Chapter 2: Sights and Sounds

This post was written on the 1st full day of our Svalbard Expedition…

Today was even better than the first day. Partially due to jet lag, and partially due to the amazing unique things we are seeing and doing, it’s hard to know which day is which. The Arctic is teeming with life. When you look outside our boat, in any direction, you’ll see some type of life—usually birds. But we also saw several reindeer today, both near and far, and two separate pods of minke whales, and we had amazing close encounters with seals.

Looking back toward the ship and our group

I felt some apprehension during our first landing in the morning. It would be our first time going ashore on Svalbard outside of Longyearbyen, and there are polar bears wandering around… Martin, our captain, and Heidi and Freddy, our first and second mates, dropped the zodiacs into the water after breakfast. After Phil and Marcelo, our two guides, checked the coast for any sign of polar bears, we boarded and headed to shore. It was great to walk around. There was no sign of any polar bears… except for the damage to one of the historical huts and the paw prints on the door. Apparently a polar bear had been “playing” with the wooden wall of one of the huts. It was slightly ominous. We also got to see a mating pair of long-tailed ducks as well as a pectoral sandpiper. It was our first close encounter with the Svalbard wildlife.

But the highlight definitely came in the afternoon. We moved to a smaller glacial bay in the afternoon and dropped anchor. With a magnificent glacier as a backdrop, the water was completely littered with ice floes. We got in our zodiacs for a cruise and were transported to a different world. Drifting slowly through the ice, no one saying a word, all we could hear were the sounds of popping and clicking. Our guides deftly guided the zodiacs around the larger icebergs, and we even touched some of the smaller bergy bits and growlers. It was peaceful, and yet utterly active. We passed a social group of black-legged kittiwakes perched on a glacier. These birds wait for the glacier to calve and then pounce on the shocked fish below. We witnessed the enormous glacier behind us calve multiple times, in complete awe.

And then we spotted the bearded seals. Slowly, silently, we glided towards them, one by one. They each were resting atop shallow domed icebergs, resting in the cool air. Twenty yards, ten yards, fifteen feet… we kept inching closer. Our guides were shocked the seals weren’t spooked by our presence; normally they leap off the iceberg back into the sea at any sign of danger. Curious, they regarded us warily from their ice perch as we gaped in stunned silence. It was incredible to spend nearly any hour so close to these creatures. It was the epitome of up close and personal.

Up close and personal with a bearded seal

It was our first time seeing bearded seals, or kittiwakes, or drifting through the ice like that. No one wanted to return to the ship. For the second day in a row, we experienced a different realm. The Arctic’s wildlife and environment captivated and captured us. It was plain to understand: we are a part of this magnificent Earth, one component of a magical planetary phenomenon. We are not the masters of it, but participants. It’s all so clear, if one can simply take in the myriad of sights and sounds.