Baffin Island & Greenland 6

John from Wildfoot travelled in August from Iqaluit on Baffin Island to Kangerlussuaq in Greenland on one of the company’s Arctic ship adventures to the Canadian Arctic. This is a log of his experiences.

 

Day 6

 

This morning at 08.45, our Arctic ship adventure continued as we crossed the Arctic Circle, celebrated by a deafening blast of the ship’s foghorn and a group picture on the bow of the ship.

 

Then, into the zodiacs and off to the shore. We are in Sunshine Fjord, just round from Cape Dyer. Today I joined a group on a quite strenuous 2 hour walk to the top of the nearest hill and back again. Walking on springy tundra with lots of beautiful wildflowers and lichens and then down to a mountain stream, clambering over rocks as we followed it back to the sea. At last I have walked off a little of all that super food and drink we are enjoying on board.

Now we leave Baffin Island and Arctic Canada and move into the Davis Strait for our crossing into Greenland  waters.

Day 7

 

Our first day fully at sea and an hour less on the time zones to GMT-4.

 

Turned out to be quite a busy day with lots of presentations, chief of which was actually by one of our fellow passengers. Matthias Breiter is a well known naturalist (of German origin but has lived for years in Alaska) who has written books on northern bears with some of the most amazing photographs. Bears are his speciality and he gave us an hour’s talk based on a lecture he had given to the Smithsonian in Washington. Really gripping and superbly illustrated, including comment on the hybrid bears resulting from grizzlies mating with young female polar bears.

Other lectures too, on early mapping of the Arctic by theorists and explorers and also on the science of glaciers.

 

We are sailing slowly today on exceptionally calm seas so that we can arrive at Disko Island in Greenland first thing in the morning, having lost yet another hour.