North to Svalbard: Tromso

Flights to Svalbard from Oslo go via Tromso and again rather than simply changing planes there, on the way up I spent two nights in this town in the far north of Norway.

One of the best things to do there is head over the bridge and get the cable car up mount Storsteinen which has great views (above and below).

In the town itself there were a number of museums and I went first to the Polar Museum. After the amazing Fram Museum in Oslo I was expecting something similar, smaller, maybe more local, but actually it had a very different vibe. Take this photo:

This was more about hunting than exploring, with the big names the ones that had killed the most animals. There were relics all around the walls:

While not to everyone's taste it must admit if felt an authentic flavour of the old north.

But generally I really liked Tromso and had a happy time wandering the harbour watching the boats and their reflections in the still waters:

I get the feeling that this place is probably better for photography during the long winter nights when the aurora flickers overhead, so maybe worth a return trip sometime.

Back to Longyearbyen & Nordic dinning

So we did the circumnavigation of Spitsbergen and return to Longyearbyen. Some flew out straight away but I and others stayed two nights before returning to the south.

For our last meal in Svalbard we went to the Huset restaurant for a 10 course tasting menu of Nordic cuisine.

And boy was it good!

Foodie Instagram heaven!

Unfortunately I ate the main reindeer course straight away without taking a picture.... does that count as a good reason to return?

Barentsburg: Lenin on Svalbard

Svalbard has rich seams of coal and the treaty allows these resources to be mined by any of the signatories. While many of these mines have closed, the one at Barentsburg run by Russia remains and we paid a visit.

It was a bit of a shock after 10 days in the wilderness:

There is a complete Russian town around the mine built in the Soviet area with statue of Lenin and that unique USSR style of architecture (top photo).

There are also a few older buildings remaining, though a bit run down:

The town has bars, restaurants and a hotel, and it was the last of these that attracted us - or rather its sauna so we could scrub ourselves clean.

For we were about to return to civilisation....

The ice of Svalbard

Couldn't resist a few more photo posts

Spot what this bird is carrying:

Fridtjovhana: The best day in Svalbard

I've been asked a few times "which was the best thing about Svalbard?"

In a way its a hard question to answer as I didn't go up there for just one reason and hence there wasn't just the one best thing.

So the answer I give is to describe the best day. It was the day we anchored in Fridtjovhana (above) and for once we were alone - there were no cruise ships or other yachts to be seen. Also I was feeling a bit better, so could participate in more activities (though alas not the swimming).

We went ashore, went for a hike (I was in the short walk group), saw some interesting flowers:

Then it was back to the beach where we collected driftwood for a fire. Here we had lunch, roasting hot dogs on a stick followed by marshmallows. A bottle of rum appeared and we toasted the day and group.

Some swam while I flew the drone (without crashing) and found a fossil.

Then back to Valiente and a chance to stand on an iceberg, which some then dived off into the icy water (again, not me). We lifted the hook & went up to inspect the face of the glacier:

By now we'd gelled as a group and comfortable relaxing and chatting.

Even the sun came out and the sky was blue:

It was a good day.

Sailing the midnight sun

It really was extraordinary to be on-deck at midnight in conditions like this.

Many felt it was time for a glass of something, beer or rum depending upon taste.

But even when its as bright as this, come the early hours I felt tired and the call of the warm bunk, so went below.

Latitude 80N

Look at those numbers on the chart-plotter! Furthest north indeed.

And what does one do at 80 degrees North? Well go swimming (*), of course !











(*) ok, confession time, I didn't actually go swimming as wasn't feeling well. But would have!

Wildlife of Svalbard

The last post described two of the depressingly sights of Svalbard, namely the signs of global warming and widespread plastic on the beach, so to balance that here are some positive aspects.

As well as polar bears we saw walruses (above), seals (below), reindeer (as posted earlier), puffins, other birds (sorry bit vague on that) and interesting plants (again, alas, not my speciality).

Didn't see any whales... maybe they were too busy making their way to London?

There was this arctic fox, but rather a long way away:

The birds got a lot closer:

On land we spotted a couple of interesting plants like these ones:

Nature's scary warnings in Svalbard

There were two very scary things about the Svalbard trip.

Firstly, the chart above. As you can see, its indicating that the ship is on land - but how can that be? We never touched bottom once.

Alas, the charts in this part of the world rapidly become out of date because of the effects of global warming. The glaciers are retreating so fast that chart updates can't keep up: each year they are further back, smaller. What we saw as two glaciers used to be one but has retreated further up a valley.

The second were the beaches: every single one we landed on we found plastic - for example, like this plastic fishing nets washed up on the beach (oh, and also a polar bear):

It was really sad & tragic how we have polluted our oceans so that even in the wilds of Svalbard at 80 degrees north there are plastics everywhere.

If you haven't seen it already, you really MUST watch the BBC's brilliant but scary documentary Drowning in Plastic. It even has a segment on Svalbard where I spotted places I'd been to and they didn't just find large chunks of plastic they found micro-plastics in the sand and gravel too.

We really have to cut out single-use plastics from our lifestyles.

The Polar Bears of Svalbard

Famously there are estimated to be more polar bears than people across Svalbard and the Barents Sea.

Even with approximately 3,000 of them out there it was still exciting to see this huge, wild, powerful animal in its natural habitat. They are genuinely dangerous and indeed while we were doing our circumnavigation there was an attack on a crew from one of the cruise ships we encountered.

Part of the problem is that during summer they can be short of food as they hunt seals over the pack ice. Fortunately the one above was clearly doing ok.

Even so we remained quite a way offshore, following the strict regulations Norway has in place. In Greenland where we barely saw another boat it would make less of an impact if we got close. In Svalbard with the constant stream of boats it could change the animals behaviour and so distances had to be much greater (though I couldn't help but note that other boats did indeed get a lot closer).

Fortunately I had brought my 70 -300mm lens for just such occasions:

In total 4 polar bears were sighted though I only saw 3 of them as one was spotted in the early hours at a time when I wasn't feeling at all well and from the cries on deck I could tell it was stationary and a long way away.

The other times we got a good view of the bear eating, swimming, walking and being dived by angry birds (not the game):

Every time we went ashore we had to stay in a close group around who ever had the gun.

It was clearly not a drill.

Abandoned Huts and Reindeer

It was always good to get ashore and stretch one's legs.

At Kinnvika in Murchinsonfjorden there were huts from a 1957-8 Swedith / Finnish / Swiss expedition (currently abandoned):

One of them was open so we could have a look inside. Outside there were reindeer:

They were some of the Svalbard reindeer which is a distinct subspecies that has adapted to the particularly cold harsh climate of those islands.

Blue ice in Svalbard

Some of the icebergs near the glacier by the Texas Bar were a very striking blue!

SV Delos Moonshine at the Texas Bar, Spitsbergen

The day after the dragging anchor incident, we visited the fjord above and saw the magnificent glacier. After waiting for a big cruise ship to leave, we anchored by this little wooden shack and went ashore.

This shack was the famous Texas Bar:

To be honest, I have no idea how it end up to be called this, but the ever informative Cruise Handbook for Svalbard described how it came to be built by over-winter hunters in 1927. It could be the most northerly bar in the world but there are no serving staff.

It operates on an honour basis by which visitors leave offerings which give them the right to drink from bottles left by others. For example, we found the following on the shelf inside:

And yes, that is a bottle of the SV Delos's famous moonshine, which we found in a little hut towards the north of Spitsbergen.

For it turned out that the Delos crew had recently been sailing in these very waters on the 59N yacht Isbjörn and you can read about their visit to the Texas Bar on this blog entry. It says how they found a "a cheap plastic bottle of Vodka" left by Mats the previous year. Mats was our skipper and he had been emailing Delos and been told to look out for their moonshine.

Not having brought anything I felt I couldn't have a taste but did uncork it to smell its lovely aroma.

Then we all had a tipple of choice from those bottles that other crew members had brought, which included one of my favourites, namely Bruichladdich. 

Cheers!

Dragging anchor onto the rocks of Spitsbergen!

It looked like a peaceful anchorage which we shared with one other yacht (above).

This was Virgohamna, which has a remarkable history. For it was from this sheltered bay, towards the north-west of the Svalbard archipelago, that several attempts were made to reach the North Pole by balloon.  One was the incredible 1898 expedition by Swedish engineer S. A.  Andree in which all aeronauts died under mysterious circumstances. The site is protected and it is necessary to get permission from the Governor of Svalbard to land.

I was looking forward to seeing the remains of this - and other - expeditions, but it was not to be. For one, I was feeling pretty sick by this point and for another the weather turned for the worst.

From gentle 10 knots all of sudden the wind veered and strengthened, maybe some sort of katabatic wind. Going ashore on the inflatable was a challenge and so some (e.g. me) were left on the boat as the skipper took the mate (with the gun) ashore as a first run.

While they and the inflatable were away we looked over at the other yacht and to our horror saw that they had dragged their anchor across the bay onto the rocks. They were all too aware of it and came on deck to do the international distress signs of repeatedly raising and lowering hands on either side. Then the VHF sprang to life on Ch16 with urgent calls for assistance.

It was a difficult moment as actually there was very little we could do apart from signal to the skipper that rather than coming back to us he should head over to them, which he did.

By now the mast was clearly leaning to one side and things were looking a bit grim.

However it turned out that the skipper had been talking via VHF to the Governor of Svalbard's support ship overnight which meant it wasn't that far away. So he was able to call them up and, yes, indeed, they were in range and could send a fast RIB to assist.

There was an anxious wait for it, but then an orange dot appeared in a ball of spray that approached and spotted us. It was able to get a tow line on the other boat and slowly drag them back to safe waters:

In the end nothing was seriously damaged and the yacht could continue on its way. Note that I've edited the photos to remove their name.

The previous post noted the downside the Svalbard's stream of cruise ships and yachts, but this incident showed the positive. Even when things were really bad, help was on hand. In Greenland this could have been more serious, though things could have been done (e.g. use the inflatables to pull off or kedge off).

As to me, my lurgy hit bad so I retired to my bunk while the others explored ashore at Virgohamna and the relics of adventurers a hundred years ago...