July 25 – Geology, not biology.

A very early 5AM start today to go and visit the fishing village of Assaqutaq . The unusually early start was because the machine shop in Sisimuit didn't have the right equipment to fix the engine parts we need, so we'll need to spend the guys of the day slowly chugging our way further up the coast to Ilulissat.

The rest of the day was spent limping up the coast on our half an engine, mostly indoors as the fog rolled in after lunch. To pass the time the guides gave a series of talks on the respective areas of expertise, though Jessica and I mostly snoozed in our room to catch up on missed sleep. One handy feature on the ship is that the closed circuit television channel always shows what's happening in the forward lounge where they do all the talks and presentations. This is so that if you're too tired or lazy to come down to the lounge for any event, you can always stay in bed and watch it on the TV in your room. This has become my FAVORITE THING IN THE WORLD and I insist this becomes part of my everyday life! From now on all invites, from family dinners to birthday parties to weddings, must include an internet feed so I can stay home and watch it from there. I may never leave the house again.

Other than sea birds and a few whales, we haven't seen a lot of wildlife. The marine biologist on board seems disappointed that she hasn't been able to fulfill our “marine mammal needs” so far (a phrase she accidentally used when introducing herself on the first day and hasn't been able to live down). However, the coastline scenery is beautiful and so far we're happy with the theme of the trip being “geology, not biology”, which is handy because there are several geologists on board.

July 24 Part 2 – What's in a name?

Today brings us out first landing as we rode the Zodiacs to shore to have a hike around the peaty marshes of the mainland. Walking is quite tiring as the peat is very spongy and sinks 4-6 inches under each footfall.

Back on the ship, mealtime seating is not assigned and you just find a spot at the tables ranging from two seats up to seven. They warned that if anyone appeared to be shy and were always sitting on their own then for the evening meal you'd get an invite to sit at one of the larger reserved tables with assigned seats with new people, and they provide complementary wine to loosen the mood. In other words, if you're antisocial they punish you with free booze. Jessica & I were invited to the reserved table by the Captain's Dinner on the first full day on board.

Before dinner the captain, a retired Navy captain from Norway (I think), gave the customary welcome speech. He started his retirement from military service by captaining cruises around warmer climes like the Caribbean, but has retreated to Arctic and Antarctic adventure cruising now that those routes have been dominated by the “Monsters of the Sea”, a reference to the 5000-person behemoths that lumber around those oceans. Next, the ships entertainer rapidly introduced the captain to each of the 120 guests individually, naming each of us by name and not getting a single one wrong. An impressive trick considering we had been on the ship for less than 24 hours.

After dinner highlighted the charm of not being on a large cruise ship, as all the passengers enjoyed a group sing-along late into the evening. We managed to stay up to almost get our first official taste of midnight sun.

At this latitude and time of year by midnight the sun had just dropped a few degrees below the horizon, but we are still heading a good distance further north tomorrow.

July 24 Part 1 – Ice, ice, baby.

We were warned last night that ultimately the tour company doesn't dictate the schedule; Mother Nature dictates the schedule. Right on cue the morning briefing brought some inauspicious news: most of the Canadian sites were were planning to visit are still completely ice-bound due to this year's harsh winter and late spring, including Resolute, where we are supposed to catch our charter flight back to Ottawa at the end of the trip. In fact, they hadn't yet figure out how we were going to clear Canadian customs since they normally fly a customs officer to one of the smaller airstrips on Baffin Island and they can't find any that they can get the ship into. (At this point if there were any Republicans or Fox News pundits on the ship, they would take these two data points as evidence that Climate Change is entirely a fabrication made up by liberal scientists... like the ones serving as guides on this ship. Though interestingly we did have dinner with a climate change denier later in the trip.) The fallback plan for the rest of the trip if the ice doesn't clear is to find our way to Iqaluit and fly home from there. The good news is that the large ice shelf on the Canadian side means there is a good chance of seeing polar bears as well as walruses, though I am saddened that we likely won't get to see the narwhal breeding grounds that I have been looking forward to.

The threat of a reduced itinerary has been counterbalanced by the fact that one of the ship's two engines has broken down and the other one is only running at 70%, so we are already well behind schedule. Since we can still make landfall on Greenland (which, for the record, is more of a mossy grey than green) the plan is to fly in spare parts and mechanics from Copenhagen to meet us at our next stop in Sisimuit.

Meanwhile, the whether is pleasant and the top deck makes for a peaceful spot to write up blog entries and watch the occasional whale in the distance:

Sadly, we haven't managed to establish a satellite connection for the internet so none of these will be posted until we make it back to civilization, which seems a long way away at the moment.

July 23 – Toronto to Greenland

When you think of getting a charter flight from Toronto, Canada to Kangerlussuaq, Greenland, naturally you think you'll be flying on Miami Air, right?

Apparently this choice of airline was a surprise to them as well since the pilot greeted us with “Welcome to Flight 664 from Toronto to Kang- kanger – ummm... I don't know how to pronounce that... Heck, I've never been there before, but hopefully we'll get you there alright.”

We got to Kangerlussuaq without issue and were greeted by the friendliest customs officers in the world: a sign taped up behind them read “Always look on the bright side of life, da-dum da-dum da-dum da-dum” and they we're happily greeting each passenger with a smile. Apparently the international treaty doesn't apply here that dictates that all customs officers must be snarly grumps who hate their jobs as well as their customers.

Before heading to our ship, we had a quick tour to the top of a local hill for a view of Greenland's ice cap in the distance.

Next on to our ship, where mostly the evening was consumed with orientation, evacuation drills, and general first-day activities. There were warnings that they might come on the intercom during the night to wake us if there were northern lights, and a joke about whether anyone was foolish enough to opt out of the wake-up call. Having spent a winter in Fort McMurray I've seen plenty of aurora, and having gotten up at 3AM Calgary-time to catch our flight I was sorely tempted to take the opt-out seriously.

What didn't make sense was that we are right on the edge of the Arctic Circle so should be far enough north for midnight sun, or at least midnight twilight given it's a few months since the solstice. Our guide claimed it was possible since we were still in Søndre Strømfjord (the longest fjord in the Northern Hemisphere) and the fjord walls cast enough of a shadow for it to be dark, but when I awoke late at night and went for a stroll it was still quite light, and no aurora wake-up call was made.

Now we push ahead towards the open space of the Davis Straight and then north up the coast of Greenland.

Causing a Commotion

Leaving for our next vacation soon...

... but sadly I don't expect we'll have any internet access, so most of the blog updates won't go up until we get back.