Q+T at home.

A few days ago Qimmiq and Talik were allowed to come home with the humans for a few hours. It turned out that even savage polar dogs likes cheese! There must be some aromatic chemicals in cheese that enhances hearing and memmory because all of the sudden the puppies were very responsive to "sit", "dæk", "bli" and last but not least "værs`go"! After wards Qimmiq tried to bury a chew toy on the sealskin. Not her brightest moment but she does get point for persistence.

Oh btw that should have said HER seal skin. She has decided that a real polar princess should not be content with sleep on the bare floor, resting her royal paws on a sealskin is far more befitting!

Driving in the dark

There is finally enough snow for some serious dogdriving and even a hint of light at the southern sky in the middle of the day. This video is from yesterday when we went out in a bit of a snowstorm! It is Talik and Nuna in the front (some where out there in the dark) with Qimmiq and Ludde in the middle and Silver and Miki as wheel dogs. Except for a discussion about whether or not we should relocate some reindeer or not (the humans vetoed no) the trip was nice. NSQTLM

End of year update

After a long silence we are back! The team is now 50% bigger with the additions of Ludde and Miki, we have finally gotten our new sledge and the snow is back! We have entered into next years edition of trappers trail The humans have been to the other side of the earth and we have in the mean time been serviced by aunt Lisa, uncle Eike and Yvonne, Jonas` human. Oh and we are now on youtube as well, have a look at our videoes here:

Video 1
Video 2
Video 3

Marry X-mas and happy new year from NSQTML (and the humans)

Summer training: The quadbike is repaired and yesterday we went for a trip in town after a brief snowstorm!

Team Qanik and Ludde

Refueling at the gas station

It was a warm day, Silver taking a break

Talik is a bit dirty after running on the muddy streets of Longyearbyen

Boat trip and tiral dog!

Team Qanik might get a new member! Ludde, the huskey is currently undergoing test driving. He is a huskey, black and brown, 2003 model, ca 30 kg and 0,2 HP.

The humans picked us up yesterday and took us for a ride in Kermit, their new green boat. That was quite nice BUT they made us wear life vests! It is so hard to be a cool rebellious teenage dog when you wear the same clothes as your siblings and MOTHER! well well it was nice to be out. On Sunday Qimmiq and Silver went for another ride- Qimmiq was positioned in the stern of the boat, when we returned to the beach and were just 50 m from land she could wait no more and made a swim for it! Rico "sprinted" (well if you can actually call it sprinting in a huge orange survival suit) after her but she was already at the car. So we returned a wet Qimmiq and dry Silver to to dog yard. Oh yes, one of great fans, aunt Lisa is back for a long time! Yesterday she and Ole took N&S for a walk while the young ones and Ludde went out with Rico. Welcome back Lisa- we look forward to lots of new adventures!

Trip in Mälerdalen 1/3 09

Slightly frozen humans

View from the sledge

The team

Talik and Nuna in the front

Qimmiq on the line

Weekend trip. On Friday the humans came with the snow scooters and picked us up for a trip. We were not quite pleased with being stuffed in boxes on the sledge. Last season we were allowed to ride on the scooter in front of the humans but they claim we are to big now! It was a bit of a bumpy ride to Reindalen since some one with a bulldozer and an anger management problem had been driving through Todalen before us, but in the end we made it. Nuna and silver have been in the cabin several times before, they spend Christmas there last year and Ulli (our ex caretaker) took us there for new year. The puppies were very curious and in the evening they all got to go inside for a short time- so cosy! The humans kicked us out just before midnight and went to bed. The next day it was Talik and Qimmiqs one year birthday! HURRA. We celebrated the day with a long trip en Reindalen and a big piece of meat in the evening. After dinner two of our fans and sometimes feeders Harvey and Marzena showed up. Even later more people came so we were not allowed to go inside again, luckily it was nice and warm (-1C) outside. In the night we had a bit of a snowstorm so we did not go on a trip on Sunday. The humans drowse us home after lunch and we played in the dog yard for some time. A good weekend for the furry ones.

NSQT

Rico and Nuna relaxing in the cabin

Sleeping birthday puppies

Talik (front) and Silver

The Humans are back!!
Yesterday the humans appeared again, they have been gone for almost 6 weeks and seem to have acquired a strange brown color in the face, peculiar in deed! While the humans were away Jonas`s human Yvonne have taken care of us, we have gone on trips with a lot of other dogs and eating lots of meat, not a bad Christmas! One thing though- the humans did not bring home any gifts for us! They said they had a gift for us but that was new reflex wests! We know its for safety, and we have to wear them but it is SO hard to be cool in something bright yellow and reflective....
Well we took the human on a little ski trip yesterday, just to get them started and today we went out with our newly pimped sledge, it even has a (YELLOW) brake now! Thanks for the present Yvonne! It is really warm at the moment, just a few minus degrees so we are getting really warm when running, hope we get some decent temperatures again soon. The warm temperatures resulted in some fog just above the ground, really spooky but fun to run in. That's all for now, we will post some pics later. NSQT

Puppy torture, the humans place food in front of us and makes .us wait and do tricks for it, doesn't that constitute cruelty to animals? TQ

Town trip!! Today the humans took us (QT) to town. We were placed outside the cafe and kept close watch on the town square! Oh yeah: we sniffed a tree, strange creations they are, they did not however seem edible so why they would place one in the middle of town we don't know. Today however the tree was emitting light. Quite practical here in the dark season. There were some human pups around who seemed to worship the tree, they were singing and dancing around it. Very peculiar indeed. We have been pulling the sledge for the last 3 days now so today when we came back to the dog yard we had a cuddle session with Rico. Tomorrow the humans go on vacation until January (they say they want to go to a warm place. We consider that utter madness as it ha just gotten down to some reasonable temperatures here). While they are gone Jonas` human Yvonne will take care of us! Well humans have a nice trip and bring back some goodies for us!!

NSQT

The last boat. Today Nord Syssel, the patrol ship of Sysselmanden left Svalbard for the season. Since it was also the first Sunday of Advent the Christmas tree was going to be lighted (Nuna claims that she has seen not just a tree before but "trees" and that they are tall plants that live in great numbers on the mainland and often stand around in packs of 1000s. QT remains sceptical. Uncle Silver was deep in a daydream about the unlimited peeing opportunities a so calleged forest would present and not available for comments). Well the humans took us on a long sledge trip in the morning to the sausage hut (Where legend has it that a kind stranger gave Nuna a sausage in 2004 and we still live in the hope of a meeting that wonderfull man again and thus return to the hut on any opportunity). After lunch the humans and aunt Lisa came back and took the puppies to town. First we went to the old quay to wave goodbye to the ship and see the fireworks. Talik though it was not that interesting and wanted to go for a walk, especially since Qimmiq kept putting her front legs up on his back to get a better view. (Fire and bangs are FUN! It kind of reminded me of the time I went ptarmigan hunting with my mom and the humans It works like this: the humans make a loud bang with some kind of stick and we get the head of a ptarmigan-yummy! Q) After the fireworks the torches were lit we and the humans followed the rest of the town to the town center. It was really interesting to walk among all the humans with their pups (think they called them children) we also met Odin and Savi from the dog yard and their humans and a lot of other dogs. At the town square we shared a cup of gløg with the humans (they got the nasty stuff inside and we got the delicious paper cup TQ). They were about to light the Christmas tree (we still have not seen it, there were so many humans so we cannot say for certain that such a thing as a tree does exist). When they said : "and now we light the tree" it went wooosh! and the town was completely dark. Impressive yes, but is that really what they mean by lighting a tree? It must be very dark at the mainland if they have a lot of trees..... After an exciting day we were driven home to the dog yard and had a big piece of frozen meet. The humans finally listened and from last week on we now get frozen beef and chicken meet every second day! Sweet

Northern light over our cages.

Map of the area around Longyearbyen with key dog localities.

Overnight trip! Our first tent trip of the season. On Saturday afternoon our, Jonas' and Mings humans came to the dog yard together with Harvey and Marzena (two of our 2-legged fans who some times takes us on trips and bring us food) and started packing the sledges, JUHU it was trip time! The boys and Jonas were in front of one sledge, the girls on another. Since Qimmiq is in heat we are not allowed to all run together. We were followed by Team Sava Vit but we out ran them! We had send Rico ahead on a snow scooter with our food, lines and the humans stuff (they do need a LOT). We arrived at the tent site, behind the Pingo on the other side of the valley after a short trip and the humans set up the Lavo and put us on lines ( we would rather have been out chasing reindeers) but we got seal for dinner so it was OK. The humans stayed all night in the tent with the oven on, eating what smelled like thai food and chocolate cake, while we were perfectly comfortable in the soft snow. We did get them out of the tent, and fast, when a unknown dog team raced by in the night and when Nuna managed to get loose by unscrewing and opening a safety carabiner! (nice work Mom! TQ). This afternoon we headed home (with a few stops on the way to discuss whether we should go reindeer hunting or not, the boring humans voted no every time). Bach home we had food and the humans went home to dry their tent and wash their gloves, they said they smelled like seal, like it was a bad thing......

NSQT

Back sledge with 2,3 dogs (from left, Oki, Silver and Jonas) In front Karoline with 3 dog powers. (picture: Yvonne)

The camp and the full moon over Operafjellet

Bababababababa like a moonlight shadow.......... It is full moon, time for howling and sledge driving. Karoline and Jonas´ human Yvonne took us on a scenic tour of the valley. Nuna, Silver and Qimmiq were pulling the big sledge with Karoline while the super energetic team Jonas-Talik were in front of the "huskey-buggey" WOW it was fast, the humans wanted us to stop to have some breaks but we were having non of that, there was miles and miles of untouched snow, glittering in the moonlight, just waiting for our paw prints! We were initially followed by Lupi and Odin, the bonsai team and their human Lene on skies, but we quickly outran them. Crossing the valley, turning north by the pingo towards Mälerdalen and finally heading home over the frozen delta, casting our own moonlight shadows on the fresh powder snow, what a trip!

NSQT

OK OK OK not my brithtest moment. Again today I managed to get on top of our house on the highest platform but again it was a bit too scarry to jump down so again my female human had to rescue me, again.......

DOH!!!

Qimmiq

Cultural education! The sun has now been down for 2 weeks and this weekend it was "kunstpause" (art pause) in Longyearbyen and after taking us for a nice trip in the morning the humans decided to further our cultural education and took the puppies for an art exhibition in town. We were a BIT disappointed that we were left outside (!!) the building while the humans went in but after we heard the first tone of the 12 man mandolin orchestra the humans unwittingly had been lured into enduring we were quite happy to be left outside to supervise the door! After 45 minutes the humans came back out and we send one of the humans home with the car while we took the other human and Aunt Lisa for a stroll through town. Back at the humans apartment we went in to say hello and were then driven back to the dog yard. Qimmiq has now moved in with uncle Silver for a few days while Talik is living with his mom again!

NSQT

Quad bike training in Adventdalen.

Seal day, seal day, seal day! Yesterday after a long trip to endalen and back with the humans on the bike we all had a big piece of seal when we came home! JUHU!! So today we are all a bit smelly. Sadley one of our favorite humans and bringer of seal, Thue, has now left the island for good. So long and thank for all the seal

Silver, Nunsen and the puppies!

Town trip. Yesterday we had a very exciting trip with the quad bike, our humans took us on a ride trough town to the gas station to get the tires of the bike filled up. We were very well behaved and stood still while the humans added air. Then we continued through town to the habour where we turned and headed home. Silver got a bit to interested in the smells on the roadside from other passing dogs so he was degrated to 2. in command and put in the middle of the team and Talik got the chance to show his worth as a lead dog together with Nuna for the last kilometer. That was great! Back home the humans had a "dugnad" repairing and cleaning the dogyard. We had dryfood today, a bit of a bummer as we usually get seal every second day but the humans must have messed up. We ate the food but only as a symbolic act symbolicing our disapointment in the mishap and we trust that the human will get their act together! All in all a good day to be a dog.

NSQT

Trip time! Our humans came to take us on a trip with our Quad bike yesterday! It was great; we were joined by Jonas the husky, a semi-member of team Qanik for the trip. We set of at good pace out in the valley but soon it got serious, as we realized that were being followed by the hormone hyped team Sava vit! We managed to keep them behind us and had a really nice trip, we turned just before the northern light station and after a shot break we headed home for dinner. After dinner the puppies went home with the humans for some "opdragelses og disiplin" training. First lesson was to wait outside the shop while the humans did the shopping before we headed home to the apartment for snacks and a belly rub After an hour in the baking hot apartment (why do humans insist on living in sauna temperatures? it was at least 15C in the apartment!) we went back to the dog yard. We have just gotten new hay in our houses so even though is finally getting down to some decent temperatures for running, we are cozy and warm at night!

Congratulations to team Akva vit, ups Sava vit with their new team vehicle!

NSQT

Today is the first day on our new blog! We would like to thank our humans and our fellow 4-legged bloggers from the dog yard for inspiring our humans to finally letting us put our furry paws on the keyboard.

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Since we have to accept that even puppy paws are to big for the standard QWERTY- keyboard we will from now on let the humans write, under strict supervision of course!

NSQT

First, slightly chaotic, trip of the season 2005. Nuna leading, brothers and partners in crime, Silver and Brutus in the middle with Yang and Janson in the back. (Humans: Mette and Karoline )

Going on a ski trip in March 2007. Silver towing Karoline and and Nuna with a friend, start out just fine, but Yang (with Rico in tow) do not seem to be in a hurry....