold wind and snow. Care is taken not to get so cold that the fingers lose feeling because that heralds frost-bite. After a quick ride back on the sled behind the SkiDoo, a big mug of hot chocolate quickly warmed me up.

And this is summer? Ah well, to search for answers that no one else has is a drive that even bitter cold can't quell.

Warm regards,

Besse Dawson

PS: If I haven't answered your email, it is because I haven't gotten it. We seem to be having a bit of a glitch here. Please bear with me. We are frantically trying to fix it. Your questions are VERY important to me. Stay posted to the journal and I will keep you updated on this.

> "Extra suns" out to the sides of the true sun are called sundogs. > <>

> No rainbows in Greenland, but "snowbows" abound when diamond dust flies. > <>