Hello there! Its now the second week of lectures, so I find I increasingly have to drink in order to have anything interesting to say! No, I'm kidding, but it was quite a heavy weekend, what with friday gathering in UNIS and then some drinks in one of the down stairs kitchens on saturday night! There was quite a few different spirits on offer, so much Cognac, Whisky, Vodka and rum was consumed by all. People here seemed to have got into the swing of being in the Arctic now, so people are often out skiing, snow mobiling, ice caving, and walking up the hills and glaciers. Me, on the otherhand, well I've been a good boy and have been revising for my exams! so instead of telling you about the wonders of Longyearbreen glacier, I would have to tell you of the wonders of particles in three dimensional infinite potential wells; so I'll spare you that.

So, instead, perhaps a little bit more about Longyearbyen. Well, this is the view from my window in barrack 9 of the rest of Nybyen, across the road is barrack 4, and there are a few 'hotels' and 'art galleries' in the other buildings. longyearbyen is at the end of the valley. We've had a really mild weekend, with temperatures as high as minus 6! its really surprising how quickly the weather can change here. as i've said before the temperature was really low (between minus 20 and 30) for the last few weeks, but now its warmed up considerably. perversely, it now feels quite warm out, and wearing the amount of clothes I was wearing last week causes rapid overheating! On the way to UNIS this morning I had to take my hat, scarf and gloves off (sorry Nan!)

In other news, we had a really bright moon

recently, so we were afforded the best view to date of our surroundings. this photo is taken from the front door of my barrack (so you can see more of Nybyen) but the mountains in the background are on the other side of the Fjord UNIS is next too, giving you some idea of the walk in the morning! and i have 9 o'clock lectures everyday! We haven't seen any more Aurora yet, but a solar wind stream hit last night, which means an increased solar wind speed and density and hence more probable Auroras. looking at the data on the internet it seems there would have been good Aurora over Longyearbyen at about 3 this morning, so i certainly didn't see them! its also a tad overcast here. However, If you look to the south in the middle of the day, the sky is considerably brighter than it was when we got here, so it won't be that long until the sun rises! I believe the sun rises properly on the 14th February, which coincides with our 'icebreaker party' (which I'll tell you about in due course) and the Wales vs England rugby match. thats going to be a really good day!

Ash