Thu
19 Jul
2018

We ven­tu­red out to the remo­test parts of Spits­ber­gen, the island of Kvi­tøya in the nor­the­ast of the Sval­bard archi­pe­la­go, not far from Rus­si­an Franz Josef Land. This is whe­re Salo­mon August Andrée, Knut Fræn­kel and Nils Strind­berg rea­ched land for the first time again after a bal­loon flight of 3 days and more than 2 months of mar­ching across the drif­ting ice. They star­ted to get rea­dy for the win­ter, but died all after a short time for reasons which we will never real­ly find out for sure.

And­ree­ne­set

It needs a lot of luck to get to this place. Even today, Kvi­tøya is often sur­roun­ded by ice, and when this is not the case, then the surf is often going high on the expo­sed coast. And when this is not the case, then the­re are often some polar bears han­ging around. The way from the shore to the place whe­re Andrée, Fræn­kel and Strind­berg had their final camp is short, but not easy to walk.

Today, we are lucky! It is a bit fog­gy, which fits the atmo­sphe­re of this deso­la­te place per­fect­ly well.

Wed
18 Jul
2018

A beau­tiful day in a beau­tiful area at the end of the world, in a litt­le bay in the remo­te nor­the­ast of the remo­te Nord­aus­t­land. See­mingly emp­ty polar desert, full of colours and struc­tures.

Relikt­buk­ta

Alber­ti­ni­buk­ta

After some hours of sai­ling in unknown waters near rocky islands, we reach a bay with a huge gla­cier and many ice­bergs. Wal­rus­ses are in the water every here and the­re, and then we dis­co­ver three polar bears who are crossing the fjord. A mother and two first-year cubs. They swim bet­ween the ice­bergs befo­re they climb up the steep slo­pe.

Alber­ti­ni­buk­ta

Tue
17 Jul
2018

The wea­ther is real­ly on our side! The first thing is a pret­ty rare landing on Wal­denøya, a small and remo­te island, in a mir­ror-like sea today. Defi­ni­te­ly a place that does not see a lot of visi­tors! Wal­ter Well­man was stran­ded here for a cou­ple of weeks with his expe­di­ti­on in 1894. We sit on the rocks and enjoy the sun and the undis­tur­bed view to the north pole.

Wal­denøya

It is sun­ny and calm all the way up to Ros­søya, so we enjoy a Zodiac crui­se around this islet, Svalbard’s very nor­t­hern­most one. Fur­ther north, the­re is just water, liquid and solid, and the north pole. A rare sun­ny day in the­se lati­tu­des!

Ros­søya

An evening excur­si­on to Phippsøya does not yield wal­rus­ses, as we had been hoping for, but a polar bear. Which show­ed up on a pret­ty short noti­ce as we had just gone ashore. Alex, who was scou­ting the ter­rain, had the plea­su­re to dis­co­ver the bear, which had been slee­ping in a ter­rain depres­si­on, at a rather uncom­for­ta­ble distance, but it was not at all inte­res­ted in us and tur­ned its atten­ti­on to a rather rot­ten car­cass of a wal­rus. We went back into the boats and enjoy­ed the views in safe­ty for man and beast. A gre­at day on 80 degrees north!

Phippsøya

Tue
17 Jul
2018

A calm night at anchor, gre­at! Hiking over Blom­strand­hal­vøya is at least as gre­at. The coas­tal sce­n­ery is real­ly varied and inte­res­t­ing, espe­ci­al­ly if you know some of the hid­den places bey­ond Ny Lon­don.

Blom­strand

Then we set cour­se to the north. The wind is a bit less than expec­ted, but enough to fill the can­vas, so we enjoy a silent crossing under sail and a sky the colours of which are chan­ging back and forth bet­ween grey, sil­ver and even blue in places.

Anti­gua

Mon
16 Jul
2018

It is gre­at to be out for a full, long day in Spitsbergen’s beau­tiful natu­re. And the warm springs far inland in Bock­fjord are fasci­na­ting. A gre­at desti­na­ti­on for a long hike! We spend hours get­ting the­re, hiking across tun­dra with ple­nty of flowers and a river plain that looks like kind of a wad­den sea. After an exten­ded rest with some food, we have soon rea­ched the fields with the sin­ter ter­races. Natu­re has inde­ed crea­ted some very impres­si­ve pie­ces of art here! All this comes with a stun­ning back­ground: a migh­ty wall of dark-red moun­ta­ins, some huge morai­nes and rug­ged moun­ta­ins.

Bock­fjord

We enjoy the sce­n­ery, the wea­ther, the hike and life in gene­ral for a full day. It is a tim­e­l­ess place. We are back on board after 9 hours.

Bock­fjord

Of cour­se the­re was also the opti­on for walks within a „nor­mal“ sca­le. The­re are also warm springs clo­se to the shore, and ano­ther walk went to a near­by gla­cier.

The wea­ther fore­cast is pro­mi­sing for the far north, so we set cour­se nor­the­ast in the evening.

Sun
15 Jul
2018

Time is just fly­ing in the sum­mer arc­tic. Not­hing too ama­zing going on in Lon­gye­ar­by­en. Some­bo­dy mana­ged to park a car in a pond next to the road in Advent­da­len. One is tempt­ed to ask: why? I don’t know. Nobo­dy was hurt, at least. Some tou­rists thought that huts in the wil­der­ness are prin­ci­pal­ly open for ever­y­bo­dy. This is not the case. It took the poli­ce to get this mes­sa­ge across in this given case. It also took the poli­ce to con­vin­ce two fema­le tou­rists that you have to lea­ve the boat when the trip was over even if it did not meet your expec­ta­ti­on. Peo­p­le in Lon­gye­ar­by­en don’t know if they should laugh or cry some­ti­mes. In yet ano­ther case, the poli­ce found ver­te­bra of mari­ne mammals in some tourist’s lug­ga­ge at the air­port. Not good. One day, when MSC Merag­li­vi­via was in the har­bour, the num­ber of peo­le in Lon­gye­ar­by­en tri­pled.

Make sure you don’t end up on the wrong ship!

Soon we will take off with SV Anti­gua. Time to check a huge pile of equip­ment, sort stuff, repair some items, replace other ones. So time is fly­ing as usu­al, and sud­den­ly Anti­gua is in the har­bour. An immense pile of equip­ment needs to be car­ri­ed on board and then it is alre­a­dy time for take-off. Wel­co­me on board and here we go! We are steam­ing against a bree­ze out of Isfjord and then turn into For­lands­und. Spits­ber­gen, here we come!

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!