Underwaater Japanese Pyramid Dean wrote:
Thanks for the Yonaguni pics. The stairway is certainly interesting.
DD & HE'ers:
On this page is a great big, very clear, pic of the stairs.
"It's a true undersea ruin"--according to a well respected geologist!
(article on the Yonaguni monument)
Leslee
From pages 138 - 140 of Nansen's book Farthest North: [ At 79 degrees North,
bears and foxes sighted. ]
" Friday, December 22d. A bear was shot last night. Jacobsen saw it first,
during his watch. He shot at it. It made off, and he then went down and told
about it in the cabin. Mogstad and Peter came on deck; Sverdrup was called,
too, and came up a little later. They saw the bear on his way towards the
ship again; but he suddenly caught sight of the gallows with the trap on the
ice to the west, and went off there. He looked well at the apparatus, then
raised himself cautiously on hishind-legs, and laid his right paw on the
cross-beam just beside the trap, stared for a little, hesitating, at the
delicious morsel, but did not at all like the ugly jaws round it. Sverdrup
was by this time out at the deckhouse, watching in the sparkling moonshine.
His heart was jumpinghe expected every moment to hear the snap of his trap.
But the bear shook his head suspiciously, lowered himself cautiously on to
allfours again, and sniffed carefully at the wire that the trap was fastened
by, following it along to where it was made fast to a great block of ice. He
went round this, and saw how cleverly it was all arranged, then slowly
followed the wire back, raised himself up as before, with his paw on the
beam of the gallows, had a long look at the trap, and shook his head again,
probably saying to himself, `These wily fellows have planned this very
cleverly for me.' Now he resumed his march to the ship. When he was 60 paces
of the bow Peter fired. The bear fell, but jumped up and again made off.
Jacobson, Sverdrup and Mogstad all fired now, and he fell among some
hummocks."
Members-
What were warm-booded mamals doing a couple hundred miles from land? By that
I am referring to the New Siberian Islands, which aren't exactly teeming
with bears anyway- they are desolate and windswept from what I understand.
Where did these bears come from? At 79* North, Nansen was at the threshold
of the opening.
To: List Members
From: Dharma/Dean
Members,
Mark Harp said the following and mentioned the following quote once- and they are my sentiments exactly. Nothing accounts for the mammalian and marine life which truly exists in the middle of the Arcticice- not inversion layers of air from the Equator, not volcanoes beneath the ocean- nothing.
" My favorite quote of all the explorers' remarks concerning the
'strangeness' of the Polar regions is from Elisha Kent Kane. It's the
kind of comment where the knowledgable reader wants to tap our
bewildered friend on the shoulder and tell him the certain answer to the
riddle which confronts him. Let me cite this excerpt from my 1994 Nexus
article:
"Ships' surgeon for the ADVANCE and RESCUE, Dr. Elisha Kent Kane
recorded his extensive Arctic experience in ARCTIC EXPLORATIONS IN
SEARCH OF SIR JOHN FRANKLIN, experiences which culminated near the 82nd
parallel. The expedition progressed as far North as was practical in
their ships, and then, when the amount of additional ice rendered
further progress impossible or at least unsafe, they continued their
poleward journey on foot with sledges. But as with other Arctic
explorers before and since, they were amazed to eventually find further
advancement thwarted by the gradual encroachment of an open polar sea.
He writes:
-----------------------------
'It is impossible in reviewing the facts which connect themselves with
this discovery--the melted snow upon the rocks, the crowds of marine
birds, the limited but still advancing vegetable life, the rise of the
thermometer in the water-- not to be struck by their bearing on the
question of a milder climate near the pole. To refer them all to the
modification of temperature induced by the proximity of open water is
only to change the form of the question; for it leaves the inquiry
unsatisfied: what is the cause of the open water?' "