Lake Of the woods, Minnesota/ Canada
Northern Minnesota is known to be cold. So cold, that many of the great arctic explorers of today’s day and age have trained there. Lake of the Woods, (where the training is located), is a great training location because of the sheer mass of the lake. The wide-open landscape allows for straight-line winds similar to arctic and antarctic conditions.
Preview: Over the duration of the training, we encountered whiteout conditions, straight-line winds, and many other (cold) scenarios that would prepare anyone for hard-core winter wilderness travel.
You will read about all of these moments during the polar expedition training with Eric Larsen. Also, if you stick to the end, I have a few extra resources for you!
Polar Expedition Training
Early in 2022, I was fortunate enough to help out with Eric Larsen’s Polar Expedition Training course up in Northern Minnesota. This course trains people for expeditions to cold, remote, and inhospitable areas of the earth such as Antarctica, Greenland, or the Arctic.
In the article, you will see my daily updates from my journal including skills and small, thought-out processes that I learned from Eric- (25+ year polar expert). I found that many of these skills are easy to overlook as a novice, yet extremely valuable for efficiency and safety in what can be -40°F weather.
Learning and refining skills are something that I value deeply, and gaining first-hand experience through the guided knowledge of industry experts is invaluable. I hope that you all can follow along and learn something that you can apply to your own future wilderness adventures or expeditions.
Day 1: Learning The Gear
Today, Eric focused on familiarizing the group with the gear that is needed to survive out in these extremely cold environments. You learn quickly that every single thing that comes on an expedition has a purpose.
We practiced setting up the tents- which is a task that sounds simple, however, there is a very specific way to set it up to maximize efficiency and minimize exposure to high winds and cold temperatures when out on an expedition.
For instance, instead of storing the tent in an original stuff sack during an expedition, Eric uses a 5-foot-long stuff sack with the tent poles ALWAYS STAYING in the tent pole sleeves about 1/3 of the way. You never fully take out the tent poles from the sleeves when storing the tent for travel. This enables a quicker tent setup versus having to connect all of them together when there is foul weather. We travel with this long 5-foot skinny stuff sack on the top layer of the sled.
This was one of many ways to make polar travel as efficient as possible!
Day 2: Random Skills
Last night, we sewed a “nose beak” onto our goggles. This is essentially a piece of cloth and nylon that we attach to the foam on our goggles to block wind from hitting our face while still allowing enough circulation to minimize the perspiration from our breath freezing.
Today, we dove deep into many of the skills needed for efficient polar travel such as layering, first aid/hypothermia prevention, stove use, satellite communication, knots, and more.
It would be impossible to write out all of the skills that Eric went over today, but I will include three random skills that I think can be applied to a variety of adventures.
1: Keeping Your Feet Warm: One way to keep your feet from getting cold when in winter environments is to wear a plastic grocery bag over a liner sock; and a thicker pair of socks over the liner sock and plastic grocery bag. The grocery bag acts as a vapor barrier and keeps your insulating layer (thicker sock) from getting wet from sweat.
2: In extremely cold environments, wrap hockey tape around metal objects to prevent your fingers from getting frost-nipped when holding. We wrapped hockey tape around our soup thermoses, MSR fuel bottles, and anything that might be difficult to handle in extreme cold. Hockey tape works better than duct tape when temperatures dip low.
3: Whenever traveling in cold environments, put a large down puffy coat on over all layers whenever stopping for a break. This is critically important as standing still at below 0F will cause you to become cold very quickly without adding the insulating outer layer.
Day 3: Gearing Up
Today was dedicated to gearing up and getting ready for our 5-day mini expedition on Lake of the Woods (tomorrow). We prepared our food and added butter to our breakfasts, lunches, and dinners to make sure we get enough calories since our bodies are constantly exerting high levels of energy in these environments.
Our daily food intake looks a little like this:
Breakfast- Oatmeal with nuts, raisins, and butter in the morning. Snacking on multiple types of bars, cheese, and sausage as well as soup (made in the morning) throughout the day. And lastly, a freeze-dried meal with added butter in the evening.
Once we finished getting our food prepared, Eric went over the proper way to pack our pulk sleds to make sure they are as efficient as possible as there is a right or wrong way to do everything out in polar environments.
We finished the night with Eric going over general and whiteout navigation during whiteouts. Tomorrow is the day when we begin the mini-expedition where we will be traveling and living out on the ice!
Day 4: Polar Beginning
Anyways, on day 4, we practiced more of the overall small nuance pieces of polar travel. One thing that amazes me, is how many small details can add up to being very efficient.
Here’s the gist of what a day of travel looks like in the polar environment…
Morning: Wake up, put the sleeping bag in a bivy for storage, get two stoves going inside the tent (one for melting snow and the other for heating tent), pour and eat breakfast, hot water goes into a thermos for the lunch break, begin changing clothes, pack sled with snacks and down parka available for short breaks about every hour.
Evening: Arrive at camp, set up a tent with side facing the wind first, put snow on flaps, get tent gear inside, shovel snow blocks in the back vestibule for snow, get sleeping bags in the vestibule, get stoves going and heat water and dry out gear then go to bed after eating!
Day 5: Tent Frost
Today we had decent ~20 mph winds and a few hours of whiteout conditions on Lake of the Woods which is really cool to practice in for me, however, I’m sure when you are in these environments enough that wouldn’t be the case…
Some tips for today are that when you go to bed for the night, make sure you cover items like boot liners and lay them flat when you go to bed for the night. If you don’t, you will wake up with a thick layer of frost over them and they will be wet (and dangerous).
Day 6: Layering
It was another great day of polar travel. 10 degrees and fairly windy outside. Not sure what the windchill was.. but today I got away with wearing these layers:
- Top: T-shirt, long sleeve base layer, anorak, and parka when I stop.
- Bottom: lightweight long underwear, bibs.
It’s amazing to see how little clothing you actually need when you are working hard in these cold environments!
Day 7: Polar Groove
Today was primarily another travel day and our longest one yet. We had pretty comfortable conditions for this kind of environment. It was 10 degrees and sunny for most of the day!
We practiced more with being efficient in polar travel!
Day 8: Potential Frostbite
Today was the final (half) day of the polar expedition training and it was a good one!
About midway through the day, the straight-line winds picked up a bit and I noticed my right hip feeling a bit numb and cold where the wind was hitting it directly. Eric emphasizes the importance of stopping and changing your layering situation if things aren’t perfect so that’s what I did.
Situations can become escalated if you don’t deal with them right away and this is no exception, as it could turn to frostbite quickly. Luckily, I put a jacket in that area of my bibs and the sting of the cold in that area went away!
Thanks for checking out my polar expedition training posts! Life is a bit crazy and has been moving 100 miles an hour recently, and I’m currently off in Alaska for the summer. Will post more updates soon!
Polar Expedition Resources
Suggested Reading:
On Thin Ice: An Epic Quest into the Melting Arctic: by Eric Larsen
In this book, you can read about Eric and Ryan Water’s expedition to traverse nearly 500 miles across the melting Arctic Ocean, unsupported, from Northern Ellesmere Island to the geographic North Pole. This is expected to be the last human-powered trek to the North Pole, ever. They encountered -70F-degree temperatures, polar bear stalking, running out of food, and more.
Other Resources:
Ericlarsenexplore.com: Here is Eric’s website where you can find some of his past expedition history as well as a list of guided trips that he runs around the world. Eric has been my mentor for a few years now and he is an excellent teacher and expert in polar travel.
Thanks for checking out the Polar Expedition Training journal post!
Here are a few more related articles:
- Week Two: 30 Days Alone In The Wilderness
- Week Three: 30 Days Alone In The Wilderness
- Week Four: 30 Days Alone In The Wilderness
Disclosure: Please note that some of the links above are affiliate links. At no additional cost to you, I earn a commission if you make a purchase. If you have any questions about the companies or my status as an affiliate, please don’t hesitate to e-mail me.
Hey there! My name is Tanner and I specialize in outdoor survival, bushcraft, expeditions and adventure travel.