The weather
situation seems to turn into a miracle! We had incredible good weather again today.
The sea is smooth like a mirror surrounded by scenic cliffs and mountains and
above all a blue sky with some clouds.
At 8.30 am
the Fram arrives to Illorsuit. Fortunately we could land because the sea ice
disappeared a few days ago and only a few relics of it's still floating in
the bay. The polar Circle Boats bring us ashore. It was a little bit quiet in the settlement as we have Sunday. Most of the people are still sleeping and some of our guests visits the tiny church. After 10.00 pm the village was more
crowded.
We enjoyed an
agreeable walk through the settlement, we could have a look into the church and proceed to the cemetery and into the hills in the vicinity of the
village.
At
lunchtime the Fram setted to sail to our next destination. But she stops short after because we saw a Bowhead Whale! The Bowhead
Whales are one of the most seldom whales and very endangered like Right Whales.
It is a great luck to be able to observe them on this trip. The presentations about
Glaciology and the History of Greenland were postponed too.
Soon after
we sailed our way to Upernavik. The sun was still brightly shining and the bay was full of icebergs. Therefore we decided to try an Ice Cruising, as we did not in the morning, because there weren't any big icebergs in the vicinity of
Illorsuit. This Ice cruising is very exciting, the boats drove close to
spectacular icebergs and the group finds a huge ice field of leftover sea ice from
the last winter. On the way back to the Fram they discovered a group of seals.
Nevertheless
we could not stayed there forever and finally we continued our way to Upernavik through
the still breath taking landscape.
Bowhead Whale in Svartenhuk (Sigguup nuua) bay nearby Illorsuit
Kayaking in Illorsuit in this wonderful sea and landscape
View of Illorsuit from the Heliport