Live exchange with participants of the General Assembly of the Even group, partner of Vagabond since 2001.

The quest continues, in vain since our departure from Nuuk... Despite the lack of coralline, small adventures embellish our route: a story of a lost diving belt then found again, whales in a sunny fjord for my 50th birthday, a tough hydrographic profile by 20 knots of wind, narrow and very shallow passages between the islands, very old stone tombs that reveal skulls and bones, French exam on Harry Potter prepared by Léonie for Aurore, crossing the Arctic circle for the first time for Natasha, delicious pan-fried scallops, the recovery of our diving compressor...

Louis, a sailor and diver I met in Antarctica, and Natasha, a PhD student in earth sciences in Toronto, joined the crew for almost two months. The aim is to search for coralline algae along the West coast of Greenland, from Nuuk to Qaanaaq.

The first week is a busy one, in Nuuk Fjord, with Lina and Emma. Great dives, lots of icebergs, drifting ice and breathtaking under water cliffs... Louis and I are coming up with bags full of coralline, despite some problems with both of our on board compressors. Our colleagues divers from Nuuk, whose compressors also broke down, manage to fill up our tanks, and the mission keeps going till the end. Card games and laughter are showing our success! Lina and Emma are going back to their labs, in Sweden and in England, well loaded with samples.

Departure from Nuuk (capital of Greenland) for a 16 months mission, in Greenland and Nunavut: paleoclimatology, oceanography, glaciology... This is a followup of 2016's mission (watch again the documentary film Climate research in the Arctic) and more scientific projects!

Vagabond is coming back to Greenland's capital. Here, on June 1st, will start the 2019 scientific cruise. Two months of underwater exploration along Greenland West Coast, to sample coralline, the red algae telling about the Arctic ocean past. The second part of the mission will be in Nunavut.

From Narsarsuaq, our photographers are lucky with a nice spring cruise, we are all enjoying this Greenlandic coastal sailing. Aurore and Leonie are taking photo lessons with Christian. Pascal, Claude and Robert are so enthusiasts that one cannot resist to taking pictures!

When leaving Ipiutaq, Vagabond has hit hard a shoal. I dived to have a look, nothing, just a scratch and some paint off. Once more, we admire the strength of our faithful red hull.

When we arrive in the after noon, we just wanted to go ashore. We met again with Agathe and Ina on the beach, then we went to the sheepfold. Because it was the lambing period there was more work than usually: we had to feed the sheeps, help them to give birth and feed with milk the lambs that didn't get enough from their mothers. In the end of the after noon, we met with, we left him with the sheeps and we went to prepare diner and have fun at home. We went to eat on the boat and we decided that Aurore and I could stay and sleep on land. When we got ashore at nite, it was really late and we went fast to the sheepfold where we were gonna stay up to 3am. This nite, two lambs were born. At 12am Aurore and I went to have lunch on board. We decided that Aurore and I could sleep an other nite on land while dad and mom where bringing Christophe and Ronan to take the plane at Narsarsuaq and take on board 4 photographers...

Very nice reunion yesterday with our friends Ina, Agathe and Kalista, at Ipiutaq farm, near Narsaq, South Greenland. It is the high season of births, and the sheeps need all their care! But they are happy to have a break and visit us for an evening on board Vagabond. Then Aurore and Leonie join them for the night watch in the sheepfold; it's also a chance to sleep on land with their friend Ina (12 years old).

After these great shared moments, and some nice hikes around, we end up leaving without our daughters. Further in the fjord, in Narsarsuaq, Ronan and Christophe have a flight tomorrow morning, while the next crew will arrive a few hours later, Christian and his 3 trainee photographers.

Quite hard to believe that we are already in Greenland, we never started a season so early! The nature is beautiful, when winter is just over, very enjoyable after 5 days sailing from Newfoundland. At first there was some swell, and some hard time. But on the other side of the Labrador Sea, we had an incredible arrival. Listening to Eric Clapton, while sailing over Erik's Ridge (The Red), that was nice on Saint Eric's day!

Vagabond was back in her world. Well, the current was up to 2 knots, trying to push us to the West, and the freezing fog didn't help either, but we were happy to be sailing in the ice again, under the moonlight and with no wind. It was all about finding our way to the Greenland coast, crossing the drifting pack ice coming from the East coast with the currents. Tired but delighted, we entered the fjords on Sunday 19th in the morning, at last. Girls were smiling like the sun, warming us up. Yes, we missed all that a lot and we feel real happiness being back in the Arctic for a new mission.