Mount pupils embark on adventurous expedition to Iceland
Early on Sunday morning a group of venturesome College pupils and Mount Staff departed on The Mount’s first Borealis Expedition to Iceland. Today, we have received an update from the intrepid explorers, they have arrived safely and begun trekking through the snowy arctic countryside.
In January 2022, Mount Principal David Griffiths, founded The Mount School Borealis Society, dedicated to furthering the academic education of College pupils in matters relating to the Arctic and Sub-Arctic areas of our planet and, at its epicentre, to providing opportunities for them to experience major mountaineering and trekking expeditions to these boreal areas.
Expedition to Iceland
Consequently, the current Iceland expedition was planned and organised. The party of College girls and staff are spending the next three weeks in the remotest part of Iceland, Norðurstrandir in the Vestfirðir, the isolated North-west of the country. They will explore the secluded fjords and ascend the mountains centred around Iceland’s northernmost ice cap, Drangajökull. The explorers will carry all their own gear and provisions whilst studying the Arctic flora and bird life of this remarkable area, truly at the northern edge of Europe. Access to the area involves a bus charter followed by chartering a boat to approach this remote coastline from the sea.
The group will also attend a reception at the British Embassy in Reykjavik to meet Dr Bryony Mathew, the UK Ambassador to Iceland, who is a former pupil of the Mount School.
Think and Live Adventurously
The expedition is intended to provide a challenging environment in which the girls can step outside their normal physical and mental comfort zones but within a distinct academic learning experience that is intended to both widen their intellectual horizons, and broaden their experiences, of the world beyond the school gates. This academic learning experience will involve areas as diverse as biology, geology, history, culture and geopolitics. The emphasis of these experiences is based firmly on developing such personal qualities as resilience, self-reliance, independence, team work and confidence.