Tuesday 3rd September. Prins Christian Sund.
Today we entered Greenland waters and the Prince Christian Sund (sound).
It was amazing. We spent 10 hours sailing through an amazingly narrow, rocky series of sounds that cut through the bottom corner of the country.
Stunning. The rocks were sensational.
We pulled into an inlet and up to the face of a glacier. We sat for quite a while while the rescue boat went out to collect some ice.
Then turned a 360 to give everyone a good look. As well as the large main glacier there was a small on to the side roaring down a steep valley.
In the afternoon we stopped at a small village to give them a present. Pineapples, Oranges and more fruit and vegetables.
Apparently the Pilots had told the captain that this ton rarely got fresh produce. How lovely.
The ship blew the horn and small boats came from all over to share in the bonus goods.
By late afternoon we sailer out back into the Labrador Sea.
The rescue boat when in and collected some ice for us.
Wednesday 4th September – Qaqurtoq, Greenland.
Qaqurtoq is a small town on the southern tip of Greenland. A fishing village with a population of 3,000 people. Pronounced Car – Toe -Toc.
What a huge day. I had a few excursions booked.
The first was a Kafamee – a visit to the home of a Greenlander. The excursion met at the dock and off we went. The town is very hilly and of course the house we were visiting was way up the hill.
Like the other Greenland towns I had visited, all the houses were up on stilts and painted in bright pascal colours. It looked great. The services ran in pipes above the ground, as it was all built on rock.
We went to the home of an elderly women and it was like stepping back into a 1950’s granny’s home. Our dear host cooked all night and served us on her very best china.
Plastic
table cloth, fine china and so many trinkets.
We all sat around and ate a selection of breads and cakes. One dish was a rhubarb
and apple dish with crowberries. We all tried to work out what they were. A bit
like small, not terribly tasty blueberries. I thought they were like the jam I
brought back from the Falkland Islands. But that couldn’t be. A world apart.
But in investigation I found this. “Empetrum nigrum,
crowberry, black crowberry, or, in western Alaska, blackberry, is a flowering
plant species in the heather family Ericaceae with a near circumboreal
distribution in the northern hemisphere. It is also native in the Falkland
Islands.”
How can the same plant develop and be native to two different arctic regions at
opposite ends of the world? I guess
migrating birds.
They showed us all the traditional clothing that is now worn for special days.
Long leggings made of scrapped seal skin. Shorts made of seal skin with the fur still on. And heavy jumpers with yokes made of bead work – now plastic beads, but traditionally seeds, bones and shells.
The outfits weigh up to 20 kg, and to purchase now are around $3,000US.
After our visit I headed off on a walk around town. Since I was at the high point of town I headed off from there.
A Spar supermarket was nearby.
Here at the top of the world, they were paying about 50c more for an avocado than we do at home.
Would not like to live in the ‘council housing’. I first thought it was a building ready for demolition, but then saw how many people lived in them.
The school was big and had a very flash sports oval – all fake turf as grass wouldn’t go well here.
Then around by the lake, with great birds and scenery. The lake freezes in winter and they skate and cross country ski on it. A few dead ends streets took me a bit further down to the lake that I wanted and almost through a few back yards.
Lots of people had a tiny outside area for the BBQ but no sitting areas, a bit cold I think.
I did see
one house with a large deck overlooking the lake, and a (very) few with flowers
and nice yards. There were lovely creeks and little waterfalls all around
town.
The fish markets were nice, and smelt great. Lucky as it’s a fishing town.
One area had a project called “Man and Stone”, that was billed as ‘petroglyphs’. Modern day petroglyphs. It was a long soap stone wall with carvings. Some were great. One artist started the project in 1993, and then 18 other Nordic artist came and did more.
By the time I got back around to the tender port the fog had really dropped and rolled in. As the ship was in the shipping lane it was blowing its horn every five minutes. The sky started to leak and about 1500 people decided to go back to the ship. But at the same time the ship had to move closer to allow tendering in the fog. So a great hold up developed. I have never seen such a long line for the tenders.
It looked a bit like a horror movie as the ghost ship was rolling into town full of zombies.
But luckily
I was not going back. I continued to wander around and see more.
At 1 pm I met my group for my next trip
– a boat trip out to the famous Greenland Ice Cap. This is the one cap that covers 80% of the
biggest island on earth. That’s a big
icecap.
We travelled for over one and half hours up the network of fjords past amazing landscapes. The rocks were amazing.
A massive mob of sea birds were working on a lot of fish.
Past great ice bergs and even acres of smashed ice – soon to become brash ice as it got colder. Lots of very old, very blue bergs. Which I guess is a really bad sign. Blue bergs are a result of being incredibly old – maybe thousands of years – and under great pressure. The oxygen is press out of them – making them clear and therefore blue.
The cowboy driver pulled the boat right up to some bergs and we got to touch them.
We then went
up one more huge valley shaped by the glacier. Sadly, the glacier was
kilometres back from the opening. But
the rocks ere stunning. Much of it being Schist,
a medium-grade metamorphic rock with quartz and feldspar woven through it.
By this stage the fog and clouds were gone and the rocks were sparkling in the
sun, with lots of water flowing down.
The ice cap came right down to the water at the place we entered. Well it did once, it was about 15 metres back. To land they just rammed the nose of the boat up against a rock. Obviously deep there, but the metal nose pushed on the rock. We stepped off and there we were.
It was great. I got to walk on the second biggest ice sheet on the planet.
After a lot of time we all got back into the boat and headed around the bay. More stunning rocks and giant waterfalls.
Some of them were huge.
With the
terrible season Greenland has just had, due to the Europe heat wave, with
record melting’s, the old ice is moving to the front and breaking of.
On August 1,
Greenland’s ice sheet lost 12.5 billion tons of ice, with researches fearing it is reaching a tipping point.
From July 30 to
August 3, melting occurred across 90% of the continent’s surface, dumping 55
billion tons of water over 5 days.
And when we saw the number of ginormous waterfalls flowing from the ice cap we
could believe it.
Greenland also had its first bush fires this
year.
Pretty sad.
On the way back we saw two humpbacks and a few seals. And lots more ice.
It was then back to the ship. Massive day. 10 hours of excursions!
Bye Greenland.
5th and 6th September – Two sea days.
Hurray. We needed some sea days.
More of the same.
Trivia – we are still in the lead.
More wonderful food and chatting.
Since Iceland we have known that we would be heading into the tail of ‘Hurricane
Dorian’.
Dorian changed path and spared Florida, but it was now roaring up to meet us.
Our plans were changed and we were to skip Halifax and have two days in Sydney, Nova Scotia instead. I was looking forward to Halifax but oh well. Sydney would be fun.
But then Dorian got worse, it slowed down and became far more powerful. Dorian was now really coming for us! Canada was to cope a pounding as well. Sydney was tipped to get 150m winds.
So the plans were changed.
We were going to skip Sydney and Halifax both, and would run and hide out in a small bay half way up the Gulf of St Lawrence – Sept-Iles.
We were to spend two days there. That would mean it would take us two days to get back to Boston, so we would not make it there by the 10th, or disembarkation day. So now the scrabble was on to get new flights home etc. As it was Saturday and the Qantas phone line was a four hour wait – I shall try again on Monday.
What a massive thing this is for Royal to have to deal with – it will cost them millions. But as they keep saying – our safety is most important.
As well as giving us all an extra day on board, they now have to contact all the people booked on the trip on the 10th and tell them their day in now only 4 nights long.
All very exciting. The sad part is now I don’t get to experience Hurricane seas as we will be hiding like sooks.Although it is really sad for the people being slammed in path of Dorian.
Next page.