Dragging 70-kilogram food-and-supplies sleds, Team Karibu skied north toward enduring winter. It was warm and raining in southern Quebec in early January. North of Chibougamau, however, snow was heavy and the expedition members did not encounter another human (save for one small group of Cree hunters on snowmobiles) until the expedition’s end. And the temperatures dropped. For 24 days in March, it was never warmer than -40 C. A few nights, says trip leader Jacob Racine, when the thermometer was reading -56 C, “It was so cold, the tree branches in the woods all around us were exploding, cracking like gunshots as sap froze.”

Check out the photos below for a taste of their adventure, which began in Montreal and ended on May 5 in Kuujjuaq in Nunavik, northern Quebec.