Arctic Odyssey 2018

Over five years in the planning, we finally set off on what promised to be the trip of a lifetime.

 

Arriving in Oslo we were greeted by an unusually warm 27C temperature. Several great days were spent in Oslo, including being guided around most of the iconic museums and sites; along the way learning much about life in Norway.

 

We then enjoyed one of the world’s great train journeys, Oslo to a showery Bergen. Our next two days in this stunning city, were bathed in very unusual warm sunshine. A fjord cruise and guided city tour, plus a day to explore the fabulous waterfront kept all enthralled in this pedestrian friendly city.

 

The next day whilst flying to Longyearbyen, we met up with the other seven travellers of the Quest Tours’ group. Flying over jagged mountain peaks and glaciers, finally the view of our destination, the world’s northern-most town appeared, as we flew down a long valley between two cloud-topped mountain ranges. Often fog-bound, we were fortunate to have this vista revealed, and being aided in avoiding the cumulo-granite.

 

A beautiful hotel, guided bus tour, sled-dog adventure, the fascinating, fabulous museum and the opportunity to wander around and explore this quirky outpost town at near the top of the world, fabulously filled in the afternoon and next morning. After-lunch we strolled down to the waterfront, to finally board our home for the next 18-nights, the beautiful gaff-rigged topsail schooner, the “Rembrandt van Rijn”.

After meeting the crew of 12, and the balance of 7 whom made up the rest of our 33-shipmates, we were given the orientation of the ship and safety briefing. Setting sail immediately we passed a multi thousand passenger luxury cruise liner; their cosseted passengers gazing at us from the deck as we motored out of the harbour. They would never be able to see or experience what lay before us; close-in to shoreline cruising, Zodiac shore and iceberg excursions, all not on their agenda.

 

We were now in the realm of the midnight sun, as we would only experience a few hours of darkness in the final few days of our voyage.

 

Our ship’s programme was now detailed; each day we would enjoy morning and afternoon Zodiac planned shore landings, or shoreline cruising excursions, as well as spur of the moment Zodiac launches, whenever wildlife, Polar Bears in particular, were spotted.

 

We were entertained and educated with afternoon and evening talks and videos by our two guides, the wickedly funny Jordi, and his cohort, Geologist, Glacierologist and all-round nice guy, Laurence. Subjects of these talks ranged from Geology, Glaciers, Polar Expeditions, Archaeology, Arctic History, Climate Change, Wildlife and Tall Ship Sailing.

 

For the next six days we explored the fjords, islands and shoreline of Spitsbergen (Spikey Mountains – Dutch), Shore excursions delivered two grades of walks, easy “ambles” and more active hikes (rambles). Glaciers, tundra, delicate Arctic flowers, bird life, Harbour Seals and Walrus, all up close left us in wonder, And recent Polar Bear footprints on the shoreline, ensured we stayed close to our two rifle-toting guides.

Our afternoon shore excursion the next day, took us to a sand spit where dozens of massive Walrus grumped together in a steaming pile. We very slowly approached this mountain of blubber, often stopping if they appeared restive, and then continuing as they became comfortable with our presence. Eventually we were around 20-metres away from the grumbling herd, tusks flashed as neighbouring bulls asserted dominance, all the while grunting and roaring. Just a fabulous, well managed excursion was enjoyed by all.

As we sailed into a fjord just after midnight, whilst most of us were asleep in our cabins, eagle-eyed Laurence spotted a Polar Bear off our starboard midships. “Polar Bear” came the call over the P.A. In minutes everyone was on deck, gazing to the shoreline off our starboard bow, where a huge male Polar Bear was prowling. Our guides now realised that this was a second Polar Bear, as the first one spotted was still swimming off midships.

We spent the next 3-hours or so on deck, as the ship followed the land based Polar Bear. Great photographic opportunities arose as the bear progressed at first along the foreshore, and then along a sunlit ridgeline, before returning to the shore. Here after a moment, he launched in and swam away into the sun. Wow what an experience! Breakfast call was late this morning.

A few more days of Seal, Walrus and Polar Bear spotting from the ship and the Zodiacs, plus shore and glacier front Zodiac excursions nearly completed our time exploring the many fjords and island of Spitsbergen.

 

Our final day at Spitsbergen had us exploring the island of Ytre Norskoya, which in the 16th century had been a Dutch whaling outpost. Evidence of this was to be found on the lower slopes, with the permafrost pushing archaeological remains to the ground surface.

A steep hike afforded beautiful vistas of both sides of the island. Puffins and Little Auks were nesting here and flying back with catch for their chicks. Arctic foxes and their so cute cubs prowled the cliffs, affording great photo opportunities

At nearly 80 degrees north, so close to the North Pole, we set sail in the evening for Greenland, passing yet another massive cruise liner hove-to off a glacier, nice for its passengers, but not even approaching what we had seen and experienced.

 

Heading out into the Greenland Sea, at the top of the North Sea, we set our sails for the first time, with all crew and passengers joining in the work, learning the ropes and having a great time. What a bunch of landlubbers we were, we could only get better!

Our crossing of the Greenland Sea was to take three and a half days; light winds and gentle seas, the norm at this time of the year, meant that we motor-sailed our way westward, for all but a dozen of hours under sail alone, in fickle, favourable breezes.

 

We were entertained on the crossing by thrice daily entertaining talks by our guides and members of the ship’s crew. These talks were interspersed by time on deck, setting and furling sails; as sailors we were improving, but hardly a well-oiled machine!

With the mostly calm seas and lack of wind, came reduced visibility in the sea fog that shrouded our passage. Sightings of nearby sea birds, Minke Whales and rare White-backed Dolphins shadowing the ship, had us all on deck peering into the swirling fog.

As we approached the Greenland coast, the lifting fog revealed huge icebergs, hidden from all but the ship’s radar until now. The size, variety of shapes and colours, as well as the bird-life that rested on and flew around them, had all of us fascinated and on deck with our cameras. Jordi wryly commented, “maybe we see bigger ones in Scoresby Sund”.

The ship now steered towards Kaiser Franz Joseph Fjord with satellite images indicating that the sea-ice was dissipating, we attempted to enter the fjord, only to be frustrated in our attempts by reforming sea-ice, forcing us to turn south and to attempt entry to other fjords down the coast.

 

As we approached the entrance to the next series of Fjords, two Polar Bears were seen swimming thru the ice flows, one very close to our stationary ship, sniffing the air for Uber Eats, us, or maybe our breakfast which was being served. A rare Hooded Seal was spotted resting on floating ice as we passed.

Finally, after another couple of frustrated attempts, we entered Store Fjord, which had not previously been explored by our ship’s crew. Exploration on the coast of the wildest country on our planet had the entire ship’s company excited with the adventure of it all.

 

A day of fascinating exploring then making way towards the next day’s adventure, exploring the unknown, uncharted and seldom visited Lille Fjord. For all of us, including our two guides, this was to be an amazing day, culminating in landing on Raffles Island at the entrance to the Fjord, where hiked to a spectacular hanging lake that had been a focus for research by climatologists in the 1990s. We completed our day by, in glassy calm seas, circumnavigating the island in the Zodiacs, sea birds nested in the towering cliffs and sea caves, small icebergs floated nearby, and after returning to the ship we weighed anchor and motored to the opposite cliff face to observe a cascading waterfall, what a great day of absolute adventure!

Sailing southward towards the world’s biggest fjord, Scoresby Sund, having heard so much about it, we all looked forward to seeing this amazing fjord. At anchor and after breakfast the next morning, the P.A. announced a mother Polar Bear and her two cubs swimming close to the ship. Zodiacs launched, we motored away from the ship, and then sat motionless as the mother bear approached very close to us, sniffing the air, before re-joining her cubs and climbing ashore, the Polar Bear family then walked along the shoreline, approaching our boats, before climbing the rocky scree to a grassy patch, where the mother bear proceeded to suckle her cubs.

That afternoon and into the evening we sailed into the further approaches to Scoresby Sund, past massive icebergs shining in the most beautiful light. The sky and cirrostratus cloud now turned on a display, with sunlight beaming thru the clouds and the ice crystals within. This created two meteorological phenomena; the Sun and one of two “Sun Dogs”, parallel smaller suns that appear to the side, and the “Bravais Arch”, also called a “smile in the sky”, an upside down rainbow visible above us in zenith of the sky. And whilst all of this enfolded, a fairly small iceberg that we just passed, commenced to roll, cracking and growling, it sent up plumes of spray and small waves as at turned over and finally settled into equilibriam.

The next days were spent sailing further into Scoresby Sund; bigger and bigger icebergs were encountered as we ventured further into the fjord. Scoresby Sund is over a kilometre deep and skirted by mountains on all sides over 2 kilometres high, the landscape was just stunning. Morning and afternoon shore excursions, ancient, discovering never before seen Inuit settlement ruins, that had been pushed up by the permafrost after 1100 years being buried, small herds of Musk Ox, Polar Bear tracks, occasional Arctic Foxes and swooping seabirds on the front of each glacier kept the guides alert and cameras clicking.

Finally, we approached the massive glacier at the end of Scoresby Sund, this is the “mother” of all big icebergs in northeast Greenland. We were confronted by three immense tabular icebergs that had calved off the glacier face; the ship’s captain estimated their size as 1.5-kilometres long x 1-kilometre wide and ½-kilometre deep. Extreme caution ruled as on these giants was actually bobbing in the calm water by some 3 to metres, indicating it was unstable and may break apart at any time. Jordi, was hoisted to the top of the mast to assess the way forward, and reported that this was as far as we could venture safely.

We retreated from our position and back down the fjord, anchoring and exploring new beaches, tundra and deltas as we headed south over the next few days. A number of smaller icebergs provided us with spectacular rolling displays as we wended our way.

We were now experiencing a few hours of darkness at night, and those to arise in the wee hours were treated with beautiful sunsets / sunrises and the most amazing light. Unfortunately cloud cover and surrounding peaks prevented observation of the hoped for Aurora Borealis, other than a green glow on the horizon later in our trip.

Exiting the Sund we sailed past familiar icebergs as passed by Jamieson Land, visiting a sometimes used hunters’ hut, and onto the only settlement in northeast Greenland, the tiny Innuit community of Ittoqqortoormiit, (ok, pronounce that). This settlement is home to just over 200 residents, smiling faces greeted our party as we went ashore to meet the locals, including some delightful kids and sled dog puppies who surrounded us.

Next morning we departed the “Rembrandt van Rijn” by Zodiac for the last time on this voyage, Ashore at Constable Pynt we were escorted by armed guards (Polar Bears prowl here), along the 2 klm track to the “International Airport”, no airline lounges here, just a Nissan Hut and wooden benches outside in the sun. The notice that a siren would sound and a blue light would flash, if a Polar Bear approached, reinforced the knowledge that Greenland is really THE wildest place on our planet.

Our charter flight was some 4-hours late in arriving in Greenland, but from there everything went smoothly into Iceland

A number of us picked up share hire cars in Iceland and set off on nine-day self-drive tours around, what is, the Number ONE tourist destination in the world.

Starting in the smallest capital in the world, Reykjavik, we firstly travelled south and east before returning on the ring road around the north west side of the island.

Iceland is justly popular, with so much to offer and see; dozens of magnificent waterfalls, glaciers, thermal hot springs and baths, Icelandic horses, Wallace & Grommet sheep, nesting Puffins, prolific other birdlife, hauled out Harbour Seals, beautiful countryside encompassing spectacularly situated farms, stunning little harbours full of colourful fishing boats and associated, picturesque small coastal villages, iceberg filled lagoons, black sand iceberg strewn beaches, and just breathtaking scenery everywhere. 

Really friendly, helpful people, great (albeit expensive) food, a well-tuned service industry that ensures everything runs smoothly. What’s not to like?

This was such a wonderful experience, we are doing it all again in 2019.