Gondalf

Between Lonely Bay and the Ered Rhívamar lies the cheerless and forbidding plateau known as the Stone Tundra. In the ancient days of Morgoth's realm this plateau was known as Angband's Threshold, scoured by glaciers, standing high on the northern shoulders of the Iron Mountains. The plateau collapsed in the cataclysm that marked the end of the Elder Days; its foundations were destroyed, its surface sagged and broken, so that it nowhere rises more than a few hundred feet above the sea. Very little soil, and, aside from tundra lichens, very little plantlife is to be found here. Most of it appears along the brooks that cross the Gondalf from the mountains on their way to the sea. The surface of the plateau is heavily crevassed, its streams passing through long, narrow valleys gouged out by the ancient glaciers. Much of the cold, cracked, weathered stone is without path or road. Travelers, seeing only the endless barrier of the snowcapped mountains to the east, the ice-covered seas north and west, and the utter desolation of barren rock and stone at their feet, are prone to despair and hopelessness.

The Jäämiehet who dwell on the Stone Tundra are an extremely hardy breed, and their fortitude of spirit is unmatched. They eke out a meager livelihood along the stony streams and tarns of the region. Their diet consists primarily of fish and seals won from Lonely Bay, supplemented by the few edible plants along the streambeds and the ever-present snow hares. Jäämies settlements rarely number more than fifty inhabitants. Life on the Stone Tundra is harsh and pitiless, and wanderers in need of assistance should expect little more than food and water and the crudest of implements from these villages. In spring, the Jäämiehet make a yearly journey south through the mountains to trade at the Spring Festival (usually held along the shores of Sheltered Bay), and lost or injured individuals may have to wait for this trek to return to friendlier climes.