Tue
11 Aug
2015

New trip, new luck. Old polar fri­ends with their fri­ends and rela­ti­ves, a very fami­li­ar set­ting right from the begin­ning. Very plea­sant.

A litt­le bit of swell in the Isfjord ent­rance. Christ­mas-tree Wil­li finds out that the sea is some­thing dif­fe­rent than a forest. The shaking of a boat is less plea­sant than the shaking of the trees.

Mir­ror images on the water in For­lands­und. Moun­ta­ins and gla­ciers seem to rise both upwards into the sky and down­wards on the water.

Pho­to Kongsfjord – 11th August 2015 – 1/2

Ny Åle­sund is a good start, a gent­le tran­si­ti­on from zivi­li­sa­ti­on to the arc­tic wil­der­ness. And mee­ting Mar­ten Loo­nen, the head of the Dutch arc­tic sta­ti­on, is always a very plea­sant affair, whe­re you will always learn a lot. Geese and foxes chan­ge in having good and bad years, rough­ly simi­lar­ly to lem­mings. The cycles don’t have three years, but seven or eight. The grass, the reinde­er, rain or snow, it is all part of the sys­tem. It is com­plex.

Pho­to Kongsfjord – 11th August 2015 – 2/2

A dead wal­rus on the shore as attrac­ted two polar bear fami­lies. Two mothers, each with one cub of the year. One fami­ly is stay­ing a bit away while the other one is fee­ding. The mother is pay­ing full atten­ti­on to the wal­rus car­cass, while the cub is busy with a pie­ce of drift­wood. The small boat with the visi­tors off the beach is, howe­ver, com­ple­te­ly irrele­vant to them. A reach meal, a feast for bears and tou­rists. A wild bit of arc­tic natu­re. A gre­at expe­ri­ence. Unless you are the wal­rus.

Wed
5 Aug
2015

A calm night, a calm pas­sa­ge nor­thwards to Isfjord, inter­rupt­ed only by a short stop when cod appeared on the depth sound­er – din­ner was secu­red. Time to show some pho­tos, for the very first time, from our Bee­ren­berg ascent on Jan May­en in July.
Then we reach Bore­buk­ta, one of tho­se bays in the rather civi­li­sed Isfjord area whe­re the­re is not too much traf­fic. Once again, we ven­ture into the arc­tic wil­der­ness, wit­hout see­ing anyo­ne. Once again into the silent tun­dra, flat coas­tal plains, which seem bor­ing from the distance but are actual­ly full of details. An old, small seal­ing ship on the shore looks as if it was left behind by its crew with the inten­ti­on to con­ti­nue the voya­ge soon, but they never retur­ned. What hap­pen­ed? No idea. (Amend­ment: the boat was left the­re by a well-known inha­bi­tant of Lon­gye­ar­by­en usual­ly known as „Hamarøy­en“ – he came from the island Hamarøy – to ser­ve as accom­mo­da­ti­on. The near­by lake has always been popu­lar for fishing among­st the locals).

Bea­ches, inter­rupt­ed by small capes and cliff coasts, incis­ed rivers. Rock land­scapes with fox dens, and very appro­pria­te­ly, two young polar foxes, one of them reason­ab­ly curious. A litt­le herd of six reinde­er making a curious semi-cir­cle around us. A nice fare­well from Spitsbergen’s tun­dra.

The surf had picked up and did not lea­ve all boots dry. Good we had been able to avo­id that during the trips so far.

Gal­lery Erd­mann­flya – 05th August 2015

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

A last, calm night at anchor in Coles­buk­ta, then some final miles to Lon­gye­ar­by­en. Then the voya­ge is over. My very own par­ty is based on fresh arc­tic char from the north coast, a pre­sent from Pål. It is enough for me for two days.

Tue
4 Aug
2015

Bell­sund – sounds almost like home, a peaceful place J far away from all that ice, back in the green tun­dra under the noi­sy birdcliffs, the colourful flowers, the reinde­er, the ele­gant­ly cur­ved bays. After a day on the ship yes­ter­day, it was nice to stretch legs a litt­le bit, a good 300 met­res up to get a pan­ora­ma view of Bell­sund. Akseløya with its ama­zing struc­tures in the north, Fri­dt­jov­breen, the lar­ge val­leys Ber­ze­li­us­da­len and Reind­a­len. The lush tun­dra with count­less flowers on Mid­ter­huks­let­ta, inter­rupt­ed by deep­ly incis­ed ice wed­ges. The litt­le rocky capes on the sou­thern side, and some jag­ged moun­ta­ins and wide gla­ciers in the distance. An ama­zin­gly beau­tiful coun­try, on a good day.

Gal­lery Bell­sund – 04th August 2015

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

A calm evening at anchor with a view to Fri­dt­jov­breen rounds the day off.

Mon
3 Aug
2015

Yes, the ice keeps on kee­ping us busy for some time. The next den­se belt of drift ice is just ahead of us. Sør­kapp Land seems so clo­se. Given the­se con­di­ti­ons, the­re are not many other ships in the area, but we are not the only ones now. The Hur­tig­ru­ten ship MS Fram is north of us, steam­ing south, a fast, strong ves­sel with a fri­end­ly Cap­tain. We con­ti­nue behind Fram, the ship is wide enough to crea­te a nice chan­nel in the ice. Their pas­sen­gers are enjoy­ing the ope­ra­ti­on, and so do we. Not an ever­y­day thing, defi­ni­te­ly.

Pho­to Sør­kapp – 03rd August 2015 – 1/3

After a first, den­se sec­tion, the ice is get­ting more open. Kit­ty­wa­kes are fishing in Fram’s wake, and the wild sce­n­ery of Sør­kapp Land pro­vi­des a sple­ndid back­ground. And as a final high­light, a polar bear is show­ing up. A big, strong, proud male, batt­le-scar­red with many scars on its face and nose.

Pho­to Sør­kapp – 03rd August 2015 – 2/3

The wide pas­sa­ge around the south cape takes most of the night, and the­re are drift ice fields bet­ween us and the coast all of the time. Same now, in the ear­ly mor­ning. Horn­sund is in view, but behind wide ice fields. We are crui­sing bet­ween the ice floes, Pål is enjoy­ing his time on the stee­ring wheel, while I am wat­ching for polar bears and wri­ting this blog in bet­ween.

Pho­to Sør­kapp – 03rd August 2015 – 3/3

We will keep a distance to Horn­sund, let’s see whe­re we end up today, pro­ba­b­ly Bell­sund. A good, safe ancho­ra­ge is the next thing we need, some rest for the skip­per, a landing for ever­y­bo­dy else.

Mon
3 Aug
2015

Ice … we’ve had a simi­lar head­line befo­re, didn’t we? Pos­si­bly. Now we are off Isbuk­ta, sou­thern east coast of Spits­ber­gen. At least, we have not been this far south befo­re, recent­ly, the south cape seems so clo­se.

Ear­lier today, we thought once again that we were through, the ice stay­ed behind, open water ahead … but a few miles later, more ice, the next den­se belt of drift ice. Accor­ding to today’s ice chart, it should have been an iso­la­ted field of „open drift ice“, well, we have heard that befo­re.

Pho­to Ice – 03rd August 2015

Sun
2 Aug
2015

Let’s for­get yes­ter­day. Too many tough hours were spent criss-crossing Storfjord, back and forth, in strong wind and high seas, try­ing to find an ope­ning in the ice and a pas­sa­ge south. What loo­ked like a pas­sa­ge tur­ned out to be a dead-end road. The east coast of Spits­ber­gen loo­ked so clo­se, Horn­sund­tind was cle­ar­ly visi­ble, but as out-of-reach as the moon.

Habe­nicht­buk­ta – 01st + 02nd August 2015

Final­ly we declared the case as hope­l­ess for the time being and stea­m­ed off towards Edgeøya, some more hours against the waves, but then we found a good ancho­ra­ge in Habe­nicht­buk­ta, shel­te­red from the sea and thus reason­ab­ly calm. Soon, life came back on our good, litt­le Arc­ti­ca II, peo­p­le appeared again and cha­os was tur­ned back into a cosy home.

The idea to sit the wea­ther out in this rather com­for­ta­ble posi­ti­on was quick­ly wel­co­med by ever­yo­ne. We could also expect that the ice, which accor­ding to all available infor­ma­ti­on couldn’t be more than a rela­tively thin stri­pe, should be spread by the strong wind, so a pas­sa­ge to the south cape should be pos­si­ble in the near future. So the next thing to do was a good din­ner, an enjoya­ble social evening and a good, long night’s sleep J

Pho­to Has­sen­stein­buk­ta – 02. August 2015

The wide tun­dra of sou­thwes­tern Edgeøya is an arc­tic dream, so of cour­se we went out this mor­ning to explo­re a bit, and our litt­le sun­day mor­ning walk tur­ned out to last a good cou­ple of hours. The tun­dra has an ama­zing dis­play of colours, it covers a low­land of rol­ling hills on basalt rock. Altog­e­ther, this attracts the eye and the atten­ti­on wit­hout any limi­ta­ti­on. The wide flat-top­ped moun­ta­ins in the distance give the sce­n­ery the cha­rac­ter that is so typi­cal for sou­the­as­tern Spits­ber­gen. A wild, beau­tiful arc­tic coun­try. Colourful flowers, the polar wil­low is show­ing the first hints of autumn. A mul­ti-chan­ne­led arc­tic river, a reinde­er, old fox traps from times of hun­ting which are histo­ry now sin­ce long. A long, silent rest to enjoy the impres­si­ons and let the eye wan­der and the spi­rit won­der.

Pho­to Habe­nicht­buk­ta – 02. August 2015

A second landing in the late after­noon tur­ned out to be a short-lived affair. After a short walk only, we saw a polar bear wal­king a bit fur­ther south. We went back to the ship and left him alo­ne in his king­dom.

Sat
1 Aug
2015

(31st July – 01st August 2015) – The day star­ted nice and sun­ny, but soon it tur­ned out to be quite win­dy, which is not par­ti­cu­lar­ly hel­pful on the rather unpro­tec­ted shores of Storfjord. Against expec­ta­ti­on, we mana­ged a landing on Edgeøya, enjoy­ed the love­ly tun­dra, the wide land­scape, a group of wal­rus­ses sun­bathing near an old trap­per hut, not far from a wal­rus gra­vey­ard whe­re hundreds of their grand­grand­par­ents were slaugh­te­red by wha­lers and hun­ters for their ivo­ry, blub­ber and skin. Now, wal­rus­ses are again enjoy­ing their life near the old, blea­ching bones. Natu­re is taking her space again, even if it takes time.

More wal­rus­ses, more wind, more ice – 07/31 + 08/01/2015

Assum­ing that com­ple­ting a cir­cum­na­vi­ga­ti­on of Spits­ber­gen would only be a mat­ter of sai­ling down Storfjord and around the south cape, we set cour­se that way. But the ice field that was shown on the latest ice chart as a rather thin belt of open drift bet­ween sou­thern Edgeøya and the east coast of Spits­ber­gen tur­ned out to be solid, den­se pack ice, pushed tog­e­ther by the strong nor­t­her­ly wind. Now we have been try­ing for more than 12 hours to find a gap in that ice field, and if we don’t find it soon, then we have to turn around and head nor­thwards again, back through Heley­sund and Hin­lo­pen Strait … not a very plea­sant thought at all, but natu­re rules. A king­dom for an accu­ra­te, up-to-date ice chart and a good wea­ther fore­cast!