Gnålodden is located centrally in Hornsund under the mountain Gnålberget. You have to keep an eye on many underwater rocks as you are approaching by boat, they have killed many zodiac outboard engine propellers.
Gnålodden is a place with a lot to see within a small area. Just the rocky shoreline is a sight in itself. The flat area is of limited size, but beautifully green with its mossy tundra, a clear indication for the presence of large numbers of Brunich’s guillemots and kittywakes that breed in the steep cliffs of Gnålberget.
The old hut, which was built in 1907 or 1908, is a real eyecatcher. Until the protection of polar bears in 1973, it was part of a classical polar bear hunting area. The bears came with drift ice around the south cape, up the west coast and into Hornsund. In some years, hundreds of them migrated through the fjord and back to the east coast: rich hunting grounds for trappers, including the legendary Norwegian female hunter Wanny Woldstad, who was one of the first active lady hunters in Spitsbergen when she wintered several times in Hornsund during the 1930s.
The panorama shows the main room of the hut, which is still regularly used by scientists from the near-by Polish research station and accoasionally by locals from Longyearbyen who take the long trip with snow mobiles.
my new book is in print and it can now be ordered 🙂 it is a photo book with the title “Norwegens arktischer Norden (3): Die Bäreninsel und Jan Mayen”, with German text Click here for further details!
BOOKS, CALENDAR, POSTCARDS AND MORE
This and other publishing products of the Spitsbergen publishing house in the Spitsbergen-Shop.
Norwegens arktischer Norden (1): Spitzbergen
Photobook: Norway's arctic islands. The text in this book is German. [shop url="https://shop.spitzbergen.de/en/polar-books/70-norwegens-arktischer-norden-1-aerial-arctic-9783937903262.html"] ← Back
Lofoten, Jan Mayen and Spitsbergen from the air - Photobook: Norway's arctic islands. The text in this book is German, but there is very little text, so I am sure that you will enjoy it regardless which languages you read (or not).
The companion book for the Svalbardhytter poster. The poster visualises the diversity of Spitsbergen‘s huts and their stories in a range of Arctic landscapes. The book tells the stories of the huts in three languages.
Comprehensive guidebook about Spitsbergen. Background (wildlife, plants, geology, history etc.), practical information including travelling seasons, how to travel, description of settlements, routes and regions.
Join an exciting journey with dog, skis and tent through the wintery wastes of East Greenland! We were five guys and a dog when we started in Ittoqqortoormiit, the northernmost one of two settlements on Greenland’s east coast.
12 postcards which come in a beautifully designed tray. Beautiful images from South Georgia across Antarctica from the Antarctic Peninsula to the Ross Sea and up to Macquarie Island and Campbell Island.
Huts are places of longing, dreams and adventure in Spitsbergen’s beautiful landscape. Even if the modern visitor’s eye may mostly be directed towards nature, most will have an open ear every now and then for exciting survival stories about explorers and expeditions, adventurers and trappers.
These huts are silent witnesses and and every one of them tells a little part of the whole story. The little book “Svalbardhytter” and the poster that is part of the same project make these fascinating places accessible for everyone.
From remote ruins, just traces in a few cases, to “famous” trapper huts such as Fredheim in Tempelfjord and Bjørneborg on Halvmåneøya, the war weather station Haudegen, the former scientific base Würzburger Hütte on Barentsøya and Hammerfesthuset, Svalbard’s oldest building.