Thu
4 Aug
2016

After a quiet mor­ning on board with gre­at views of the han­ging gla­ciers on Prins Karls For­land and a bit of geo­lo­gi­cal info­tain­ment (what a stu­pid word! It was a pre­sen­ta­ti­on, or a lec­tu­re, if you pre­fer that. Peri­od.) we rea­ched Kongsfjor­den. Both Kongsfjord­bu­tik­ken and air­ship mast have a remar­kab­le dra­wing power also for advan­ced Spits­ber­gen tra­vel­lers. And we want to re-fill die­sel any­way, to be able to reach the remo­test parts of the Sval­bard archi­pe­la­go should the oppor­tu­ni­ty ari­se. We will see what the wea­ther tells us to do.

The gre­at wea­ther with light exact­ly from the right direc­tion made an excur­si­on to the gla­ciers almost man­da­to­ry. Arc­ti­ca II under sail near Kong­s­ve­gen, some of Spitsbergen’s most impres­si­ve moun­ta­ins in the back­ground, all in suns­hi­ne, and then a big cal­ving just behind the boat. An ama­zing sce­ne, a spec­ta­cle, almost too much for the sen­ses.

The wea­ther is still fine, but sup­po­sed to turn to the worse tomor­row. So we igno­re time and tired­ness but head of for some good hiking on Blom­strand­hal­vøya. Well-known ter­rain, you should think. But even here, the­re is always some­thing new to dis­co­ver. One group takes off for some moun­tain hiking, enjoy­ing fine views of the sur­roun­ding gla­ciers and moun­ta­ins from an ele­va­ted posi­ti­on. The others do some caving. Not wit­hout suc­cess.

Gal­lery Kongsfjord – 04th August 2016

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

It is late as ever­y­bo­dy comes back on board. Break­fast is delay­ed next mor­ning and not real­ly syn­chro­ni­zed. We are alre­a­dy back to the west coast, hea­ding north, as we get up one by one.