Gallery 4: Hinlopen Strait

Lom­fjord, Alkef­jel­let, Wahl­ber­gøya, Kie­per­tøya

For the first time on this trip, we had some noti­ceable wind and sea as we ente­red the nor­t­hern Hin­lo­pen Strait. This is also part of a sai­ling boat voya­ge in the arc­tic. But it was not too much and after a cou­ple of hours, we ente­red Lom­fjord whe­re we made a long, beau­tiful moun­tain hike the next day.

The focus on the next 24 hours was most­ly wild­life, next to a love­ly litt­le hike on the nor­t­hern part of Wahl­ber­gøya. Alkef­jel­let is an ama­zing place, one of the natu­ral mira­cle of this pla­net in my opi­ni­on. Wal­rus­ses and even puf­fins, may­be the big­gest fau­ni­stic sur­pri­se in Hin­lo­pen Strait. You shouldn’t real­ly expect to see puf­fins in Sval­bard, they are not a high arc­tic bird spe­ci­es, and this is not Lofo­ten …

A crew mem­ber of ano­ther ship had ano­ther sur­pri­sing mee­ting with the regio­nal fau­na in 1995 on Kie­per­tøya. This mee­ting tur­ned out to be a tra­gic one. The small group of crew met an aggres­si­ve polar bear, and as they were not suf­fi­ci­ent­ly armed, the result was one dead man and ano­ther one serious­ly inju­red (and the bear was later shot by the poli­ce). After a litt­le search, we found a small memo­ri­al plaque on a litt­le basalt cliff. A simp­le monu­ment, but a strong remin­der how serious­ly you have to take the who­le safe­ty issue that is inher­ent in mee­tings of polar bears and peo­p­le.

Gal­lery 4: Hin­lo­pen Strait – Kie­per­tøya

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

To Gal­lery:  → west coast (1)  → north coast  → Nord­aus­t­land  → Hin­lo­pen Strait  → Storfjord  → west coast (2)

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