Northern Lights is a spectacular phenomenon, can defenetly be spotted above the 60:th latitude but the lights become more and more beautiful the more north you go.This picture was taken in Umeå, at the 64:th latitude.
Let's trace back the path taken:Jan. 25, 2004 - Disembarked Explorer II in Ushuaia. Flew to Buenos Aires (3 hours).Jan. 25 - 27 - Spent 2 nights in BA exploring its wonders. Had a great time shopping, eating & enjoying 2 nts of tango shows. It was extremely hot ... 34 deg. C!!! Imagine going from Antarctica to this heat!Met up with Nestor (nefi) & Eveline & Gaston.Jan. 27, 2004 - Flew to Miami & then Houston. 8 hrs flight to Miami. Layover was long. Jan. 28, 2004 - Flew (2.5 hrs) to Houston. Explore Houston on foot for about 7 hrs or so. Left Houston for Los Angeles. Another 2.5 hrs. Arrived in Los Angeles around midnight.Jan. 29, 2004 - Left L.A. early morning (8 am flight) to Anchorage, Alaska via Seattle on Alaska Air. Total flight time, about 6 hrs. 1 hr layover in Seattle. Arrived Anchorage around 3 pm. Head for city center & explore for a few hours (& a great adventure, will...
Polar-Circle-Baptism---------------------------------------------------------------------- This is a wonderful way to smell like old fish.They baptize all crew-members crossing the ARCTIC CERCLE for the first time with a smelly sauce of old fish and plenty of other bad things. - Smells great for several days ! Better have your 'Polar Certificate' ready, when working on a new cruise-ship - it might prevent another baptism !
Send a postcard to all your friends, collecting stamps! - They will certainly enjoy this special Postage-stamp!-------------------------------------------------------------------- Longyearbyen is the northernmost postoffice in the world at 78* 12' 28''altitude
It was one of my best days in The arctic, at Svalbard / Spitzbergen, when the cruiseship M/S Vistafjord ran aground inside of Kongsfjord--------------------------------------------------------------------- I made plenty of pics of this very special day out in the wilderness of the lonely fjord & the rescue of our shipYou may see it on my EUROPE > SVALBARD > Sitzbergen-pagehttp://www.virtualtourist.com/m/1ffe4/b3f3d/
ClimateThe entire region receives continuous sunlight during the summer for more than 1 day. Conversely, winter visitors will experience long, cold periods of darkness and twilight. The southern part of the Arctic Circle is in a sub-arctic climate zone. Precipitation is low, averaging only 12-18 inches in the west and 8-12 inches in the east part. Snow falls 8 or 9 months out of the year, averaging 60-80 inches a year.
In Alaska, everything was unexpected - everything was memorable, except maybe Anchorage. I'm Swiss: mine is a tiny country, and for this reason everything is very close-by. Wherever you look there's a house, a car, a lake, a mountain... something. In Alaska, especially up north, there was nothing... one could look around and see endless open spaces for miles and miles... that's my fondest memory: the silence, the fresh unpolluted air, the nothingness of everything. Many... but the most special one is the Gates of the Arctic National Park... dramatic isolated mountains in the middle of nowhere... I have rarely ever seen such majestic mountains
People call Tromso in 2 different ways: the "Gate of the Arctic" and the "Paris of the North". While the first definition seemed obvious to me, I did not understand the reason of the second until i got there. No, it doesn't look like Paris at all - no imposing buindings, no fancy boutiques - but hey, so much life! People (not tourists!) crowd the streets day and night, there's plenty of pubs, clubs, discos, performers... everything. I was meant to stop for a night only on my way to the North Cape and I found myself stuck there for ages, eventually missing the Cape and with no regrets. I found so much to see and do, and I met such lovely people, that continuing up north was no longer a priority or something desirable . The Polaria exhibition - really good, and then the Arctic Cathedral, the Polar Museum, the buzzing High Street, the Harbour and its own buildings, and the absolutely...
The Lofoten are a group of islands in Northren Norway. Their economy is based on tourism in summer and on cod (stockfish) in winter. I went in summer, after having seen wonderful photos at a friend's home. They are just so dramatic: peaks are high, rugged and rocky, steep, barren, grey -little grows on them, other than saxyphrage and the occasional patch of green grass. Where the mountains finish, the sea starts, abruptly, unexpected. The waters are crystal clear and painted in all possible hues of blue and green, interrupted only by the occasional deserted beaches or coves, of immaculate white sand. Beaches like one would not expect to see here... beaches that would look appropriate in the tropics only. the houses. Often people could find no appropriate ground and had to settle for the rocky shores, building their red Rorbus on precarious stilts, like the racks where they used to hang...
Tuktoyaktuk is an Inuvialut hamlet (about 1500 inhabitants) on the shores of the Arctic Ocean. More specifically it's in Kugmallit Bay in the Beaufort Sea, east of the Mackenzie Delta. There's no road to there but there are scheduled flights in summer (Aklak Airlines) while in winter people use the iced river as a road and drive to Inuvik. Tuktoyaktuk is somewhat famous for a strange geological phenomenon: the pingos, which are ice-cored hills scattered everywhere in the area. One more piece of info: the name Tuktoyaktuk means “Resembling a Caribou”. the Community Underground Fridge (basically a hole dug into the permafrost), the strange ice-core hills named Pingos, the bay for Whalewatching, the Artists' Homes, and the church with sealskin decoration: really cute.
Reviews and photos of Arctic attractions posted by real travelers and locals. The best tips for Arctic sightseeing.
Q: I suddenly mused that it might/should be more interesting to check out the Canadian North, the Inuits etc instead of checking out...
A: Sheherezad, I think “Into the Northwest Passage” tour is definitely unique and is the kind of tour that you’d remember for the rest of your life. I’d say, go for...
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