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January/February 2007 issue	In this issue Table of Contents Feature: Polar police Feature: Pond hockey Feature: Mountain pine beetle The Inside Story Editor’s Notebook Reverberations Explorer À la carte Mosaic

Day 2. LEARNING THE ROUTINE
45°34’N, 60°10’W

	Photo: Benoit Aquin

We’re heading into the Gulf of St. Lawrence and up through the Strait of Belle Isle, and our time today is filled with intensive safety training and ship familiarization. Last time I was on one of these ships, I got stuck in my immersion wetsuit and couldn’t get out. This ship has dry suits, which are still a bit claustrophobic for some. Photographer Benoit Aquin and I have a good laugh, but this is serious training led by First Officer Stéphane Legault and Third Officer Catherine Lacombe. When all is said and done, including written and online tests, we have completed the "Ship specific familiarization checklist referred to in FSM-6C1 section 3.3," we have done "Mandatory Occupational Safety and Health Training," including a computer-based training program called "WHMIS and You," as per Coast Guard regulations, and we have received signed certificates to attest to our success.

Benoit and I have the run of the ship. We check out all the systems — propulsion, electrical power generation, water desalination, sewage, communication, security, fire, waste, food service ... we’re on a selfcontained world on the high seas. Everywhere we go, crew members are accommodating, within the limits of the work they’re doing at the time, friendly and anxious to help us understand what makes the Louis tick.

Sailing through the Strait of Belle Isle into Iceberg Alley, we clamber up to the crow’s nest, the highest point on the ship. We get there by climbing stairs up five storeys to the bridge, then proceed up a 20-metre ladder inside the main mast to a trap door. The view from there is unbelievable, especially at night when the watch officer fires up big searchlights to scan for icebergs.

My most profound geography lesson in a while happens as we turn the corner of Labrador, leaving the warm northeastward-flowing waters of the Gulf of St. Lawrence and entering the frigid southwardflowing waters of the Labrador Current, which brings down all the icebergs. The temperature drops from the balmy 20s to near-zero — on July 22! Since turning that corner, we’re on a course of zero degrees, due north, for 700 nautical miles. It will take us through the Labrador Sea and into Baffin Bay.