Svalbard
First: Svalbard is great and everyone should visit! Beautiful place and a very different part of the world.
Nice casual start to the morning. I was up at 8, had breakfast then headed off to the bus stop to go to the airport. I got the local bus this time which was much cheaper than the airport express.
Wandered around the Tromso airport which was super busy when I arrived but then absolutely dead. There were probably only 50 people on the plane to Svalbard.
I sat at the window in the airport to get the last bit of light that I would see for a few days. As the plane made its way further north you could see the light disappearing over the horizon. By the time we arrived at the Longyearbyen airport it was about 2pm and pitch black.
I'm staying at a hostel called Gjesthuset 102 which used to be coal miner accommodations in the early 1900s. It's a pretty nice hostel but it is unfortunately about 2.2km from town so it means a good 30-40minute walk to get into civilisation. It's very affordable though and if all you really care about is being picked up by tour operators then it's perfectly fine.
I'm sharing a room with a Canadian guy and an Italian lady who are both very nice. The Canadian guy is studying in Poland at the moment so I recommended Eataway to him as something to investigate. Nice to have a good recommendation for someone!
I wandered down into town and made it just in time for the lighting of the town Christmas tree. That's the second one of these ceremonies I've made now. RIght place right time I guess. When I got there a couple of hundred people were holding hands, singing and running in a circle around the Christmas tree gathering enough energy to light it. Unfortunately they were having some technical difficulties so after trying to light the tree 3 times everyone gave up. Santa came out and all the kids lined up to get their presents and the Christmas lights unceremoniously came on while they were all paying attention to something else. Was funny.
Everyone seemed to be having a good time but again there was no public alcohol consumption. Even the mulled wine was non-alcoholic! Silly country. Interestingly a lot of people were wearing reflective gear which makes sense here where it's full dark for 6 months of the year.
I love this dashboard that's outside a few places and shows a countdown for when the sun will reappear. There are 2 dashboards I found out later. One counts days til the light can be seen over the horizon and the other counts days til the sun actually hits Longyearbyen. There's about a 20 day difference between those 2 dates!
Looked around town for a while then trudged my way back up the hill to the hostel where I had dinner and met a few other people. Went out for drinks at the Coal Miner's Bar & Grill across the road from the hostel and was joined by some of the others after an hour or so.
Interestingly I got to watch the bartender turn a few people away from the bar. Booze is really cheap here compared to the rest of Norway because it's a tax free zone. So beers that would cost 180kr in a bar / 50kr in a supermarket on the mainland cost 60kr / 15kr respectively up here. Wine and spirits are the same. So given how cheap it is to get drunk apparently a few of the local construction workers have been getting smashed and the turning up to work still drunk or hungover. Which is dangerous on a construction site in the dark. So the boss had had meetings with these guys then gone around to all the bars in town and said they weren't allowed to buy booze there anymore! How embarrassment.
Monday morning I got picked up for my first activity ... Dog sledding! I'd been really looking forward to this and it was great fun. It wasn't exactly what I was expecting but it was still great.
I chose to go with a company called Svalbard Husky. It's a smaller company and was like $3AUD more expensive than the bigger one which everyone seems to go with. But for the sake of a couple of bucks I would prefer to support a smaller operation. Luckily for me I was the only person on the tour that day so I got a bit better experience than others might have I think.
So the guy picked me up in his van (free candy!) and took me down to their office to sign the disclaimer and get kitted up in gear. I had taken all my own stuff down but he suggested I wear their stuff and I'm glad I did. The snow was up to my knees at times and my boots would have been full of snow. It would have been OK but their gear was just designed for the activity I was doing. So I put on my snow suit onesie, big boots, hat and mittens then we headed about 10 minutes out of town to the kennel.
What a reception! They have just under 100 dogs and they all went berserk with excitement when the van drove up! All the adult dogs have their own kennel and are chained to a pole so they can't run away or go pick a fight with another dog across the way. And they are separated into male and female sections so breeding can be controlled.
This is where the first of my expectations were wrong. I kind of expected to see a bunch of purebred huskies but these dogs are all over the shop. The guy explained to me that they don't use purebreds because none of the purebreds are ideal for sledding. Instead they have been selectively breeding across a few varieties of arctic dogs for the right characteristics. Friendliness, a good coat, big paws and various other things. So what that means is that all the dogs look different which is interesting. Some are closer to pure Huskies, others look like German shepherds, some look like they could be wolves and others are unique snowflakes. And the males are definitely much larger than the females on average.
Regardless they are so friendly! My first job was to go and say hello to as many of the dogs as I could! So I headed to the closest section and they all went berserk! Running in circles, barking and straining at their chains to get close to me. I'd say 95% of the dogs were up on their hind legs stretching for a hug as soon as I was within a metre or two of them. They were all so beautiful and friendly! Sloppy kisses and hugs ... It was amazing. Who would ever want a cat? A few of the dogs weren't interested in any attention so I moved onto the ones who were. I probably got to say hello to 75% of the dogs before I had to go help with hitching up the sled.
I had to share a sled with the guide but that was fine. Meant I could drive as much as I want and rest when I was tired. It also meant we took 2 more dogs than they would normally take which meant we could go a bit faster.
My guide is actually a professional dog sled racer as well. Who knew that was a thing?! He's been doing it on the mainland for a few years now and has decided to do a season or two up on Svalbard for something different.
So the guys hitched up the first dog to show me how to do it then I had to help with the rest. The excitement when the dogs saw me coming over with the harness was awesome! These guys really love to pull those sleds!
The process of hooking them up is as follows:
1. Grab their collar, stick them between your legs and grip with your knees then unhook them from the chain.
2. Stick the harness over their head then thread the front paws through it so it sits over their chest.
3. Grab the harness then lift the dog so it's walking on its hind legs. They call this "2 wheel drive" because the dog just jumps with eagerness but with not enough power to break away. If you leave them on 4 legs ("4 wheel drive") they can just take off and leave you on the ground or break your grip.
4. Go to the sled then chain the front then back of the harness to the guide ropes linked to the sled.
5. Go get another dog!
Sounds easy but they are wiggling and jumping and trying to get away the whole time. It was fun hooking them up though some of the dogs were huge and I'm glad I weigh as much as I do! Apparently some small Chinese girl last week was given a big dog to harness and he just took off with her still holding onto him. Dragged her for a few minutes until the trainers caught up. At least she held on!
One thing to note is that the guides all have to carry rifles, flashbangs and flare guns here because it's a polar bear zone. Not that we'd be able to see it until it was on top of us but it's a safety thing. While I was in town apparently they had a polar bear wander around the university and they had to chase it off with a helicopter. It came back again the next day. I didn't see it unfortunately but the danger is real!
Anyway - onto the sled. I got a crash course in driving and was a passenger for the first few minutes until we got across some roads but then it was my turn.
It was really fun! It's quite physical as you're leaning left and right to control the turns and you have to run behind to push the sled or stand on it and "kick" the snow to add some momentum. It's pretty tiring after a while as it's not easy doing this shit in fluffy snow ... It's like running up stairs because you've got to make sure you lift your feet out of the snow.
And this is where my second expectation was wrong. I expected the dogs to be yelping and barking and excited as they ran at full speed! This is not the case. The dogs were actually really quiet while pulling the sled and you don't want them running at full speed. They are trotters. They can trot for hours pulling the sled but they don't do it at high speeds for very long.
Going out into the full darkness of the Advent valley where you can't see the lights of the town was just amazing. Your eyes quickly adjust and you can make out a significant amount of the landscape and it's just eerily beautiful. There's only the sound of the sled on the snow, the wind, the dogs panting, me breathing hard as I try to keep up with the dogs and the snow crackling as the temperature changes slightly. Fantastic.
One of the dogs was pretty randy and he kept trying to jump the female dog next to him while we were running which was funny. Guide had to keep shouting at him to get him to stop. And it was very amusing seeing the dogs take a shit while still keeping up with the rest of the group. Skills! Although one of the dogs cannot multitask and brought the whole sled to a stop while she shit because she can't do it while running! A training opportunity perhaps.
I did have a rest after about 30 minutes because it was pretty hard work for me but I'm definitely a bit fitter now than I was at the start of the trip. Once we got up the top and turned around to come back we switched back and I drove the whole way back to the camp which was excellent. I only tipped the sled over twice which I was quite happy with! You've really gotta manhandle the sled sometimes with your body weight to keep it on the right path and I wasn't paying attention a couple of times.
After we got back and unharnessed the dogs I got to go play with the latest batch of puppies! There were 4 of them and they were about 3 months old and they were gorgeous! 3 of them were just jumping all over us as soon as we got into their cage and they had a great time wrestling with us. The last one was a bit shy and would only come out when you weren't paying attention to him. If you patted him he would immediately run back into the kennel then come back out a little later and see what was going on. Very cute puppies and named after a McDonald's theme as they were up to the letter M. So there was a McFlurry, a McNugget and I forget the other two. I was too busy cuddling them to take any photos of us wrestling.
After a while we got back in the van, went back to pick up my stuff and he dropped me off back at the hostel.
It was a great day and I'm considering doing dogsledding again before I leave.
I had another walk around town later, ducked into the local library and took some photos for Amy then bought some food and went back up to the hostel. I think I would pay the extra money and stay in town next time. If you want to go into town once per day it's at least an hour's worth of time to do so between walking there and back. The walk isn't difficult (slightly uphill the whole way back) but it's just tedious.
Tuesday I got picked up for my second activity ... Snowmobile!
Same basic process to start. Picked up, taken to the office to gear up then driven out to the starting point. I wasn't alone this time sadly but I got my own snowmobile of course.
There was a Danish couple of the tour as well but she decided to be a passenger only which meant we had 3 snowmobiles.
This was fun as well but definitely not as much to it as the dog sledding. You get on the snowmobile which is fairly idiot proof at the speeds you're allowed to go. I think the max we got to was 50km/h but I wanted to go a lot faster. It felt so much slower than the go karts in Tokyo and they were going basically the same speed.
We followed the same defined path as every other snowmobile tour which was a bit disappointing but you can't see much so it's not a huge issue. The main problem with it was that we were constantly driving over other people's tracks which sort of made it annoying to steer at times because the skis were caught in the other tracks if they were deep. Any time I was able to get onto fresh snow was much better and easier to steer.
We stopped at a thing they call a "Pingu" which is basically a mountain that's formed by fresh water under the surface pushing up the land. They last a couple of thousand years then the water finds another way out and starts to do the same thing elsewhere.
At the halfway point we stopped for a cuppa tea and a biccy. Instead of tea though I had this Norwegian berry syrup stuff which was delicious. It's basically really thick cordial and you mix it with hot water and it makes a very sweet and delicious warm fruit drink. I intended to buy some to bring back but totally forgot about it.
Overall the snowmobiling was good fun but like the gokarting it really felt limited by the speed you were allowed to go. Would have been much more fun with some higher speeds .
And unlike the dog sledding where you start to see the landscape after a while the use of headlights on the snowmobiles totally kills your night vision so in the dark season this is really about driving a snowmobile rather than sightseeing.
So it was fun but probably not something I would do again in dark season.
After the tour I didn't get a ride back to the hostel but instead stayed in town and had a walk around the sections I hadn't been to. I went down to the "beach" and checked out all the shops. And slipped on some ice and fell on my knees which hurt a lot. I'm glad I bought a headlamp in Poland because it turned out to be really useful here.
I spent an hour or so speaking to one of the local ingress players who owned it. Really nice guy who was born and bred on the island which was quite unusual! Nearly everyone else I've spoken to has moved here from somewhere else.
I trundled off back to the hostel eventually and went for another couple of beers at the bar across the road.
My roommates vacated the room today and I was lucky enough to have the room to myself for the rest of my stay. If only I could have made a double out of the beds!
On Wednesday I was supposed to be going on a hike to an ice cave on the Lars glacier. But I woke up with an extremely sort left foot. I could barely walk around the hostel and I just didn't think I could commit to a 5 hour hike up a glacier so I pulled out. Very disappointing.
So I just stayed in the hostel all day and rested my foot. I periodically went outside and stuck it in the snow to try and get the swelling to go down and did a bunch of stretching and working the muscles to loosen them up a bit. The stretching seemed to help so I'm thinking I had a case of Achilles tendonitis or maybe bursitis.
I was supposed to be catching up with the Ingress player for a beer tonight but I had to postpone as I really didn't want to make the 40 minute walk into town and back.
Late in the evening I decided the foot was well enough and I booked the same hike again for the next morning.
Woke up Thursday and the foot was still pretty sore. Fuck! So I breakfasted, showered, stretched and the foot turned out to be OK for the hike.
So I got picked up, driven 100 metres to the start point (/eye roll) and then we started the hike. There was an older Danish couple on the tour with me which was both annoying and a blessing. Annoying because we went a bit slower than expected because the lady wasn't very fit but a blessing because I got to rest a lot and felt pretty fresh the entire trip.
The guide had a beautiful dog called Bris (breeze in Norwegian) who joined us for the trip. Used to be a sled dog but is now just a pet.
So we hiked up the hill then the glacier for about 90 minutes and went into the ice cave. It was pretty awesome. The cave is created from glacier meltwater and other than some ropes is completely natural. It's not sculpted by the guides or anything.
It's slightly warmer in the cave than outside. There's a huge variety of ice in the cave from beautifully smooth layered walls, to small stalactites, to ice roses and whatever else you can think of. Probably my favourite bit was a big teardrop shaped bit of ice with no air bubbles that was so clear you could see all the rocks caught in it.
We were able to go about 100m into the cave before it because very narrow and you'd have to crawl to get any further. We had a snack and some hot drinks then headed back down the hill to the car.
A really nice experience.
I showered and chilled out for a while back at the hostel then went for a big walk around the parts of town I hadn't explored before meeting up with Haakon (local ingress player) for a couple of drinks.
I tried to go get some food at a place called Huset which another guy at the hostel had recommended but I was too early for their kitchen so I ended up eating at the place we had drinks. I had smoked minkie whale for starter and a moose burger for main which was both pretty good. The whale was again a subtler flavour than I expected (much like the sashimi in Japan).
We drank til about 11pm then I had a fun 40 minute walk back to the hostel for my last night.
The next morning I was up early, got an 11am bus to the airport and took off to Oslo.
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