Bil­lefjord

Thu
31 May
2018

One night’s sai­ling had taken us far into the inner bran­ches of Isfjord and we woke up to a fan­ta­stic pan­ora­ma in Bil­lefjord. Mir­ror images on the water and dozens of seals lying on the ice! No landing to start with, as the bay was still fro­zen and the shores blo­cked by ice, but we tho­rough­ly enjoy­ed.

Sce­n­ery in Bil­lefjord.

It was loci­gal to con­ti­nue just around the cor­ner to the migh­ty Nor­dens­ki­öld­breen. One of Isfjord’s big­gest gla­ciers and more or less our last chan­ce for a polar bear sight­ing.

Sce­n­ery in Bil­lefjord, Nor­dens­ki­öld­breen.

Stun­ning sce­n­ery and a love­ly encoun­ter with a Beard­ed seal, but no polar bear …

Beard­ed seal at Nor­dens­ki­öld­breen.

Then it was time for a landing. Cho­sing a beau­tiful spot in Bil­lefjord not far from Nor­dens­ki­öld­breen, I went back to old “hun­ting grounds” (not lite­ral­ly) which brought back many fond memo­ries. That was just me per­so­nal­ly, but ever­y­bo­dy enjoy­ed the walk, the sce­n­ery and the silence.

Landing near Bruce­by­en. Always the­se ter­ri­bly long Zodiac rides from ship to shore! 😉

Bruce­by­en was the site whe­re a Scot­tish com­pa­ny inves­ti­ga­ted coal occur­ren­ces around 1920. A short-lived adven­ture.

Bruce­by­en.

Then, final­ly … we were almost on the way out of Bil­lefjord, then we got our polar bear! Distant, yes, thus cer­tain­ly not allo­wing for world-class pho­to­gra­phy. But it was our polar bear! Cle­ar­ly visi­ble with bino­cu­lars, it brought a smi­le on ever­y­bo­dies face.

Polar bear at Nor­dens­ki­öld­breen, if you can see it. It was a bit distant, but it was our polar bear, and it was real! 🙂

So it was a hap­py ship that set cour­se for Lon­gye­ar­by­en in the late after­noon.

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