Fri
12 Aug
2022

After a bit of a grey day yes­ter­day – we could watch a polar bear on a small island dis­ap­pearing in the fog – it cle­ared up today. The wea­ther was on our side again, and it was to remain so for seve­ral days. We were (and still are) cle­ar­ly in the right area on the right time. Good stuff!

That is also the simp­le reason why the­re was just no time for blog wri­ting. I need to catch up a bit now.

We spent that Fri­day (12th August) on the north side of Nord­aus­t­land, in Nor­dens­ki­öld­buk­ta and in Rijpfjord. Stun­nin­gly beau­tiful sce­n­ery, bar­ren, of a high arc­tic, strong cha­rac­ter, not seen by many peo­p­les’ eyes. The­re are inde­ed places whe­re you can think that you might inde­ed be the first per­son the­re. Of cour­se that is impos­si­ble to tell for sure, and quite likely at least some geo­lo­gists have been the­re, they have been all over the place. But still, just the fact that the thought as such isn’t com­ple­te­ly non­sen­se is ama­zing, in the year 2022.

I lea­ve it up to the pic­tures to tell the rest of the sto­ry of this day.

Gal­lery – Nord­aus­t­land – 12th August 2022

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

Thu
11 Aug
2022

A wea­ther fore­cast that was quite bad espe­ci­al­ly for the nor­thwes­tern part of Spits­ber­gen made us move away from that area quick­ly, and a long night of sai­ling (motoring, actual­ly) took us to Sjuøya­ne, the nor­t­hern­most islands of Sval­bard. We pas­sed by Wal­denøya in wind and fog, but rea­ched Phippsøya not much later and could make a landing the­re.
 

Wed
10 Aug
2022

Nord­ves­th­jør­nest av Spits­ber­gen er et vel­dig vak­kert og variert områ­de, med man­ge spen­nen­de steder som man kan besøke. Været var litt grått men ellers fullt på vår side, og der­med ble det en vel­dig opp­le­vel­ses­rik dag. Vi begyn­te med en flott fot­tur på Dan­s­køya og så besøk­te vi noen hval­ros­ser på Ams­ter­damøya, ved siden av gam­le spek­kov­ner fra hval­fangst­tiden i Smee­ren­burg. Så til­ba­ke til Dan­s­køya. Det var en del stein­kob­be der på fjæ­re­st­ei­ne­ne, og ikke langt der­fra lig­ger fort­satt kul­tur­min­ner fra Andrée og Well­man sine nord­pol­fer­der i Vir­go­ham­na. På turen vide­re nord­o­ver gjor­de vi en avs­tik­ker inn i den utro­lig vak­re Fuglefjor­den. For en flott dag!

Gal­lery – Nor­thwest Spits­ber­gen – 10th August 2022

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

Tue
9 Aug
2022

Engelskbuk­ta gave us beau­tiful scenic views despi­te the low clouds.

Later, we rea­ched Ny-Åle­sund.

A lot could be writ­ten about the many beau­tiful impres­si­ons of this day, but it is late now …

Gal­lery – Engelskbuk­ta, Ny-Åle­sund – 09th August 2022

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

Sun
7 Aug
2022

We are off again, now with Arc­ti­ca II. Good stuff! Actual­ly, it doesn’t take much the­se days to make a start a good one: the trip actual­ly hap­pens, it starts as sche­du­led and with ever­y­bo­dy who is sup­po­sed to be here. That is enough to make us hap­py for now.

After a cou­ple of hours we had rea­ched Trygg­ham­na and took the oppor­tu­ni­ty for a first walk. To our ama­ze­ment, we find our­sel­ves wal­king in the fos­sil remains of a tro­pi­cal sea. Corals and other fos­sils ever­y­whe­re! But it is more than 300 mil­li­on years ago that they were ali­ve …

Gal­lery – Isfjord – 07th August 2022

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