We decided to sail along Herbert Island to the town of Qaanaaq, approx. 35 miles away. There was no wind, but quickly we got into a heavy fog covering the boat and ice bergs. It took two of us to stay on watch all the time to avoid any encounters with ice bergs the size of busses. Slowly the fog lifted and we pushed the engine a bit to get to Qaanaaq.
Our original plan was to travel up to Siorapaluk, the northernmost settlement in Greenland. But we decided that we would rather have more time in Qaanaaq to do community outreach and to prepare the boat for the next leg. And finally Tim feels that there is a fair chance to discover yet another northern salt marsh on the Harward Islands close to the Greenland Ice Sheet.  We hope to report on newly discovered salt marshes tomorrow.
Sailing to the Harwards Island might bring other adventures than northern salt marshes as hunters tell us this is the preferred area to hunt narwhal. Mattak – skin and blubber of the narwhal – is a treat eaten raw and the meat is cooked. Three different hunters told us to be careful in there – but we were not sure whether they were concerned with our safety travelling in icy waters or with us getting between whales and hunters.
So far we have not had much luck spotting whales, but sitting on the deck this afternoon we saw seals. They got up to breathe and sea gulls were following their every move, circulating in order to grab any leftover fish.
Qaanaaq lays on the side of range of low mountains offering the town little protection from wind and icebergs in the Inglefield Bredning. The city, which rests on a long, sandy beach, has 600 inhabitants and probably the same number of four-legged inhabitants. During the winter the dogs are used for hunting and fishing on the ice, but during the summer they sit and wait for the cold winter to return.
Realizing that we were late for Saturday shopping, we quickly got the zodiac in the water and set off for our mission: to get fuel and fresh water for the boat, and showers and laundry facilities for the crew.
The town is fairly small and the oil tanks are situated right in the center of everything, so we started there. But people on the beach told us that the Polar Oil tank was closed for the weekend.  We found the water station near the beach and filled up our 6 jugs for water stored on deck for extra supplies, but had to leave with empty gasoline jugs. Our skipper however found that we have enough diesel to take us to Harward Islands – and importantly enough back again.
Our next mission was to find showers and laundry. In Kullorsuaq we found a community house where they offered washing and laundry facilities, so we asked around for similar facilities here. There is one in Qaanaaq too, but that too is closed for the weekend.  Still with our hopes high, we tracked down the local guesthouse to find the facilities needed. But the landlord there explained that she had had guests staying for nights in a row and that here water tanks were almost empty.  We would have to come back after the weekend.
I settled for the last, but not the least refreshing solution. Sascha and I found a stream leading water directly from the glaciers above the town to the beach. We followed the stream up to a quiet place above the town, where I cold finally wash.
Back on the Arctic Tern, we sat on the deck, enjoying the warmth of the sun. Valentine decided to take the kayak into the icy waters. The kayak has travelled with the Arctic Tern all they way from St. Lawrence, Canada to Qaanaaq without being used, but now was the time to launch it. Valentine headed off in the afternoon sun.

Sascha Schiøtt is 25 years old and was born and raised in Qaqortoq, South Greenland. She has been interested in nature and wildlife since childhood, and has worked as a student at the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources in Nuuk. Here she helped with sampling data for several studies. This sparked her interest in Arctic biology and she is currently studying biology at the University of Aarhus, Denmark.
As a member of the voyage to the Last Ice Area, Sascha is helping with outreach and activities in town and settlements visited en route, including translations from English to Greenlandic and Danish.
I was born and raised in South Greenland, in a town called Qaqortoq, where the climate is with relatively mild with warm summer, temperatures of up to 20 C or more, and mild winters. Because we don’t get sea ice during the winter, there are no Huskies either. We actually also have a few introduced trees and flowers as well as cultivated farm land.
Coming from South Greenland and going up north onboard the Arctic Tern, has really impressed me, as I always get amazed at how big Greenland really is, and how diverse the nature in Greenland is. In fact some of the flowers we have seen during the trip, are flowers I haven’t seen before in my life, as some only grow in Northern Greenland. Since yesterday, we have seen a lot of little auks. They are mostly found in the high arctic, and I have never seen them in South Greenland.
What I hope to see here on this trip, are Narwhals and Belugas. They are really rare to see in south Greenland and I have actually never seen any, only what we can buy in the stores, which are sent from hunters from North Greenland. Not only are some of the animals and flowers different from what I know from growing up in South Greenland, but also the mountains seem different. The mountains here, gives me a feeling of how harsh the winters they have up here really are. The mountains up here seem to be more fragmented, as a result of glaciation and also from the frost heaving, where ice formation in small cracks in the stones makes them fall apart and therefore erode faster. This gives the mountains a more rough and fragmented look.
And it is amazing to think, that the sea is covered with sea ice during the winter and that the sun goes down for at least 3 months. All of this makes me amazed that people live this far up north, but I can also see how beautiful a place it is to grow up in and live in. Some day in the future, I would really like to experience the winter up here, experience the sea ice, the darkness and the cold. All of this makes me want this place to remain like this in the future, as these special conditions make it possible for some animals to survive and also is an important part of the big ocean and therefore the rest of the world. It is a shame to think that this might not be like it is today in the future.
 

Leaving Savissivik, we decided to head to our next stop right away as the wind wouldn’t leave us alone and the anchorage was not safe for a longer time. So after an hour stop, we kept going and were aiming for the North Star Bay and Pittufik/Thule Air Base. A little bit of wind, enough to set the sails and turn off the engine for a few hours, a few icebergs and here we are, actually sailing in good conditions for few hours. The crew enjoys the silence of a sailing boat, actually sailing. As the night passes, we go through our watches. The crew does 3 hours watch and the guests do 2 hours watch, everyone has to wake up in the middle of the night at some point!
By late morning, we are close to the Thule Air Base. We call them and ask for permission to come around: all right, we can anchor around the old settlement of Qaanaaq at the foot of Mount Dundas, but no permission to dock at the actual Base. Fair enough, the anchoring spot looks very nice and very well protected. So… it could be a full night for everyone. Maybe…. It always depends on the weather, the quality of the anchorage, and our obligations for the next days.

All happy and well fed by the beginning of the afternoon, we head on shore for a walk. Getting up the hill is kind of hard after several days on board! It feels a bit weird, but very nice. We climbed Mount Dundas, where a small and steep path with lots of rocks and scree and a bit of climbing with ropes challenged us. Very amazing landscape from the top, 220 meters above sea level: one side on Thule Air Base, the other way on icebergs, a glacier and offshore. A 360 degree landscape – every minute we all think that we are quite lucky to be here!
The Thule Air Base is a very important place for Greenland as far as history is concerned. There was a settlement here called Qaanaaq until 1953 and the Americans came during the cold war and requested the land to establish a military base. That is how 117 people “were invited” to go and live somewhere else. So the settlement was abandoned and you can see today that the old settlement houses are still there, quite in good shape actually. From the sea, we could see the American Air Base, it does look bigger than expected, and seems to be in a very good area — flat, close to the ice cap and protected.

Dr. Tim Dowson joined the Sailing to Siku expedition to research salt marsh development in high latitude Greenland, in the Disko Bugt area. Salt marshes are important archives of information on changes in relative sea level from the Holocene period, as a result of their position at the interface between land and sea, their development controlled by biological, marine and climatic factors. Read full bio here.
Looking at the detailed maps available, I thought I had found an area close to our planned route north where there was a good chance of finding a salt marsh. I was optimistic although no marshes have been reported this far north, as I had seen some salt marsh plants at Tasiusaq where we spent our third night.  So as it was warm enough for a marsh to grow, it was just a question of protection from large waves and ice damage.
Reaching the area took extra time, including a slow crossing of the aptly-named Giesecke Ice fiord, where the question was constantly which ice floes were safe to bump into – OK if the size of a vacuum cleaner, preferably not those the size of a fridge.  But when we reached the site, all we found we found was a small round bay with a few small bergs bobbing about, enough to destroy any marsh starting to form.   But at least I saw some more of the grass-like plants that I wanted, in the splash zone above the high tide line.  A bit disappointed, under thickening cloud on our way on to a potential mooring point for the night, I had a 2-second glimpse through a crack in the edge of an island of just what I was after – plants below the high tide line.  In less than an hour, with the help of Mette and Valentine, I had a few samples from the most important zones of this new marsh, each one ‘leveled’ to give a position in relation to the today’s sea level – crucial to interpreting the lab findings when I am back at Durham University.

Dr. Tim Dowson joined the Sailing to Siku expedition to research salt marsh development in high latitude Greenland, in the Disko Bugt area. Salt marshes are important archives of information on changes in relative sea level from the Holocene period, as a result of their position at the interface between land and sea, their development controlled by biological, marine and climatic factors. Read full bio here.
I am now on the last leg of my own journey to meet the Arctic Tern at Upernavik, some 200 km north of here. I had a chance to have a look at the coast near to the airport here at Ilulissat yesterday, and while there are lots of salt marsh plants to be found in small clumps, there is little genuine salt marsh as such. This is a ‘high energy’ coastline, both because of the ‘fetch’ – Disko Bay and Baffin Bay beyond it meaning large storms, or even just waves, can batter the coast – and also the hundreds icebergs, large and small, that make Ilulissat so special, can erode away any salt marsh that starts to form, or when rolling over can send big waves which can do the same. So what I’ve found is really ‘splash marsh’ rather than salt marsh proper. I hope to have a chance to look in another, more sheltered bay slightly further away shortly, before my plane leaves – anything I find here will be a bonus but will help build a picture of how sea level has varied in West Greenland over the recent centuries. I’m really excited by this chance to extend our sea level research further north up the coast – as well as to the journey, places and people I will meet, in their own right.
I was told yesterday that it was the first day of autumn here – the weather a bit cooler, with some cold rain at midnight, and fog preventing planes from flying. Certainly a contrast to the 2 weeks of hot weather I had recently further west in Disko Bay, a stark contrast to the torrential rain that stranded my wife across the city from our home in Newcastle, England recently. Unseasonable weather in both places, with the loss of a major bridge at Kangerlussuaq, an important airline hub in Greenland, not because of heavy rain but through hot weather meaning more ice sheet melting has taken place than normal, and the river filling up much more than in the past. These events strike an ominous chord alongside a scientific report I have heard about this morning apparently predicting the loss of all summer ice in just 4 years. This will have dire consequences for local people, wildlife, and also for the world in general.

Finally the day has come for kicking off the first leg of Sailing to Siku – our voyage to the Last Ice Area.
The crew for the first leg – nature photographer Thorsten Milse, researcher Tim Dowson, biology student and interpreter Sascha Schioett and myself, Greenland Policy Officer with WWF Denmark, travelled to Upernavik, Greenland for our first meeting with the Arctic Tern and its crew, already onboard.
Sunny and calm weather with temperatures around 8 C gave us a very pleasant introduction to Upernavik.  From the airstrip overshadowing the town from the island’s central hilltop, we saw the harbor and the Arctic Tern, our home for the next 16 days.
With all our gear onboard Grant, Pascale and Valentine, the Students on Ice boat crew, gave us an introduction to life onboard a sailing boat – how to deal with a ‘man overboard’ emergency, how to fight a fire onboard and or to evacuate the boat if necessary. More importantly we learned that life on board the Arctic Tern includes good coffee and snacks and that a very nice dinner can be prepared with Greenland Halibut, a tad of white wine, a few fresh carrots and potatoes and lots of spices.
We discussed the days ahead and decided to start with only 3 miles on the first day, taking us to the north-east shore of  Upernavik island. Here Tim had was excited to have identified an inlet containing a salt marsh, early this morning – with the help of the midnight sun.

Since our arrival in this country, we’ve discovered a new culture and a new language – because few people speak English, we’ve learned some useful words, like how to say hello and thank you in Greenlandic. I practice my ‘thank you’ whenever it is needed: qujanaq, pronounced ‘Kru-Ya-Nak’. Half the time, it makes the locals laugh out loud! But I don’t despair. We always make ourselves understood for the important things (fueling, getting water, finding a grocery store, shower, etc..). People here are very friendly and smiling, and the assistance is appreciated in these isolated villages halfway around the world. Everyone takes the time to answer our questions in half-English, half-Greenlandic, half-sign language.
The biggest challenge for the crew takes place at the supermarket: stalls full of meat and fish all look equally delicious. Fishing is an important part of the country’s economy. The only problem: we have no idea what’s what! ‘Allatooq’, ‘eqaluk pujuugaq’ or ‘Tuttu’, the choice is yours! (based on our understanding, those translate to ‘seal’, ‘Muskox’ and the name of a delicious smoked fish that still eludes us to date). The crew is divided: Pascale has a soft spot for seal meat, Grant and I definitely vote for muskox. Note also that it is very easy to find whale on the menu here.
We return to the boat, get a few hours of sleep and it’s off to the north via the east side of Disko Island. A superb second day with full sun and a slalom between the icebergs. The coast of Disko Island is beautiful, we see even the Greenland ice cap. Heading out of the bay, we have a small setback: head wind and fog. So we make a last stop before Upernavik, in Arfertuassuk, a fjord that offers a quiet shelter for the night.

The next day we decide to circle Disko Island to the east to see the mythical Ilulissat glacier. It’s the source of nearly 10% of Greenland’s icebergs, and is often considered one of the most productive in the northern hemisphere. We are not disappointed.
The villaqe of Ilulissat is already active, with many people in the streets (in proportion to the village’s size, of course!). A few stores open (even though today is Sunday), and a few restaurants. It is after all the third largest municipality in the area, with about 4,500 inhabitants.
Our captain is already here. He guides us for a short hike (the crew was initially divided on which direction to follow – women on one side and Grant on the other – the reader will have to guess who won) and we finally made it to the Jakobhavn glacier and an unforgettable view! Icebergs, bergy bits, small ice cubes, whites, blue, transparencies and so on, an ice field so compact, no doubt, this is the right place!