Polar Voyages

by Gray, Gordon

  The next morning we all meet up at breakfast. There are twelve of us. It is fair to say that none of us are in the first flush of youth. Doreen and I had been on previous trips with some of the group but others we have not met before. There are Derek and Anne, who we met on the Greenland trip. There are Jill and Angela who organised the charter with Per Magnus. They are two independent ladies who live their own lives most of the year but join up each year for trips together to far-off places. Then there are those who have never visited the Arctic before. Sarah and Anthony, who seem to have been to all the hot and sticky places like the Amazon. Sarah’s mother Barbara, who is a lovely lady and who one afternoon towards the ends of the trip, when it was announced that we were trying for yet another Zodiac landing, decided that she had had enough and, said ‘Fine, You all go. I am staying here in the Saloon on my own with a very large whisky.’ No one argued and in fact some of us were quite envious. Then there are Amanda and Alex, who have also never been to the Arctic but heard all about it from Gill and Angela, and want to see it for themselves. In addition, Per Magnus himself is coming as the expedition leader and, with him, his wife Katarina; who as a director has a large role to play in the running of the Company. Both of them, as well as Per the skipper and Lisa, one of Per Magnus’s full time Arctic guides who is based in Spitzbergen, have all led many expeditions in and around Spitzbergen so there will be no shortage of ideas as to where we should try to go.

  The Stockholm is berthed across the end of the commercial jetty, dwarfed by a large merchantman lying along the main jetty. We are warmly welcomed on board by the captain, Per Engvall, as well as by Annika and Kjell, the stewardess and the chef, who between them run all the ‘hotel aspects’ of the ship, and the rest of the crew. After the safety briefings, we set sail down the Isafjord towards the open sea and into a strengthening south-westerly breeze, which gives us a few white horses and a gentle roll for our first night at sea.

  The ship is a real beauty. She is small enough to get into the bays and small harbours but big enough to offer some degree of comfort for her twelve passengers and seven crew. Stockholm was built in Helsingbors Shipyard in Sweden in 1953 as a lighthouse tender for the Swedish National Maritime Administration. She is 40 metres long and has a gross tonnage of 361 tons. After her life in the Baltic she was saved from the scrap yard and bought from the Swedish Government by her current skipper/owner Per Engvall. He restored her and saw the potential in her for small expeditions to the Arctic. He converted and updated her for expedition work and to meet passenger-carrying standards and Lloyd’s ice-strengthened standard A1. He restored the ship’s interior to how she had been when she was new. This included the restoration of the beautiful wooden-panelled bridge front and interior and the wood panelling in the main saloon. To enable more passengers to be carried, he turned the original hold space into passenger cabins and a central messing area and linked this area through to both the bow and stern areas. This allowed her to carry at least twelve passengers. By 1998 she was ready to go.

  Polar bears outnumber humans on Svalbard. (C. McCutcheon)

  Entering the mess it instantly reminds me of seeing Captain Scott’s ship, the RRS Discovery. The early polar expedition ships had a very similar layout, with a central wardroom mess and cabins opening off it. A central skylight makes it a bright and cheery mess deck. The atmosphere in the Stockholm, with the old charts and pictures of the Arctic on the bulkheads, combined with the rich use of wood and brass, gives her a warm and adventurous feel. The cabins are basic but cosy. Ours has two wooden bunks, (that were exceptionally comfortable), drawers and a wardrobe for stowage and a small shower cum toilet as well as a small porthole. This we have to keep firmly closed, as it is only a few feet above the waterline. The whole cabin is painted white and is spotlessly clean.

  A gale has sprung up out in the Arctic Ocean but we avoid the rougher weather by sailing up the Forlandsundet, a wide strait between Prins Karl Forland Island and the mainland. Dinner is timed so that we are in sheltered waters by the time it is ready. Dinner on the first night is a delight. Norwegian smoked salmon, beef tenderloin with port and truffle sauce and some good wines.

  Map of Spitsbergen and the route taken. The route was, as always in the north, determined by the ice and not us.

  Our first night’s sleep is interrupted by our first meeting with the wildlife. At four in the morning there is a tap on the cabin door and Lisa tells us that we are stopping to watch a group of about twelve walruses on a shingle spit on the island. I struggle up on deck to find I am the last, apart from Doreen who decides to stay in bed. The spit projects out into the sound from Prins Karl Forland Island and has an exceptionally steep shore. Because of this, and the fact that it is dead calm, Per edges the ship right up to the shore so that the bottom of the bow is just touching the bottom of the shingle bank and we, standing on the fo’c’sle, can almost lean over and touch the walruses on the shore. Not that we want to, the smell is enough and the continual belching and snorting is not conducive to getting any closer. Especially at four o’clock in the morning! A few bleary, red eyes peer up at us then close again. They are lying in a haphazard heap, overlapping each other with some asleep even though they have the tusks of others sticking in their side, or a flipper and folds of skins over their heads. Apart from an occasional glance they remain aloof and disinterested in our presence on their beach.

  We continue sailing north up the strait, through the narrows and later that day we go into Ny Ålesund. This village sits on King’s Fjord, a long, wide fjord running south-east inland from the sea. The village was set up by sealers who were looking for fuel during the First World War. They found coal and set up the Kings Bay Coal Company. Its offices still stand above the tiny harbour/jetty. Unfortunately, a number of mining accidents led to the deaths of many miners and in 1962 the mine was shut down.

  Two Norwegian whale catcher boats are alongside when we arrive. They are easily recognised by their crow’s nests and harpoon gun on the bow. They are reportedly hunting for minke whales, which Norway is allowed to do for ‘Scientific Purposes’. These obviously include selling raw whale meat on Bergen fish market. They are fine-looking boats. Both look new and are made of varnished wood and are obviously clean and well cared for. There is, however, no sign of the whalers themselves as they are probably sleeping down below. Ny Ålesund is now a thriving polar research centre with scientists and students from around the world living there during the summer. It also boasts the world’s most northerly post office, which sits among the other rust-red, painted wooden houses and buildings above the harbour.

  It was from here that a number of attempts have been made on the Pole, particularly by air. A tall, metal lattice mast, which was the tethering point for an airship, stands on open ground about half a mile from the village. Amundsen and the Italian Nobile, together with the American, Ellsworth, set off from here in the airship Norge N1 in 1926 and flew over the North Pole and carried on to land in Alaska. They were the first people to positively see the North Pole as well as the first to fly over it. A fine plaque and a bust of Amundsen have been set up at the base of the mast to commemorate the event.

  Proceeding up the coast of Albert 1 Land on a brilliant sunny day.

  Per and Per Magnus, are both keen to get up to the north so we reluctantly leave this delightful spot, leaving the two whalers resting gently against the quay. It has been a cold and breezy morning with snow showers blowing through. However, as we sail from the village, the sun comes out, illuminating a beautiful glacier on the eastern side of the fjord. As the sky clears, the sea instantly turns from grey to a sparkling blue. We sail out of King Fjord and up the coast of Albert 1 Land, the sun shining down on our small ship, which is no more than a dot in the vastness of the dazzling sea. After half an hour, the after deck resembles a cruise ship lido deck, with bodies lying in the sun everywhere. The only difference is that these bodies are not in swimsuits, but have heavy boots, parkas, hats and gloves on as well as sun glasses.
It is a fabulous afternoon. The sun shines down and everywhere we look there is another fantastic view. We have a flat, calm, glistening, blue sea and white, snow-clad mountains and glaciers edge down to the sea under a clear blue sky. The gentle murmur of the engine continues as Stockholm heads further and further north. Spitzbergen might only be a speck on the map but when you see it on days like this, when you can literally see for miles and miles, you realise what a vast wilderness it is; a wilderness of endless mountains and ice, empty of any form of human life. As the afternoon slips by, some people snooze on deck as the ship rolls along and the soft vibration of the engine helps relax us all. Some creep quietly below for a snooze in comfort and others sit in the bridge and chat with Skipper Per until drowsiness takes over and they also sneak off below. Per continues to sit contentedly in his chair in charge of his own ship, going where he wants to, in to the far reaches of the Arctic. I chat with Alec and Amanda up on the fo’c’sle, sitting under the bulwark and sheltered from the wind but still in the warm sunshine. They cannot believe either the weather or the beauty of the Arctic on their first trip. Like many in the Arctic for the first time, they expected snowstorms all the time. So, the afternoon drifts gently by, at every turn another spectacular view of Albert 1 Land, another glacier creeping to the sea, another ridge of snow-covered mountains climbing away deep into the interior. Another fjord, this time Magdalene Fjord, opens out to starboard, still, silent and empty in the sunshine.

  The peaceful afternoon drifts by as we sail up the coast taking in the beauty of the islands. By early evening we reach the north-west tip of Spitzbergen and enter the narrow, twisting Sorgattet which separates Dane’s Island and Amsterdam Island from the mainland. The towering black cliffs climb above us as puffins and little auks flap furiously along the cliffs to their burrows and nests. This whole region was used by the Dutch, Scandinavian and British whalers in the seventeenth century and many of the place names reflect the history. This particular area is called Smeerenburg. Smeer is the Dutch word for blubber. So, this was Blubber Town. It is a low, flat area backed by low hills. It was set up in 1614 as a tented camp. They would catch the Greenland whales from small rowboats as the migrating whales passed through the islands and drag them ashore on the shingle beach and reduce them to oil in huge pots or coppers up to 2 or 3 metres wide. The Danes were also trying to establish a base here and there were disputes between the two nationalities. After the first years when they lived in tents, in 1619, the Dutch brought wooden huts, bricks and building materials and the camp became more permanent. Smeerenburg grew to sixteen or seventeen wooden buildings with cobbled lanes, brick-based boiling ovens and even a small fort in the centre of the settlement. It is reported that at the peak of the industry in the 1630s there would be up to 200-300 men living here in the summer, working for seven separate whale blubber bases, each financed by a different ‘chamber’ or company, from Holland.

  The Bears are Here!

  We round the beacon on the end of the spit that has, for years, guided ships through the strait. Then, as we are passing Slaadfjord, a small ice-filled fjord on the mainland side, Per alters course into the fjord looking for a mooring for the night and we break into the fast ice that leads up to the Sallstrom Glacier at the end. His plan is to spend the night anchored in the fast ice below the glacier. The glacier is large and dramatic and in the early evening the sun shines through the mountaintops onto the glacier, turning it a gleaming ice white and leaving the glacier front and the fast ice in deep blue shadows. We are watching the scenery when someone notices a slight movement on the ice against the dark shadows at the base of glacier. Then, as we slowly move into the thicker fast ice, through the binoculars, the slight movement resolves itself into two polar bears hunting along the glacier front. Eventually, when we are well into the thick fast ice, Per stops the ship. All falls silent, the sun slowly sinks lower and the bears continue their search along the deep-blue shadow of the glacier front as we relax on deck. The day is completed by another superb dinner and fine wine.

  Stockholm edges gently into the fast ice in front of a glacier near Danskoya, north-western Spitsbergen.

  The glacier front near Danskoya. The vast emptiness and remoteness of Spitsbergen is humbling.

  A polar bear eyes up a potential dinner.

  ‘The Bears are here!’, Annika cries from the galley. We rush up on deck as quietly as we can, grabbing cameras and coats on the way. There, just a few yards in front of the port bow, are the two bears. One is a mother and the other is her cub, but probably about a year-and-a-half old. They are staring and sniffing, moving and stopping. Then, when they see us emerge, they snort quietly and wander away for a few paces, then turn and nervously wander in again. The main deck of Stockholm is low, with only about 8 feet of freeboard at the lowest point, so we are almost down at eye level with the bears. They come right up to the side. The mother’s fur is a glistening white and champagne yellow while the cub’s fur is pure white. It looks so soft as the sun shines through the individual hairs and fibres of their fur. Four jet black eyes pierce and X-ray us, and everything they see, as their black noses are constantly working to take in every scent. Four small, round and rather cute ears listen to everything that is said (listening perhaps for an invitation on board for dinner). The loudest noises on the ice are their giant, pigeon-toed paws, as they gently crunch on the ice, and the sound of their breathing and short snorts as they savour the smells from the galley. On board, twelve passengers and all the crew are transfixed and silent. No one dares move or breathe in case we scare them off. Slowly, they become bolder and stand with their noses right at the deck level, peering through the rails. What will they do? Will they try to get on board? If they decided to there was no way to stop them. One jump and they will be on deck in a furry heap of hungry, prime carnivore. Will one of the peppermints in my pocket be acceptable? The smells from the galley of the shrimp, marinated in chilli and ginger, starter and the Asian fish dinner, with white wine sauce, as the main course will undoubtedly be more attractive to them, so my peppermints are probably safe. They do not appear to be threatening in any way, just curious and interested, and they hold eye contact with us until a movement along the deck distracts them. As we are watching the bears, an Arctic fox, half in and half out of its white winter coat, trots round the ship. It is half the size of a normal fox. It is obviously following the bears to collect any scraps from whatever meal they find.

  Finally, the bears grow bored and wander off across the ice astern of the ship, still sniffing the air and looking for a better supper than anything a few tourists can offer. We settle down to our coffee in the mess deck and let our heartbeats return to normal.

  Into the Ice

  We sail again in the morning; having remained moored safely in the fast ice all night. No sooner have we left the fjord ice than we stop again to watch two male walruses on an ice flow near the fjord entrance. The early morning scene is magical. The two walruses are lying on an ice floe in the black waters of the fjord and behind them is the backdrop of the steep, snow-covered mountains and a glacier, all bathed in soft sunshine. As we move north through the strait, dead ahead of us, something is happening on a big ice floe. It is the two bears from last night and they have found their breakfast. They are devouring a seal that they have caught out on the ice. Blood covers the floe and it is easy to see that they have dragged the unfortunate seal onto a firmer part of the ice. The bears’ faces are now bright blood red as they bury their heads in the seal’s body and come out tearing and ripping pieces of flesh, blubber and entrails. Glaucous gulls scream and flap round the edge of the floe. Occasionally, one of the bears makes a move towards a gull to scare it away then returns to the seal’s belly. Per edges the ship ever closer until, at about 100 yards, he feels we are close enough to see without being too close to scare them off so that they will lose the meal.

  After a while, we move off and leave them to it – after all we have our own breakfast to get still. As we head out into the A
rctic Ocean from the islands and turn east we can already see a wall of ice stretching right across the horizon. We are the first ship up this way this season so we have no detailed information from others who may have gone round before us. We steam towards the ice and enter it, with Per taking the ship in a careful but determined manner deeper and deeper into the pack ice, looking for a way through. Half a mile from the ship another polar bear is busy eating the last remains of a seal, with gulls circling him. He is a large male and he totally ignores us. He stays and chews at the last remains of the seal for some time before wandering off across the ice without a glance at us.

  Walruses lie on an ice floe off Spitsbergen.

  Small sailing vessels at Longyearbyen, destined for the north of Spitsbergen. (C. McCutcheon)

  Stockholm fast in the ice in a sheltered fjord allowed some leg stretching on the ice.

  We try to see if we can find a route through the pack to the east all afternoon but there is no clear water. This is the fast winter ice that is still frozen to the land and has not yet retreated. Looking out across the ice through binoculars, the shimmer and reflections create hazy mirages that look like towering icebergs, or lines of icy cliffs of white skyscrapers in the far distance. As we had seen in Franz Josef Land, it is easy to start convincing yourself that there must be land and mountains out there. It is easy to see how the early explorers in the Arctic believed that there was a great undiscovered land to the north.