Re: Friday 20th July: fog, sun and walrus
Awelina of Sweden
James Collier
Sat 21 Jul 2012 01:31
Hannah woke up first and thought the world had ended: no sounds of engine, windlass, sailing, breakfast etc. which is what she usually wakes up to. Actually she just woke up first, but it was 11 am!
Thick fog, but after Hannah's excellent coffee (beginner's luck we feel) we set off with radar and GPS and fog horn. We had intended to walk around Yttre Norskoyane but decided that thick fog was not propitious. After a couple of miles it lifted, and once in Smeerenbergfjord it cleared completely and we had a perfect sunny day (it's now 3am, and it's still a cloudless sunny day).
We ran under jib to Magdalenefjord, the most photographed in Svalbard apparently, and it is magnificent. We had lots of ice in the water, carved into weird shapes which we sailed through. A lone boat from Belgium was here in the anchorage when we arrived, but now there are 4 boats. On the way the only thing which went wrong was the roller reefing which jammed, but James and Peter soon fixed it.
We rowed ashore and were immediately attacked by a cross tern, which pecked our heads and sh*t on James, but shortly after we were welcomed by the Sysselmann's representative, André. He invited us back to his hut for coffee, but we were stir crazy and needed a walk. So instead he lent us his hi-tech telescope and told us where to look for Walruses.
We had a great walk to a glacier, and waited ages while it cracked and thundered but were disappointed not to see any large lumps fall into the sea. Peter tried his first steps on a glacier - the more experienced of us hung back and drank whisky from James' hip flask. Peter got covered in mud and came back complaining that it was all muddy and big rocks sank underneath him (yes, that's why we hung back!). We then turned round, but spotted walrus hauled out on the beach opposite across the fjord. 10 of them, complete with tusks - exactly like in the photographs! There were also arctic skuas and barnacle geese on the beach. Apparently a bear was here yesterday, but we didn't spot it.
When we went to return the telescope the two staff from the sysselman's office came out and had a long chat despite it being well after midnight by now. There are two of them posted here for the summer: one is a full-time career policeman and one a temporary employee. The temporary one is a biology graduate from Tromso and asks if there are jobs in Cambridge. They gave us some fruit since they had a surplus: apparently cruise ships leave them presents, and the last one left them two crates of exotic fruit! They warned us that a Hurtigruten cruise ship is expected at 8am tomorrow, but on current form we will still be snoring long after it's come and gone. Nonetheless the polar-bear is placed strategically in the rigging, complete with sun glasses and bobble hat, to ward off the zombies.