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HOLIDAYS TO SPITSBERGEN
SPITSBERGEN EXPEDITION CRUISES
12 days from £4220 pp
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Map of tour | Itinerary
Ships & Expedition Leaders
Follow in Amundsen’s footsteps to these islands of extraordinary beauty with their glacial landscapes, migratory bird life and remote settlements. Here, where the sun never sets in summer, you lose touch with time, whilst slowly savouring a mountainous beauty unmatched anywhere in the world. Spitsbergen is the largest of the Svalbard archipelago’s islands, whose capital, Longyearbyen, is the most northerly point in the world reachable by scheduled flight and where (between April 20th and August 22nd) the sun never sets. The name means “land of the jagged peaks” and geologists estimate that millions of years ago the archipelago was at the equator, subsequently drifting north over millennia to produce a dramatic cornucopia of mountain rock formations; heat hardened sea beds now pointing skywards and glacier walls, some as long as 200 km. The largest settlements are Longyearbyen, with a population of about 1400, the Russian mining town of Barentsburg that is frozen in time and Ny Ålesund from where Amundsen began his epic voyage across the North Pole by airship. The old trappers’ huts, made from drift wood and logs carried down the Barents Sea, bear witness to the winter hardships still borne by a handful of hunters. For botanists Spitsbergen’s some 200 species include the delicate Svalbard poppy; abundant Saxifragas particularly the prolifically purple oppositifohen; white heaths of Cassiope; pink mounds of Silena acaulis and the delicate blue hues of the Boreal Jacob’s ladder. For the ornithologist the sheer abundance of the literally millions of Brunnich’s Guillemots and Little Auks are just mind boggling. With King Eider, Ivory Gull, Sabine’s Gull and Snow Buntings to add to the show, Svalbard is something of a photographic paradise. If you take one of our expedition cruises partway round the archipelago then the arctic mammals are the stars of the show. This, of course, is Polar Bear country and you will have a good chance of seeing females with their cubs searching out food along with lugubrious walruses hauled out on sand banks and the Svalbard reindeer grazing.
DAY 1 UK – OSLO Scheduled SAS flight to Oslo, self transfer to and overnight at Clarion Oslo Airport Hotel.
DAY 2 OSLO-LONGYEARBYEN Early morning scheduled flight from to Longyearbyen and transfer to the ship. Time for a look around Longyearbyen before early evening sailing.
DAY 3 Sail into Krossfjorden and Zodiac along the sculpted front of the 14th of July Glacier. Nearby cliffs have Kittiwakes and Brünnich’s Guillemots nesting whilst Arctic Foxes patrol the base of the cliff in case a hapless chick falls from its nest whilst Bearded Seals cruise this scenic fjord.
DAY 4 In Liefdefjorden go ashore on the tundra island of Andøya. Common Eiders and pink-footed Geese nest here along with rare King Eider which may also be seen. Sail along the sheer face of the Monaco Glacier, where thousands of kittiwakes and occasionally polar bears are seen.
DAY 5 Today we reach our northernmost point at Phippsøya, in the Seven Islands north of Nordaustlandet just 545 miles from the North Pole. Possibly sit in the pack ice, taking in the spectacular surroundings.
DAY 6 Visit Laagöya today, a low island with a big lagoon where a walrus herd tends to congregate; Sabine’s gulls nest on the island as well. At Sorg Fjord we may find another herd of walruses not far from the graves of 17th century whalers.
DAY 7 Sail into Hinlopen Strait, home to bearded seals, ringed seals, polar bears, and ivory gulls. Navigate the ice floes of Lomfjordshalvøya in Zodiacs and explore the bird cliffs of Alkefjellet with thousands of Brünnich’s guillemots. Attempt a landing at Palanderbukta on Nordaustlandet, home to reindeer, pink-footed geese, breeding ivory gulls, and walruses.
DAY 8 Near Torrelneset, explore the polar desert of Nordaustlandet, next to the world’s third largest ice cap. Sailing south of Nordaustlandet there is good chance of seeing Greenland whales.
DAY 9 In Freemansundet to land on Barentsøya to visit an old trapper’s hut and then take a brisk walk across the tundra in search of Spitsbergen Reindeer and Barnacle Geese. Later cruise south to Diskobukta on the west side of Edgeøya and Zodiac through the shallow bay to land on a beach littered with whale bones and logs carried down from the Barents sea. Climb to the rim of a narrow gully inhabited by thousands of Kittiwakes, Black Guillemots and piratical Glaucous Gulls.
DAY 10 Cruise the side fjords of the Hornsund area of southern Spitsbergen enjoying the scenery of towering mountain peaks: Hornsundtind rises to 1431m while Bautaen there are also 14 magnificent glaciers in the area and very good chances of encounters with seals and Polar Bears.
DAY 11 Land on Ahlstrandhalvøya at the mouth of Van Keulenfjorden. Here piles of Beluga skeletons (a small white whale), the remains of 19th century slaughter litter the shoreline and there is a good chance we will come across a pod. Cruise into Recherchefjorden during the afternoon and explore an area of tundra at the head of the fjord where many Reindeer feed.
DAY 12 Return to Longyearbyen and disembark for transfer to airport and return flight to the UK via Oslo.
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