This summer we were able to cross another item off our bucket-list. We went on an expedition cruise around the island of Spitsbergen. With a suitcase full of winter clothing, we left a scorching hot Italy for an adventure in the Arctic.
The trip we booked was the Circumnavigation Spitsbergen – In the Realm of the Polar Bear of Hurtigruten. This is a 10-day expedition cruise around Spitsbergen, the largest island in the Svalbard archipelago. From Oslo, we would fly to Longyearbyen where we would embark on the MS Fram to then sail around Spitsbergen.
Travel overview on the Hurtigruten website.
Where exactly is Svalbard?
Svalbard is an archipelago in the Arctic Ocean, some 565 km north of Norway and less than 1,000 km from the North Pole, consisting of several larger and dozens of smaller islands. It has been part of the Kingdom of Norway with a special status since 1920. That means Svalbard has its own administration and anyone can come and work there without visas. Even though the Oslo – Longyearbyen flight, the only city on Svalbard, is a Norwegian domestic flight, there is strict passport control because Svalbard is not part of Schengen. Svalbard covers an area of 61,045 km², but only 3,000 to 4,000 people live there, depending on the season, about half of them in Longyearbyen.
What is an expedition cruise?
The difference between a Hurtigruten expedition cruise and a regular cruise in, say, the Mediterranean is that on an expedition cruise you don’t have a fixed itinerary. You never know in advance exactly where and when you will be in a particular location and whether you will be able to go ashore. A Plan A is drawn by the expedition leader and captain, but depending on the weather, nature, and the unpredictability of the Arctic, it may well turn into Plan B, C, D, or E.
You embark on an expedition cruise to experience and enjoy the outdoors. Therefore, no entertainment is offered on these voyages as is usually the case on cruise ships. There is no life music, no theater, no pub quiz, and no kids club. Lectures will be given by members of the expedition team on Svalbard history, polar bears, bird migration, whales, and climate change, among other topics. Outside on deck, you can watch birds with the ornithologist, spot whales and dolphins with the marine biologist, or learn to recognise and name clouds. The last event was unfortunately thwarted twice by the dense fog that suddenly appeared.
The language of communication on board is English, and a good knowledge of the English language is required to be able to follow the lectures. The German guests could use headphones to listen to the translation by the translator who was on board especially for them.
Fram! Forward!
Through the app Vessel Finder, we had followed the two cruises of the MS Fram that left before us with great interest. Several circumnavigations around Spitsbergen were also scheduled for the ship MS Spitsbergen. I had spent many hours studying both ships, average temperatures, ice thickness and weather before we chose to sail on the MS Fram on June 25. By leaving on this date, I believed we had the best chance of completing the circumnavigation.
We chose the MS Fram because her construction makes her the more suitable ship of the two for polar waters. Besides, we just had to choose Fram after visiting the original Fram at the museum in Oslo last year. Fram (“Forward”) is the ship that was used by famous Norwegian explorers Fridtjof Nansen, Otto Sverdrup, Oscar Wisting and Roald Amundsen on expeditions in the Arctic and Antarctic between 1893 and 1912.
Go with the flow
Having followed the June voyages of the Hurtigruten ships in Svalbard, we knew that ice conditions had prevented them from completing the circumnavigation of Spitsbergen. Both ships had remained along the west coast. Through the Hurtigruten Insiders Facebook group, we read messages from disappointed passengers, but there were also positive accounts of polar bears and other wildlife. It is a trip to the Arctic and nature is unpredictable. The weather can be miserable and the wildlife may not be where you have the opportunity to see it during your cruise. Of course, we did hope that the ice conditions would improve and we would have the best trip possible.
Even before we left home, the program changed and we decided to adopt a “go with the flow” attitude to enjoy everything as much as possible and guard against any disappointments.
The trip we booked with Hurtigruten already included the Oslo – Longyearbyen flight and we would spend the first night in a hotel in Longyearbyen. So it was with great disappointment that we received an email informing us that due to unforeseen circumstances we would not be spending our first night in Longyearbyen, but in a hotel near the airport in Oslo. To ensure we would not miss the flight to the Arctic, we had planned our arrival a day earlier. So now we had two nights at Gardermoen Airport Oslo and would missed our free morning in Longyearbyen. But we would unexpectedly make up for that at the end of the trip because our flight from Longyearbyen was delayed a day due to strong winds.
