First Landing

After boarding the ship we sailed over to a nearby glacier.

Glaciers are extremely common in Svalbard--we had seen dozens as we flew in and would see many more as we sailed through.	This one, however, had an image of a laughing Jesus on it, which made it somewhat different. Pat thought of auctioning it on eBay, but couldn't come up with a way to preserve it.
At 10:00 pm the sun was still high enough to make interesting patterns in the unusual cloud formations. During the trip the sun did not, of course, set at all.	The next morning Chuck spotted the first of the strangely-shaped ice formations we would see. This is a "bergy bit, " while larger pieces of floaring ice are called icebergs. He dubbed this one "the crocodile."
We made our first landing at Hornsund, a wonderful deep fjord in the southern part of Spitzbergen Island.	There was a complex polar bear protocol before we landed anywhere that began with launching a Zodiac.
A naturalist then took the Zodiac and cruised up and down the landing site to check for polar bears.	Once that was cleared, a group of naturalists went over and searched for hidden polar bears.
Once guests were allowed to land, also via Zodiac, naturalists cruised up and down the coast looking for bears and all the naturalists were on the alert.	Every naturalist was armed at all times. Pat asked one if he was a good shot. His answer was, "Well, I took an NRA course." Not the answer she was looking for.
While they were doing all that, we had a chance to go through the long process of getting ready to go ashore. What the well-dressed adventurer was wearing: waterproof boots (for jumping from Zodiacs into freezing water), insulated waterproof pants over jeans, a parka over a shirt and sweater, gloves, scarf, wool hat (here covered by a waterproof hood against the rain), camera, and binoculars. Whew! Made hiking a challenge. Yes, those are walruses behind us--more on them later.
The Expedition Leader was Tom Ritchie. Whenever he came to a corner he would yell, "Hey, Bear!" Pat wondered if a bear would pop up and say "Hi, Tom." But he was VERY good at his job.	There were 12 naturalists on board, ranging from an undersea specialist to an ex-trapper, as well as generalists like Tom and several photography experts (after all, this is National Geographic). One of the experts was a botanist and encouraged us to look closely at the plants, which seldom grow to more than two or three inches tall.
It was late in the year, but this glaucous gull still had a couple of chicks.	Most of the plants are dwarf versions of familiar plants, like this buttercup.
Others are less known down south, like the saxifrage--the most common flower we saw.	The naturalist, Steve MacLean, demonstrated how to "assume the position" to do arctic botany.
Naturalist Stefan Lundgren told us about the old trapper's cabin--where another of our naturalists had spent his honeymoon. In this environment, even wooden buildings last for decades or longer--unless they are damaged by polar bears.	Afterwards Pat climbed up the hill (NOT with Mike) for a better view.