Sun
15 Jul
2018

Gråhu­ken! We are not far from this famous cape as we wake up. A light bree­ze is blo­wing from the nor­thwest, but not too much, it is not a pro­blem to land and we are hap­py to pay a visit to the famous hut whe­re Chris­tia­ne Rit­ter win­tered in 1934-35 (she immor­ta­li­zed her adven­ture in the book „A woman in the polar night“). I have got a very spe­cial reason to be hap­py to get to this hut now, and today’s visit is inde­ed humbling and tou­ch­ing. More about that later.

Gråhu­ken

In a later stage of today’s landing at Gråhu­ken, a polar bear turns up. It is a safe distance, and he (or she) turns around and moves away as soon as he (or she) gets awa­re of us. So do we.

Andoya­ne

An excur­si­on to one of the small islands in Lief­defjord turns out to be a visit to an arc­tic para­di­se. Colours, struc­tures, birds. Ple­nty of them.

Sat
14 Jul
2018

Eine ruhi­ge Nacht vor Anker, herr­lich! Min­des­tens so herr­lich war die Tour auf der Blom­strand­hal­vøya. Die Küs­ten­land­schaft ist sehr abwechs­lungs­reich, vor allem, wenn man ein paar bestimm­te Ecken kennt. Es gibt nicht nur Ny Lon­don, son­dern noch so ein paar rich­tig schö­ne, ver­steck­te Stel­len.

Blom­strand

Dann set­zen wir Kurs Nord. Der Wind pus­tet zwar nicht ganz so fröh­lich wie erwar­tet, aber immer noch fröh­lich genug, um die Tücher zu fül­len, und so genie­ßen wir die Stil­le unter Segeln und einem Him­mel, des­sen Far­ben zwi­schen Grau, Sil­ber und punk­tu­el­lem Blau oszil­lie­ren.

Anti­gua

Fri
13 Jul
2018

Our first day out and away from Lon­gye­ar­by­en! Our first stop is Ny-Åle­sund in Kongsfjord, a gra­du­al tran­si­ti­on from civi­li­sa­ti­on to wil­der­ness. The vil­la­ge is calm today, goo­se fami­lies are fee­ding on the tun­dra bet­ween the hou­ses. While we walk around, Alex gives a talk about the past and pre­sence of Ny-Åle­sund, I give a talk about Roald Amund­sen and all the north pole expe­di­ti­ons through the cen­tu­ries and as we hap­pen to meet Mar­ten Loo­nen, lea­der of the Dutch Arc­tic Sta­ti­on, we even get the latest news about Bar­na­cle geese, Com­mon eider ducks and their rather unre­la­xed rela­ti­onship to polar bears that look for food on the bree­ding islands of the­se birds in Kongsfjord.

Camp Zoë

We sail up Kross­fjord in the after­noon, land at Camp Zoë, an old Rudi-/Mans­field-hut and do various walks and hikes in the tun­dra and up the hills. The sur­roun­ding moun­ta­ins are very impres­si­ve. We share the tun­dra with reinde­er, ptar­mi­gan and a lonely polar fox and enjoy the view of some white hor­ses on the blue water of Kross­fjord.

Tinay­re­breen

An evening visit to Tinay­re­breen is the icing on the cake on this day, a Fri­day the 13th. It is Anke’s and Chris­tia­ne Ritter’s bir­th­day today. Hap­py bir­th­day!

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.

Thu
31 May
2018

It is real­ly ful­ly win­ter still here in Isfjord. Snow, snow, snow. Add to that some sun, the sound of a birdcliff in the back­ground and a wide pan­ora­ma of fjord and coast, moun­ta­ins and gla­ciers, reinde­er and geese on the first bits of open tun­dra. Does it get more beau­tiful than this? Hard­ly.

Late win­ter in Trygg­ham­na.

Har­bour seal.

Snow bun­tings at Alk­hor­net.

Some gol­den moments at Alk­hor­net.

We also made a visit to the Ymer­buk­ta swim­ming club. Always nice to meet the locals 🙂

Ymer­buk­ta swim­ming club.

Many will pro­ba­b­ly agree that Barents­burg is not more beau­tiful, not in a clas­si­cal sen­se. But dif­fe­rent. Very dif­fe­rent! It is his­to­ri­cal and poli­ti­cal. We did have a clo­se look at all of this. If you have missed this, than you have not ful­ly unders­tood what Spits­ber­gen is all about today. Lenin would agree.

Lenin in Barents­burg.

Loo­king back at the last cou­ple of days, we had ple­nty of good reasons to rai­se the glas­ses to a won­derful trip. So we did in the evening. A skål to Cap­tain Mario and chef Piet! And of cour­se to the who­le crew, but cap­tain and chef are key posi­ti­ons as ever­y­bo­dy knows who has tra­vel­led on a ship. A word for all of you who have tra­vel­led on Anti­gua in recent years and who are curious how things are going here now: of cour­se I was also curious how it would be after our for­mer Cap­tain Joa­chim and chef Sascha had set cour­se for new adven­tures. Big shoes to fill, as all of our fel­low tra­vel­lers will con­firm. So I am more than hap­py to tell you know that I am loo­king for­ward to many more trips to come with Anti­gua! We have had a gre­at jour­ney now (and still not finis­hed yet)!

Thumbs up for the Anti­gua-chef Piet!

Wed
30 May
2018

We could spend the who­le day in Kongsfjord. This post­card-level-beau­tiful fjord con­sists, next to moun­ta­ins, of many lar­ge gla­cier, and we had a very good and clo­se look at seve­ral ones of them, both from a land­ba­sed per­spec­ti­ve and from the sea. This alre­a­dy descri­bes most of today’s acti­vi­ties suf­fi­ci­ent­ly.

At Blom­strand­breen.

Hump­back wha­le in Kongsfjord.

We were at the right time at the right place to meet a Hump­back wha­le who waved us a fri­end­ly fare­well with his migh­ty flu­ke. And to round the day off, we went for some insi­de insights of Blom­strand­hal­vøya.

Ice­berg in Kongsfjord.

Coas­tal cave, Blom­strand­hal­vøya.

Ano­ther beau­tiful day in the Arc­tic!

Wed
30 May
2018

The wind that had bothe­red us yes­ter­day evening ser­ved us well later during the night and car­ri­ed us far north, so we woke up with wal­rus­ses just around the cor­ner and of cour­se we made good use of the oppor­tu­ni­ty ☺

Wal­rus­ses in For­lands­und.

Ny-Åle­sund is of cour­se a clas­sic on most Spits­ber­gen voy­a­ges, but on this par­ti­cu­lar trip, it is a rather unex­pec­ted geo­gra­phi­cal high­light in the truest sen­se of the world. Who would have thought just a few days ago that we would make it this far north? But here we were, and we could even enjoy bril­li­ant suns­hi­ne – a rare thing on the west coast of Spits­ber­gen – and then, final­ly, a calm night in the har­bour. Some­thing we had well deser­ved, as we all agreed!

The air­ship mast at Ny-Åle­sund.

Mon
28 May
2018

The pas­sa­ge during the night from Horn­sund up to Bell­sund could have been a bit smoot­her, but it was all for­got­ten when we were gree­ted by some very curious reinde­er in Bell­sund, with a gla­cier in the back­ground! So we did later, stan­ding on a litt­le hill, enjoy­ing an ama­zing view over the fast ice in Van Mijenfjord.

Sval­bard Reinde­er are smal­ler than their rela­ti­ves on the main­land.

Later we saw some wal­rus­ses, also with a gre­at scenic back­drop. Bell­sund is one of Spitsbergen’s most beau­tiful places. It is easy to get lost here, men­tal­ly!

View over Bell­sund

And now the­re are some kilos of pla­s­tic less on the bea­ches in Bell­sund. We also remo­ved a fishing net. The­re was a smal­ler pie­ce of fishing net whe­re 2 reinde­er had got ent­an­gled. At least one of them had died with the net in the ant­lers. The other one may have escaped. Awful! This who­le pla­s­tic issue will stay with us for a long time, I am afraid. The­re is still a looooot of work to do. Most of it far south of Spits­ber­gen, by the way.

Other than that: ano­ther beau­tiful day in the Arc­tic!

Remains of fishing nets and other pla­s­tic was­te have often tra­vel­led thou­sands of miles befo­re they end up on Spits­ber­gen.

Sat
26 May
2018

The pas­sa­ge from Bear Island to Horn­sund was fast and good. The timing could not have been bet­ter: short­ly befo­re we ente­red Horn­sund, the wind tur­ned to the north and picked up to gale force. This would not have been gre­at at all at open sea, but as it was, it did not mat­ter much and some hours later we were firm­ly ancho­red in a shel­te­red bay deep­ly insi­de Horn­sund. Not­hing was to be seen of the land­scape as ever­y­thing was hid­den behind den­se snow show­ers. We have obvious­ly arri­ved in the high arc­tic!

The gla­cier Horn­breen, South-Spits­ber­gen

Today, howe­ver, it cle­ared up and we even got some blue sky and bright suns­hi­ne. Love­ly! It was good to get some solid ground under our boots again, so we hik­ed across an island and enjoy­ed gre­at views of the sce­n­ery. Later we went out for a stun­ning zodiac crui­se bet­ween many small ice­bergs which were shi­ning in the sun, and final­ly to a migh­ty gla­cier front in Bre­pol­len in inner­most Horn­sund. Our first day in Spits­ber­gen, and Horn­sund has shown us some of his best sides!

Anti­gua well shel­te­red in the bay of Bre­pol­len, Horn­sund

Belu­ga wha­les swim­ming through Hornsund/ Ves­t­re Bur­ger­buk­ta

Thu
24 May
2018

Con­side­ring the wea­ther fore­cast, I had been rather opti­mi­stic regar­ding today’s visit to Bear Island, but less so when I saw how the wind and waves came from the sou­thwest, rol­ling around the sou­thern tip of the island and making the sup­po­sedly shel­te­red eas­tern side an uncom­for­ta­ble place to be. So I was rather uncer­tain if we could make it ashore today.

Which way to Bear Island, plea­se?

Sør­ham­na was cle­ar­ly not an opti­on, and a quick look into the bays fur­ther north did not give us much in terms of useful opti­ons eit­her. To get at least a bit of shel­ter, we ended up drop­ping the anchor in Røed­vi­ka clo­se to Mise­ry­fjel­let. No chan­ce to get ashore here, but any­way it was good to have Anti­gua reason­ab­ly calm for a while.

After having obser­ved the wind and wea­ther for a while, Mario, Sarah and I took a Zodiac to see if the­re was real­ly no chan­ce to get ashore any­whe­re. The wind see­med to have cal­med down at least a bit. This is our 8th visit to Bear Island with SV Anti­gua, and we can’t pos­si­bly make this the first one wit­hout a landing? Of cour­se it is up to mother natu­re in the end, but we wan­ted to give it a try at least … the key to suc­cess tur­ned out to be that Mario took the Anti­gua clo­se to the coast in a drift posi­ti­on whe­re islets and rocks took most of the power out of the swell, so we could board the Zodiacs safe­ly and go ashore on a love­ly beach which its­elf was per­fect­ly calm. Heia Bear Island! This area, on the sou­the­as­tern coast of the island, is among­st the most beau­tiful spots. A small, but good impres­si­on of the beau­ty of the natu­re on this remo­te island which is still rather rare­ly visi­ted, being off the usu­al tou­rist trails.

It was with a big smi­le that ever­y­bo­dy got back later on board. In the evening, we set cour­se for Spits­ber­gen.

Made it! View over Bear Island

Thu
24 May
2018

Always kee­ping a good eye on the wea­ther fore­cast, we deci­ded in Stok­mark­nes to make this our depar­tu­re point from the main­land of Nor­way and to set cour­se direct­ly for the Barents Sea and Bear Island. The­re is a lot of wind in the north Atlan­tic, and if we are too late, we will get more of it than we will like, and we will get it on the nose. So, bet­ter to be out ear­ly to avo­id that! Taking off here and now, we have a good chan­ce for very fair sai­ling winds on our way north.

Set­ting cour­se for the Barents Sea and Bear Island

So we said good­bye and fare­well to main­land Nor­way in Stok­mark­nes and a few hours later we were alre­a­dy at sea. Sails up and cour­se for Bear Island (Bjørnøya)! That was our mot­to for the next round­about 44 hours. Sun, sai­ling with 9-10 knots, tho­se were the the­mes of the day on Wed­nes­day. The same, just wit­hout sun, on Thurs­day mor­ning, but now we have got Bear Island 20 miles ahead of us and we will drop anchor in a very few hours!

Tue
22 May
2018

This bridge last night tur­ned out to be an inte­res­t­ing thing. A 30 met­re high bridge and a 31 met­re high ship. Well, but the 30 met­res of the bridge are the gua­ran­teed mini­mum hight abo­ve the hig­hest high water ever. To be sure, we sent mate Nick up the Besan to see if the main mast would fit.

Bridge at Stok­mark­nes, Ves­terå­len.

It did. The­re were still seve­ral met­res of space.

Soon the­re­af­ter we had rea­ched Stok­mark­nes in the late evening hours. Next to us, the old Hur­tig­ru­ten ship Finn­mar­ken is bea­ched, now ser­ving as a muse­um.

Old Hur­tig­ru­ten ship Finn­mar­ken, now a muse­um, in Stok­mark­nes, Ves­terå­len.

After a love­ly sun­set (the last one of the voya­ge!) and a calm night in the har­bour, we woke up to found the day to be grey and rai­ny. Nevert­hel­ess, we went off for a nice hike up the hills behind Stok­mark­nes.

Snow fields in the moun­ta­ins behind Stok­mark­nes, Ves­terå­len.

Nevert­hel­ess, it was a good hike with some nice views under the clouds, and it is always good to get some exer­cise. Espe­ci­al­ly if you have got some days at sea ahead. And we will soon set sail for Bear Island (Bjørnøya)!

Grey view of Stok­mark­nes, Ves­terå­len.

Mon
21 May
2018

The wea­ther was much more agreeable today: still clou­dy, but no rain and very litt­le wind. So we went to the love­ly island and har­bour of Skro­va, which we rea­ched after a short pas­sa­ge from Kabel­våg during break­fast. Skro­va has very nice oppor­tu­ni­ties for various hikes. The top of the moun­tain Skro­vaf­jel­let was still hid­den in clouds, but the lower moun­tain Stap­pen was free and pro­vi­ded some gre­at pan­o­r­amic views.

View over Skro­va, Lofo­ten.

On the way fur­ther north we had nice, gent­le sai­ling wind wit­hout too big waves. Per­fect con­di­ti­ons to enjoy the view of SV Anti­gua under sail from the din­gy. A gre­at and impres­si­ve view! Then the swell went up again and the wind down and so did the sails, con­se­quent­ly.

SV Anti­gua under sail in nor­t­hern Ves­t­fjord, clo­se to Litl­mol­la.

Later during the after­noon, we rea­ched the famous Troll­fjord. A place whe­re natu­re had put a lot of effort into crea­ting a stun­ning tes­tim­o­ny to her own, gre­at powers. Che­ers to the ice-age gla­ciers that have made this ama­zing bit of land­scape!

SV Anti­gua in Troll­fjord.

In the end, even a Sea eagle tur­ned up and cir­cled around the ship. A gre­at, rich day!

Sea eagle in Troll­fjord.