Tue
24 Mar
2015

You don’t have to go far away. Light and sce­n­ery, gre­at views and some wild­life – it is all here, clo­se to or even within Lon­gye­ar­by­en. No polar bears or wal­rus­ses, but tho­se endu­ring win­ter dwel­lers who can’t escape: reinde­er and ptar­mi­gan. The lat­ter are well camou­fla­ged also in win­ter, with their white plu­mage, so you almost can’t see them in the snow when they put the head down to pick some seeds from the fro­zen tun­dra, which is expo­sed whe­re the snow has been remo­ved by reinde­er on their eter­nal search for food. So gre­at to watch this ever-las­ting fight for sur­vi­val in the arc­tic wit­hout being part of it.

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

Hior­th­hamn, just oppo­si­te Lon­gye­ar­by­en, has one of Spitsbergen’s most impres­si­ve bits of his­to­ri­cal heri­ta­ge: the old coal ship­ping cra­ne from the ear­ly 20th cen­tu­ry years of mining. Young ice floes are gent­ly scrat­ching the icy shore while the set­ting sun casts a blood-red light over the moun­ta­ins on the north side of Isfjord. It is late after­noon, not even evening, but it is just over 2 weeks ago that the first sun­rays in Lon­gye­ar­by­en were recei­ved with cele­bra­ti­on after the polar night. Now the light is coming back quick­ly.

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.