Danskeöen. Wednesday, June 10th
We are living here now! “Hobby” went north at 4 P.M. and we have established ourselves as well as possible in the little hut. During the few days we have been with “Hobby” it has practically turned to summer here. Snow lies only on the high hillsides and in occasional heavy layers here and there in the bottom of the valleys. Otherwise the fields are bare—to says “fields,” by the way, is not to use the right expression, because the whole of Danskeöen is one complete heap of stones! In course of time water and ice have burst the sides of the hills into pieces, and it is only the very steepest of the precipices which are not covered with loose stones. We hear the water trickling everywhere, deep down between the stones, which lie so loosely that we have to be more than careful in climbing over them. To-day it has rained for the first time during our stay in Spitzbergen. It is nice and homely to sit in the hut and listen to the rain lashing against the glass windowpanes, and to watch it splashing onto the ground outside.