TWO award-winning photographers and Arctic adventurers have shared their memories of a very cold trip to Ellesmere Island, near the North Pole in the Canadian high Arctic.
David Gibbon and Conrad Dickinson launched their photography exhibition Wild and Wonderful at the Queen's Hall Arts Centre on December 3.
READ MORE: Award-winning photographers launch exhibition on Arctic expedition
David, 47, is a part-time Royal Mail postal worker and photographer from County Durham, while Conrad, from Bardon Mill, is a polar explorer, photographer, and used to be a captain in the British Army specialising in Arctic warfare.
In 2018, David began running yearly commercial trips taking small groups of photographers to the far north-west of Iceland to photograph Arctic foxes in winter.
He leads an expedition to Ellesmere Island, Canada's northernmost and third largest island, in March.
More than one-fifth of the island has been turned into a national park, called Quttinirpaaq National Park.
Conrad has been on more than 70 polar expeditions and is the only Briton to complete the Polar Grand Slam - the three toughest Polar journeys crossing Greenland, Antarctica and reaching the North Pole all unsupported.
He is President of the Northumberland Wildlife Trust (NWT) and was selected to lead the Walking with the Wounded British team and Prince Harry to the South Pole in 2013.
David said he first met Conrad when he was trying to get a job with the NWT and Conrad asked to join the Ellesmere photography trip.
The exhibition will display their Arctic adventures, with photography from Ellesmere Island, where Conrad and David went in March 2022 and survived in temperatures as low as -50 degrees.
A different gallery of photographs will also be on display in the exhibition showcasing British wildlife.
Conrad said: "Wearing the hat as President of Northumberland Wildlife Trust, I would love people to see the variety and wonderful wildlife we've got in Northumberland.
"The vast majority of the photographs were taken in Northumberland. I'd be really happy if anybody got inspired by the wildlife that's on display."
Speaking of the Ellesmere trip, David said: "The reason we go in March is because of the time of year you get beautiful sunrises and sunsets, it's one of the coldest times of the year but if you go in April or May you get 24-hour harsh sunlight, which is no good for photography."
Conrad and David went to Ellesmere with a team including three other photographers, while the local Inuit helped them navigate the landscape.
The Inuit lived in the nearby hamlet of Grise Fiord.
The team travelled across Ellesmere on snowmobiles and lived with the Inuit for two weeks in the wilderness, which David said was 'pretty extraordinary'.
On the way to base camp on the first day, one of the snowmobiles broke down so they were forced to leave it behind.
David said: "We spent time trying to repair it with the Inuit but couldn't get it to work. By the time we got to base camp it was one o'clock in the morning.
"It's -50 degrees during the day so we have no idea what it was at one in the morning, but it was horrendous."
David said most of the time they lived in a small hut they found, which protected them from the worst of the cold.
David said it was so cold they wore masks, because if any skin was left bare they would instantly get frostbite.
"We had masks and ski goggles on, we looked like something from outer space. But the Inuit had nothing on their faces.
"They're flying around on these snowmobiles at 60mph with the wind hitting their face, with the wind chill it's about -65 degrees.
"They're so used to it. They had scars all over their faces from the cold. When we questioned them about not wearing masks they said it gets in the way," David said.
Conrad said over the years, he has worked with many Inuit and said 'they're an incredibly tough people'.
He described the moment when during the Ellesmere expedition, one of the Inuit hit a rock while driving on a snowmobile and flew into the air.
"He was thrown about six or seven feet into the air, and he landed really hard on the ground. He just got up, dusted himself down and carried on," he said.
"Another thing I've learnt from them they've got a complete understanding of the snow, ice and the wildlife that lives on the land. They're completely in tune with it," Conrad said.
David said Conrad was invaluable on the trip because of his vast experience, and taught him efficient ways and methods to survive in Arctic temperatures.
"He helped me with clothing, what to do when your hands go numb, which they did, what to do when your feet die with no feeling in them."
He said you have to 'violently kick your foot back and forwards and it forces blood back to your feet'.
They took their own medical kit including tramadol in case of broken bones.
"There was one occasion I nearly lost an arm. The snowmobile tipped over and it stopped just before my arm hit a big boulder, luckily.
"We were eating 6,000 calories a day, but it was so cold your body burns calories that quickly we actually lost weight.
"All your organs are working overtime. Before I went to Ellesmere I had a full health check including an ECG to make sure my heart could cope with the temperatures," David said.
Conrad said he lost about half a stone on the trip.
Photographing an Arctic phenomenon called a sundog was one memorable experience, which is when colored spots of light develop due to the refraction of light through ice crystals.
Conrad described his most memorable experience on the trip to Ellesmere.
"It was incredibly cold," Conrad said. "Just lying on the frozen snow and ice, less than one metre away from Arctic hares that were coming up to us and were just curious about who and what we were.
"Ellesmere's the tenth largest island in the world, which is huge, but there's only 140 people live on that island so the wildlife haven't seen people before," he said.
Witnessing the hares' curiousity was also David's most memorable experience on the trip.
"They've never seen humans before because very few humans ever go that far north, they were running round our feet, they were like pet rabbits."
The hardest part for both Conrad and David was the cold.
"It's hard to describe the pain in your hands and feet, you basically lose all feeling. It can be quite scary when you lose feeling completely in them," David said. "We had specialist boots on designed for polar exploration which allegedly protects down to -100 degrees, two pairs of Merino wool socks on and heatwarmers in them."
Conrad added travelling on the expedition was difficult, adding up to 12 hours a day over rough terrain on snowmobiles.
He said he's got a lot of wildlife photography in store for next year, travelling from Iceland to the Farne Islands and Bass Rock.
David's photography trips will take him and Conrad to Iceland in February to photograph Arctic foxes.
David will return to Ellesmere in March.
"I've got other trips in mind, I want to do a trip to Greenland as well. I like the cold places, I love the aesthetic you get in photographs with snow and it gives you a nice, clean image which is part of the reason why I like photographing in Arctic regions," David said.
"A lot of our images at the Queen's Hall are like that, they're minimalist surrounded by snow, so it avoids any distractions in the shot when it's all white."
To view Conrad's work, go to https://www.conraddickinson.com/gallery and for David's, go to https://www.robertharding.com/.
The exhibition will be open until January 28.
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