Arctic July 2025
In July 2025, we took a Hurtigruten Expedition cruise around Svalbard. The cruise was called "Circumnavigating Spitsbergen, In the realm of the Polar Bear" It was a 10 day cruise aboard the MS Spitsbergen.
July 20: Sunday in Longyearbyrn
We had arrived late the prior afternoon July 19 on SAS flight SK4496, and stayed at the Radisson Blu Polar Hotel, in Longyearbryn, Spitsbergen. Longyearbyen is a small ex-coal-mining town on Spitsbergen Island, in Norway's Svalbard archipelago. On the 20th we had a bus tour at 2:30 PM. Prior to that we walked around the town a few times. We had coffee and tea at the Husky Cafe along with several well behaved huskies. Also ran into Margret and Douglas there who we had met the previous night at dinner.
We visited almost every shop that was open and sat for awhile in one of the larger collections of stores. Lunch was at 1PM.
The bus tour was very interesting taking us quite a distance to Camp Barentz, visiting a husky musher and bonding with some very friendly huskies. We then had pancakes and hot drinks and learned about polar bears. Next we visited the Svalbard museum which was laid out well if I had not entered through the exit.
Last stop was at the ship. We boarded via the gangplank and were scanned in with our hand luggage and everything in our pockets checked just like boarding a plane. Our cabin was 621, it had our bed plus the option for 2 pull down beds from the wall. Must be very tight with 4 people. Plenty of storage under the bed for luggage and boots, it was nice to unpack and not live out of our suitcases.
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| Front of the ship was to the left(port). |
It was a busy evening getting our jackets and collecting our boots for shore excursions. Met another couple from Scotland, Fay and Paul.
July 21: Monday in Ny-Alesund
We had a 2:30 tour of the Research village for just us 2 and some Swiss guy. We saw an arctic fox and the take off point for Roald Amundsen's north pole airship flight. Initially coal was mined here, but it is now just research area and a cruise ship stop. We had to turn off wifi and bluetooth so as not to affect research projects.
July 22: Tuesday, 2 Zodiac Landings
In the morning we had our first arctic zodiac landing. We saw 2 walrus and walked around the beach. There was a whaling station here where they rendered whale blubber for various purposes.
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| Looking onshore |
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| Looking offshore across the bay |
In the afternoon, we visited Alicehamna bay, named after “Princess Alice”, the boat used by Alberto I of Monaco during an sea expedition to Svalbard between 1898 and 1907. We hiked to the top of a hill passing 2 graves along the way. On the way down, we walked around the lake and then along the bay. Way warmer than the morning outing. There were polar plungers out and a sailboat anchored nearby.
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| MS Spitsbergen out in the bay |
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| Gull skull |
July 23: Wednesday, Northwest Spitsbergen
One landing and one zodiac cruise. The landing was to Jotunkjeldene, AKA "Jotun springs", two geothermal springs located in Bockfjorden. Another hill climb with many alpine flowers, many past their prime.
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| Moss Campion |
The afternoon zodiac cruise was to Monacobreen Glacier, it is located in Liefdefjorden. There are 3 glaciers in this bay, Seligerbreen and Monacobreen shared a glacier front not too long ago, until 2014. Now they are separated by the mountain Stortingspresidenten.
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| Bearded Seal |
Later in the day the ship cruised past Moffen Island on our way to the edge of the summer pack ice. The island was overrun with walrus.
July 24: Thursday, The Quest for the North Pole
Today we were stopped just shy of the North Pole(~1000km) by the pack ice at 81 degrees 28 minutes 44.4 seconds North and 17 degrees 18 minutes 23 seconds East.
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| The ship way off in the distance |
Did a zodiac cruise among the loose pack ice. Later attended a water color workshop and made a birthday card for a new friend Douglas for his birthday. In the evening played bingo, which was actually very fun.
July 25: Friday
In the morning we visited Kinnavika research station built during the International Geophysical Year 1957-59 at Murchisonfjord on Nordaustland. There were many buildings and huts some in fairly good shape and some not.
research station built during the International Geophysical Year There were lots of buildings, some had had heating. It is still used.
In the afternoon, the waves were too high for a zodiac cruise, but we had polar bear sightings to compensate for that. It was a mother and cub way up on the mountainside. The mother sleeping and the cub roaming around.
The view from our camera.
and the view from the ship's GSS (Gyro-Stabilized System) camera directed to the Ship's bar screen and all cabin TVs.
July 26: Saturday
Another polar bear sighting, so no landing at Kapp Lee. This guy was easier to see and we tracked him over hill and dale till he went out of view and the ship moved on to our next port of call.
We instead landed further south, there was a very airy shack and further on a better shack, but there were nesting birds near it so it was out of bounds.
We had dinner that night with 2 of the expedition staff, Julie(bird nerd) and Jean (french rock guy) and the 2 older Norwegian ladies we had met before.
July 27: Sunday
The morning outing was a zodiac cruise at Samarinvagen, a secluded bay. We saw a seal, heard 2 calvings from the glacier Samarinbreen and had hot cocoa from a floating snack bar.
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| The only polar bear seen today |
The PM landing was at Gnalberget Peak at Gnalodden, South Svalbard. Thousands of birds nesting up on the cliffs. Saw a fox relaxing in the nook of a rock and saw a puffin on the way back to the boat. Later we passed the Polish Research station at Hornsund.
Cabin originally used by a trapper woman Wanny Woldstad in the 1930s. Still is use today by researchers from the Polish Research Station.
July 28: Monday
The morning outing was to Bamsebu (bear cabin) and a beach littered with bones of hundred belugas in Van Keulenfjorden part of South Spitsbergen National Park. We were able to look into but not go into this cabin. The protruding nails on the window were to deter polar bears.
During the afternoon landing we saw a heard of reindeer close up at Varsolbukta on the northern side of Bellsund.
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| Off in the distance is our polar bear spotter with flares and rifle |
Another shack.
Our trip was off the charts.
July 29: Tuesday
Our journey was at the end and we arrived back at Longyearbyrn.
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| Remains of the coal transport system seen all over the island. |
We had to vacate our cabins by 8AM and our luggage was moved off the boat, we loaded it onto the bus and we were taken to the airport. Our SAS SK4491 flight to Oslo was at 10:45 and it was an uneventful 3 hours. It was raining when we landed and after checking into the hotel (Radisson Blu Airport Hotel) located within walking distance of the airport. We decided to go into Oslo via the express train which was a 20 minute ride.
We walked around to do some last minute shopping for consumables and then had ramen for dinner at Koie Ramen Munch Brygge near the Munch museum.
July 30: Wednesday
The flight from Oslo to Frankfurt (UA 9095) was on time, 6:56AM to 9AM about 2 hours. Seats were in business accomplished by having the middle seat unoccupied.
Our flight UA 43 in business class from Frankfurt to Newark left about an hour late. The flight encountered some turbulence but was not too bad. We waited over an hour for our luggage to show up on the baggage carousel.
Appendix:
Very useful about the Spitsbergen Svalbard region here.
Link to Norwegian mappings of Svalbard here.
