Mon
23 Sep
2024

The last day of the voya­ge, the last day “Spits­ber­gen under sail” in 2024. In Ekm­anfjord and Dick­son­fjord. We star­ted at Flin­thol­men, a perl of arc­tic natu­re and sce­n­ery.

Then we crui­sed Dick­son­fjord. The­re was this gut fee­ling … and yes, we did see polar bears, during the very last miles of the trip! What a luck, ever­y­bo­dy was so hap­py. They were pret­ty far away, no frame-fil­ling pho­tos, but that didn’t mat­ter, it was real­ly about the expe­ri­ence of having seen them in the wild. The real thing. The distance was a good 500 m, and this is, by the way, the distance requi­red by law from 2025 during spring (until end of June; from July it’s 300 m and all this is valid within Svalbard’s 12 mile zone).

A few hours later we were back in Lon­gye­ar­by­en, and thus this beau­tiful trip came to an end. It was fare­well and good­bye, on various levels. This was my very last trip with good old Anti­gua in Spits­ber­gen, after more than 30 sin­ce 2010. We went many miles tog­e­ther and the part of this voya­ge that hap­pens in Spits­ber­gen waters is over now. But we’ll meet again, quite soon actual­ly, in a few weeks in north Nor­way 🙂

And it was my very last Spits­ber­gen voya­ge under the cur­rent legal regime. A lot will chan­ge next year (more infor­ma­ti­on here). Bey­ond the requi­red distances from polar bears (see abo­ve), we won’t be able to go ashore any­mo­re as free­ly as we can so far. We will still be able to do good and inte­res­t­ing voy­a­ges from 2025, but they will be dif­fe­rent. May­be even bet­ter in cer­tain ways. Less pres­su­re to sail to remo­te are­as, less miles, more time to go hiking etc. Not a bad thing in its­elf. I would very much pre­fer it to be a mat­ter of my own choice, though (and not – sor­ry – the choice of some idi­ots far away, the­re is sim­ply no exper­ti­se in the­se new laws, just office table bull­shit. Sor­ry, I get car­ri­ed away, but it is tuff stuff).

So Sval­bard life will con­ti­nue also next year and bey­ond as far as we can tell now, but it will be dif­fe­rent. A lot will be lost espe­ci­al­ly for tho­se who have been around for a while, tho­se who know the place. We have done well on this trip, visi­ting places like Fjer­de­breen on the west coast, Idun­nes­et in Wahl­enberg­fjord, Zei­pe­lod­den in Pal­an­der­buk­ta and Mof­fen. All of them will not be acces­si­ble any­mo­re from 2025 – unless you come on a pri­va­te trip. Which is ridi­cu­lous, of cour­se; who comes to such remo­te places on a pri­va­te trip?

I am pri­vi­le­ged to have been around here, and I am gra­teful for that.

Thank you, Anti­gua! Thank you for being such a gre­at, such an enjoya­ble part of this jour­ney! The ship, the crew that made it all pos­si­ble, ever­y­bo­dy who was part of it and made it so enjoya­ble. Thank you for now, all the best and see you again, any­whe­re bet­ween the poles!

Pho­to gal­lery Isfjord: Ekm­anfjord & Dick­son­fjord – 22nd Sep­tem­ber 2024

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Mon
23 Sep
2024

Back in Isfjord! Good thing, we still had plans here. Start­ing with the tun­dra para­di­se at Alk­hor­net with ple­nty of good loo­king reinde­er, an arc­tic fox, two ptar­mi­gans and a curious­ly park­ed Sys­sel­mes­ter boat.

We spent the after­noon at Bore­breen, a might­i­ly impres­si­ve gla­cier due to its cur­rent advan­ce. The tur­ning ice­berg was just as impres­si­ve.

And Piet and the ser­vice crew show­ed what they are real­ly capa­ble of in the evening. Yet ano­ther high­light on this day which was not poor in high­lights at all. Now we were just curious if we would mana­ge to see a polar bear tomor­row, on the very last full day of this trip …

Pho­to gal­lery Isfjord: Alk­hor­net & Bore­breen – 21st Sep­tem­ber 2024

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Sat
21 Sep
2024

After a long pas­sa­ge during the night we rea­ched St. Jons­fjord exact­ly in time after break­fast to enjoy a love­ly mor­ning moun­tain hike with stun­ning gla­cier views.

In the after­noon we made a tun­dra walk at Gjert­se­nod­den, enjoy­ing the sun.

Pho­to gal­lery St. Jons­fjord: Valen­tins­ryg­gen, Gjert­se­nod­den – 20th Sep­tem­ber 2024

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Fri
20 Sep
2024

Wed­nes­day ended with landing on Mof­fen (for any­thing befo­re that, see pre­vious blog). Cool! Mof­fen is a very spe­cial place and cer­tain­ly one that you don’t get to too often.

It tur­ned out to be good to con­ti­nue to Hol­miabuk­ta in nor­thwest Spits­ber­gen for ancho­ring. The wind picked up quite con­sider­a­b­ly at the north coast. Time to move on. But we were in the right place and we got a love­ly mor­ning at Sal­ly­ham­na and Sabi­neodden.

The after­noon was quite win­dy, but we finis­hed it in a rather spon­ta­neous and very cool way at Smee­ren­burg­breen.

Pho­to gal­lery – Mof­fen, Sal­ly­ham­na, Smee­ren­burg­breen – 18th/19th Sep­tem­ber 2024

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Wed
18 Sep
2024

Again, it is fog­gy in Hin­lo­pen Strait. It was just enough to visit the wal­ru­ses on Wahl­ber­gøya. And they were in pret­ty good mood 🙂

Then – fog, fog. We didn’t see the sky again until we rea­ched Murch­ison­fjord in the evening. Full moon abo­ve the moun­ta­ins. The nights are get­ting dar­ker and dar­ker now.

A night at anchor in Wea­sel­buk­ta is some­thing quite spe­cial in its­elf. And so is a hike on Nord­aus­t­land, name­ly Roald­top­pen in this case.

Now we have set cour­se for mof­fen. In thick fog …

Gal­lery – Hin­lo­pen Strait: Wahl­ber­gøya, Murch­ison­fjord – 17th/18th Sep­tem­ber 2024

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Mon
16 Sep
2024

The won­derful, remo­te Nord­aus­t­land! „Remo­te“ is a rela­ti­ve term of cour­se. But in the eyes of someone who star­ted dis­co­ve­ring Spits­ber­gen by hiking from the sett­le­ments, it is kind of the dark side of the moon (and we did stretch the boun­da­ries pret­ty far back then).

So the­re we were. In Wahl­enberg­fjord. At Idun­nes­et, to be pre­cise. A love­ly hike with gre­at views of the inland ice.

Gyl­dé­nøya­ne did not turn out to be a polar bear para­di­se this time as on pre­vious occa­si­ons. Would have been too good, I guess. Curr­ent­ly the beasts just don’t want to show up. Well, we’ve still got time.

In Pal­an­der­buk­ta, we star­ted a hike in the polar desert, but retur­ned soon becau­se the wind was real­ly start­ing to blow quite hard.

Gal­lery – Wahl­enberg­fjord: Idun­nes­et & Pal­an­der­buk­ta – 16th Sep­tem­ber 2024

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Sun
15 Sep
2024

In Wors­ley­ham­na in Lief­defjord we had a look at Vil­la Oxford, a real Nøis hut from the 1920s. And we made a love­ly litt­le hike to the coast of Wood­fjord. On the way we found a memo­ri­al for Frank Wors­ley (Shackleton’s cap­tain on Endu­rance), which I had somehow never seen befo­re. Who may have put it the­re? Pro­ba­b­ly the expe­di­ti­on of Geor­ge Bin­ney from Oxford in 1924, I sup­po­se.

We made a loop into Mus­ham­na. Ever­y­thing fur­ther north – pos­si­bly polar bears, cer­tain­ly the Rit­ter hut at Gråhu­ken – remain­ed pret­ty much hid­den behind low clouds and rain.

Gal­lery – Wors­ley­ham­na, 15th Sep­tem­ber 2024

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Sat
14 Sep
2024

We star­ted the day near Ler­nerøya­ne in Lief­defjord. A beau­tiful mor­ning, the air crys­tal-clear, mir­ror images on the water. It con­tin­ued this way at Mona­co­b­reen. What a beau­tiful world! By the way, Mona­co­b­reen is curr­ent­ly advan­cing mark­ed­ly on its eas­tern side.

Later it was time to stretch legs a litt­le bit. So we did on Reins­dyr­flya, after a visit at the remains of the Kreuz­rit­ter wea­ther sta­ti­on from the dark years of the second world war.

Lief­defjord: Mona­co­b­reen & Sørd­a­len – 14th Sep­tem­ber 2024

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Fri
13 Sep
2024

A gol­den day at the nor­t­hern west coast, the „Seven ice­bergs“, Dei Sju Isfjel­la. One of tho­se rare days when you can actual­ly do a bit more on the wild outer coast bet­ween Kongsfjord/Krossfjord and Mag­da­le­nefjord than just pas­sing by. We went by Zodiac into the lagoon of Fjer­de­breen and spent a sun­ny mor­ning on the morai­ne hills near this migh­ty and very impres­si­ve gla­cier. Stun­ning!

Later we went into Kob­befjord on the west side of Dan­s­køya. Exact­ly, that is the place whe­re the tra­ge­dy of Møkle­by and Simon­sen hap­pen­ed in 1922. But what main­ly caught our atten­ti­on were the seals that Kob­befjord owes its name to (Kob­befjord = Seal bay). Har­bour seals, to be pre­cise. And a litt­le evening walk with a faint hint of wha­ling histo­ry. And an arc­tic let­ter­box.

Gal­lery: West coast: Fjer­de­breen & Kob­befjord, 13th Sep­tem­ber 2024

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Thu
12 Sep
2024

Kongsfjord. We had rea­ched Ny-Åle­sund during the night and that’s whe­re we also spent the mor­ning. Cold, win­dy and inte­res­t­ing, as always. With some gre­at views of the Tre Kro­ner and all the other moun­ta­ins and gla­ciers in inner Kongsfjord.

In the after­noon, we got more views of this grand sce­n­ery from a clo­ser distance. Stun­ning. But so is also the gla­cier ice loss, which has even acce­le­ra­ted in recent years. The­re is no deny­ing of that.

On the other hand, the amount of ice in Kongsfjord was quite sur­pri­sing.

The day finis­hed with an ama­zing sun­set in Fjor­ten­de Juli­buk­ta.

Gal­lery – 12th Sep­tem­ber 2024 – Kongsfjord

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Wed
11 Sep
2024

We spent the first full day in For­lands­und, with a won­derful mor­ning in Eidem­buk­ta, with the litt­le gor­ge, green tun­dra, wide views. It was pret­ty cold – that’s how it should be on 78 degrees north in mid Sep­tem­ber.

In the after­noon, we spent some gol­den hours on Her­man­senøya. From the distance, a small, not very exci­ting loo­king island. On a clo­ser view, full of inte­res­t­ing and beau­tiful details.

And the sun­set later that evening in nor­t­hern For­lands­und … stun­ning!

Pho­to gal­lery For­lands­und: Eidem­buk­ta & Her­man­senøya, 11th Sep­tem­ber 2024

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Tue
10 Sep
2024

Here we go again. The last time „Spits­ber­gen under sail“ for this year. The last time „Spits­ber­gen under sail“ with SV Anti­gua for me. The­re is inde­ed a bit of sad­ness.

But for now and here, we are loo­king for­ward to a gre­at trip and we enjoy a fan­ta­stic start, sai­ling with 10 knots into the sun­set. Just beau­tiful!

Gal­lery Isfjord, 10. Sep­tem­ber 2024

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