24 August, 1999

Aloha from Greenland, Today we woke up knowing it would be our last day. The sun was shining and my first thought was the weatherman is wrong. By the time we got to breakfast it was overcast and by the time we went to check on our equipment for final shipping at the hanger, it had turned to sleet or a very wet cold snow.

We received some more visits from various personnel as we are disembarking so that we get all of the proper paperwork done. Everyone is very friendly up here; similar to a small village. We decided to check out the post office. There are two post offices on the air base; one is US and the other is Greenlandic. I wanted to mail from the Greenlandic post office. Outside the post office was the Greenlandic herald, a polar bear with his tongue wagging out of his mouth. Inside was a curious selection of tourist products from stone carvings and mucklucks to musk oxen steak. We returned to the barracks and decided to drive out to D- Launch. It is a dismantled ICBM (Intercontinental Ballistic Missile) site built on a moraine above the Air Base. Moraines are rock deposits left after glaciers recede. From the top we could see the icebergs leaving Wolstenholme Fjord and entering the sea. There is access to the large missile silos underneath the ground by steps and so we explored the area with flashlights. It was eerie to be in a place that housed a tool of mass destruction. It was snowing by the time we came out and the surrounding hills were covered with a layer of snow. Most of the snow that covers the base in the wintertime blows off the ice cap, but this was blowing in off the sea.

When we returned to base we received a call that our flight wasn't able to fly in today and so would not leave tomorrow. We will be delayed another day. We decided that we should climb Dundas Mountain tomorrow.

Greenlandic Post Office at Thule

Gift shop inside the post office. Notice the walrus skull on the counter. Walrus and seal are eatten by the Inuit,as well as by their dogs. It is the fuel meat for their major mode of transportation across the ice and snow, dog sleds.

Musk ox steaks inside a refrigerator at the post office.

One of the many grey arctic foxes around the base; they look cute, but are known to carry rabies.

View of Dungas Mountain from D-launch.

View from the look out tower down on to the D-launch silos.

Kevin with a flashlight inside the silo.

Left to right John, Anne, and Kevin infront of the Top of the World entrance.