First navigation On 8 June 1900,
Zarya left St. Petersburg heading for
Kronstadt and the
Gulf of Finland, where it had a minor problem. While it was being fixed in
Tallinn, Toll left the ship, crossed the gulf, and went by train to Oslo to consult with Nansen, and then to
Bergen to meet
Zarya. From Bergen to
Tromsø the ship was guided by a specially hired local
pilot. In Tromsø, while the crew was waiting for the coal resupply from England, there were two major incidents: Malygin got arrested after a drunken brawl, and Semyashkin contracted a venereal disease and was found unfit for his duties by Dr. Walter. The day after passing
North Cape, on 11 July 1900
Zarya approached
Polyarny to replenish its coal. There Toll and Kolomeitsev had a major quarrel over their roles on the expedition, which ended in Kolomeitsev asking to be to relieved from his duties. Their command styles were very different: Toll longed for comradeship and treated sailors as equals, while Kolomeitsev tried to keep a distance from the men and imposed harsh punishments for unruly behavior. Kolomeitsev thought that Toll's attitude undermined his authority as commander of
Zarya. After unsuccessful mediation attempts, Kolchak likewise offered his resignation. This had the effect of easing the conflict, as Toll could not afford to lose two of his key assistants. On the morning of 12 July the expedition took onboard 60 sled dogs and two
mushers Peter Strizhev and Stepan Rastorguyev, On 30 July outlines of
Sibiryakov Island appeared on the horizon. Toll decided to make a stop there to rest and perform maintenance on the boilers. A group of polar bears were encountered and a few killed for food. On 5 August, the expedition changed its route towards
Taimyr Peninsula. From then on it had to make stops as long as 19 days being stranded in icefields and shallows. On the night of 3 September it saw its first
aurora. Soon sailors noticed a light ahead, and decided that it was
icebreaker Yermak, but astronomer Seeberg realized that it was
Venus.
Wintering in Taimyr On 22 September 1900 the expedition stopped for wintering in the Bay of Colin Archer. The event was marked by a party, with champagne and brandy for the officers and beer for the sailors. Soon after,
Zarya became completely frozen into the ice. A meteorological station was set up on the ice, using sails for the walls. The station had a phone connection with the ship which was used to send observation results every hour. Contrary to
Nordenskiöld and Nansen, who managed to pass Cape Chelyuskin before wintering, Toll failed to reach eastern Taymyr. This would affect the entire course of the expedition, and eventually lead to its tragic outcome. Meanwhile, Toll nearly got Kolomeitsev and Rastorguyev killed by thrice sending them into snowstorms to the mouth of
Taymyr River and the settlements of
Dixon and Golchikha, without a proper map available.
Undiscovered northern lands On 23 February, Toll sent Matisen and Strizhev to survey northwards. The pair crossed the
Nordenskiöld Archipelago from south to north; on reaching the 77° mark, they turned to the west, and then returned due to the perceived shortage of dog food. Matisen was very close to discovering
Maly Taymyr Island, for which he only had to travel extra 150 kilometers north-east from the northernmost point of his journey, and some 200 km north he could find
Severnaya Zemlya. Toll was dissatisfied with the results and a few days later sent Matisen to a new journey with Nosov. This time Matisen mapped two new islands of the Nordenskiöld Archipelago, but turned back after meeting ice ridges. Kolchak's next expedition from the ship nearly cost him his life. When he, together with Byalynitsky-Birulya and two sailors, decided to lower a
dredge into a crack in the ice, they were surprised by an angry polar bear. A dog came to their rescue and distracted the bear while the sailors ran to their camp for their rifles. Toll returned to
Zarya on 10 August, just in time. Two days later the ship started shifting in ice towards the open sea. After the departure of Kolomeitsev, all watch shifts were shared by two officers, Matisen and Kolchak. This forced Kolchak to reduce his scientific work to the most essential measurements. A brutal storm hit the ship on the night of 29 August, flooding the
quarterdeck with icy water and overturning a huge wooden table in the messdeck. On 3 September
Zarya entered Nerpichye Bay and tried to break through to a parking lot in a small harbor that was protected by a shallow from incoming icefields. On the banks sailors spotted a small house made of driftwood and the team of Vollosovich that was awaiting them. Fighting with strong currents, wind and ice the schooner ran aground several times and only on 5 September reached the harbor.
Second wintering Using the driftwood brought by the
Lena River, expedition members soon erected a magnetic observation station, a weather station and a
banya near the house of Vollosovich. While running from hot banya to cool down in snow, a common practice of the time, Kolchak got
inflammation of the periosteum accompanied by a high fever. The failure to find the Sannikov Land was a strong disappointment for Toll, who called the voyage "Exploration of the Sannikov Land and other islands". The passage to Vladivostok through the Bering Strait seemed unrealistic and the results of the expedition too small for him. He decided to send Matisen in search for the Sannikov Land in February–March 1902, after the
polar day set in, and upon his return, explore the Sannikov Land, if found, or
Bennett Island if not. Evenings in the messdeck were spent in philosophical debates, and their most fervent participants Kolchak and Birulya, were often sent to cool down to the shores. Those trips made the two men close friends, and resulted in an observation by Kolchak that in extreme cold, when a river locally freezes to the bottom, the incoming water would flow on top of ice until the entire stream freezes. On 21 December 1901, Dr. Walter died of a heart attack during his duty at the weather station. He was feeling unwell the weeks before but tried to hide that. He was replaced by Dr. Katin-Yartsev, who arrived in late April 1902. Vollosovich developed
neurasthenia, and Toll allowed him to leave the expedition. He briefly accompanied him on the shore between 15 and 30 January 1902, and upon returning to
Zarya, sent Matisen for his planned explorations. On the continent, Toll learned that Rastorguyev, who was supposed to rejoin
Zarya, went to Chukotka with an American expedition, signing a lucrative contract. Previously, in early February Toll received a note from the Academy of Sciences instructing him to limit the expedition to explorations of New Siberian Islands and terminate it in the mouth of the Lena. On 8 August it was directed to Bennett Island. According to Katin-Yartsev, there was little hope to reach Bennett, and the main goal was to collect the group of Birulya on New Siberia. When the passage between Belkovsky and Kotelny island became blocked with ice, Matisen tried to skirt Kotelny from the south to pass through the Blagoveschensky Strait to Cape Vysoky. In the shallow waters of the strait the ship was damaged and started leaking, after which Matisen decided to get around New Siberia from the south. He succeeded, and on 16 August
Zarya sailed in full swing to the north, only to get blocked by ice on the next day. By 23 August the ship ran low on coal, and would not make a return journey even if it managed to reach Bennett, which was some 90 miles away. Matisen decided to turn south, abandoning Toll. Later Kolchak and most other polar explorers and historians did not criticize that decision, believing that Matisen had no choice. Meanwhile, the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences asked merchant A. I. Gromova, the owner of polar steamship
Lena, to rescue the main part of the expedition and offered her the ownership of
Zarya in return. On 25 August 1902
Zarya entered
Buor-Khaya Gulf and approached
Tiksi Bay.
Lena had not arrived yet, and Matisen tried to bring the ship into the delta of the Lena River. Kolchak with two boatswains performed depth measurements over three days, but could not find a safe passage.
Lena departed on 2 September and by 30 September reached
Yakutsk, where expedition members disembarked and proceeded to
Irkutsk on horses. During the trip, Nikolai Bezborodov accidentally shot Trifon Nosov, who later died from
sepsis.
Fate of the groups of Toll and Birulya Toll arrived at
Bennett Island on 21 July 1902 facing a dilemma: set a basecamp and engage in hunting to replenish his food supplies, or rely on the arrival of
Zarya and proceed with explorations. Toll chose the latter. The group had built a shelter from driftwood which was also to be used for fuel. For reasons unknown, they did not store food and abandoned the remains of killed bears and reindeer. When it became clear that the
Zarya would not be coming, the group was already low on ammunition, with only 30 shotgun rounds found at the shelter, and the reindeer had already left the island. Kolchak failed to find any traces of the men on Bennett or New Siberia Islands, and assumed they met their fates while navigating between them. Meanwhile, Birulya's group left New Siberia and reached the mainland by December 1902. == Achievements and importance of the expedition ==