Kicksled

A perfectly functional vehicle in Tromsø in wintertime. In Norwegian its name is Spark.

Landing across the ice at 80° N

Amongst my favorite moments in expedition cruising is when the conditions are such that you don't have to use other landing crafts than you own two feet. This is from Chermsideøya high north in the Svalbard archipelago.

Hammerfest

Travelled through Hammerfest a while ago with Hurtigruten. What a city! Quite colorful and thriving on the natural gas taken ashore on the nearby Melkøya, where there is a plant that is, essentially, a giant 10 billion $ fridge that makes it liquid and transfers it to Liquid Natural Gas vessels that takes it to the markets.




A few hours further north, before you arrive the port of Havøysund, you witness another method of luring energy out of nature. The giant windmills dot the spectacular cliff in an intriguing way.

Ice Cutting in Tempelfjorden, Spitsbergen

This is the highlight of my winter. I took part in a logistic operation with Spitsbergen Travel. The task was to cut out ice-blocks from glacier ice. The best spot for this was about 60 kilometers out of Longyearbyen. In February the light is fantastic.

In Arctic Air Space

The sun is almost back in Longyearbyen, Svalbard. These pictures are taken from the flight in yesterday and out today. The landscape is extraordinary fascinating in the blue ambient light from the sun below the horizon. The reason I was in Longyearbyen this time was to launch the Norwegian Polar Institute Cruise Handbook for Svalbard (sorry, only in Norwegian, coming in English by the summer), the project I have been working on this winter.