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Days 7: North West Passage Expedition on HX’s MV Fridjtof Nansen, August/September 2025

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Days 7: Pond Inlet, Nunavut, Artic Canada

From Paul Bryers, August 23, 2025

A stunning sunrise welcomed us as we completed our crossing of Baffin Bay, arriving at Pond Inlet around 7 am.

The inlet’s surrounding mountains were magnificent with many white capped ranges and glaciers ploughing their way down to their tidal termini and releasing icebergs.

The town itself, Pond Inlet, is part of Nunavut, the largest and northernmost territory of Canada.  It was separated officially from the NW Territories via varies Acts in April 1999. These Acts, provided the Nunavut territory to the Inuit for self-government.

The town is small with a population of around 1550. The buildings are predominantly cabins with additional community structures.

In the afternoon, some of us embarked on the Zodiacs to land away from the town and walk along a beach to the Salmon River.

The best part of this excursion was the view towards the mountains.

The hike itself was quite disappointing as it just involved trudging along a smelly sea weed beach to the outlet of the Salmon River. To be fair to HX, these excursions are new and very difficult to organize with the locals – it takes a lot of time and patience. There is clearly an opportunity for improvement.

Nevertheless, the Salmon Creek was pretty and we were offered tea by a woman who just happened to be sitting in the Arctic Tundra – unfortunately she had only boiling water, no tea or cups; it’s the thought that counts.

We spotted a lemming…

…some loons…

…..some nice shells….

….some nice stones…

….and some pretty lichens and ground plants…

All in all, another great day in the Arctic.

Days 5-6: North West Passage Expedition on HX’s MV Fridjtof Nansen, August/September 2025

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Days 5-6: Cruising from Ilulissat, Greenland to Pond Inlet, Canadian Arctic

From Paul Bryers, August 21-22, 2025

We spent the last 2 days cruising from Ilulissat, Greenland to Pond Inlet in the Canadian Arctic.

We encountered a mix of weather with regards to sun but the whole crossing has been boringly calm. One moment complete fog then we burst out of the fog like a naughty Haggis on a hot date.

Fog!!
Escaping the fog bank!
Sunlight!
Dating Haggi

A few sea birds accompanied our voyage – notably the Glaucous Gull and Northern Fulmar with his stubby, yellow beak..

Glaucous Gulls
Robust Northern Fulmars

Day 3: North West Passage Expedition on HX’s MV Fridjtof Nansen, August/September 2025

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Day 3: Sisimiut, Greenland

From Paul Bryers, August 19, 2025

What a spectacular location. The houses remind me of the West Coast of Scotland; Tobermory, Tarbert, Barra….

Quite incredible…..esp. liked Dog Town where all the town dogs and their pups stay as they are worker dogs and not pets..

The town is impressive. While steeped in history it is very progressive. Schools for neurodivergent and Down’s, etc…no one left behind.

Our hike up the mountain was fun but the wee insects were as bad as midges. Still, we got great views ….

Antarctic and Falklands Cruise – Day 7 – Whale Watching

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Paul S. Bryers, January 2, 2020

We saw loads of large icebergs and were lucky enough to see ten’s of Humpback whales feeding over a period of several hours.

Antarctic and Falklands – Day 6 – Danco Island (2)

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Paul S. Bryers, January 1, 2020

Our zodiac landing was far easier today. However, the walk up/down the snow covered hill to see the Gentoo Penguins was quite challenging – worth it though for the magnificent views!

And at last we saw a Chinstrap Penguin.

We did our landing at 1.30 pm, it’s now 7.49 pm and there’s still folks on the hill.

What a way to spend the first day of 2020!

Antarctic and Falklands – Day 6 – Danco Island (1)

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Paul S. Bryers, January 1, 2020

We arrived at Danco Island about 12.30 pm after cruising around the area enjoying the magnificent scenery and seeing blows and tails of quite a few whales.

See 2nd posting on Dante Island for more photos.

Antarctic and Falklands Cruise – Day 5 – Trinity Island

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Paul S Bryers, December 31, 2019

Sailed overnight from Greenwich Island to D’Hainaut Island, located within Mikkelsen Harbour, Trinity Island. D’Hainaut was a whaling station many years ago. The surrounding scenery was amazing with mountains, glaciers and some bergs.

The one below was huge!

The zodiac trip to the island was interesting in that Gentoo Penguins were diving in/out of the water all over the place.

It was a more challenging landing than yesterday as zodiac had to do a rock dock (basically, you ram the zodiac up on the rock face and hold it there with the engine full on until people get off/on, and then you have to walk over a combo of Gentoo shit and ice/snow.

Once landed, Gentoo Penguins were everywhere.

The island also has a lot of whale bones and a fairly intact old whaling boat.

We saw the blows from a few live whales today – naturalist said Humpbacks – but no sightings of tails or breaches, as yet. BREAKING NEWS – Two Humpbacks just breached….no photo though…

Antarctic and Falklands Cruise – Day 4 – Drakes Passage and Yankee Harbor, Greenwich Island

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Paul S. Bryers, December 30, 2019

We completed our crossing of Drakes Passage early this morning after an uneventful night. Then there were the first sightings of icebergs in the distance and at last the South Shetland Islands, Antartica!

And our first spotting of a penguin (gentoo) diving in and out of the water. Hard to get a photo as they move so fast.

Our zodiac landing today was Yankee Harbor, Greenwich Island to see the Gentoo Penguin colonies and elephant seals. Cute penguins, grumpy seals!

Antarctic and Falklands Cruise – Day 3 – Drakes Passage

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Paul S Bryers, December 29, 2016

Although we are ahead of the storm, the Captain says we are still getting some 30 foot waves which are making us shake, rattle and roll (a bit). I don’t think it’s bad at all.

Chris was up birdwatching before me but then Dramamine was required and a consequent nap…

Plenty of Giant Southern Petrels around…

and the occasional Great Skua….

Apparently an Albatross was spotted but I didn’t get a photo – yet.

Antarctic and Falklands Cruise – Day 1 and 2 – Punta Arenas through Parque Nacional Alberto de Agostini

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Paul S Bryers, December 28, 2019

So December 27 was the start of our 16 night Antarctic & Falklands cruise.

We flew from Santiago down to P Arenas – great views of Andes..

We were then bused around P Arenas for about 4 hours to see the highlights. This was more than enough time, believe me. Especially since 1 hour was at a graveyard. At least we saw our wee ship from a lookout hill. And when I say wee, I mean very wee….it’s the one docked in the middle in the photo below…

At last we boarded MS Roald Amundsen and after being shown how to put on our orange thermal live saving suits, we headed out into the unknown, or at least little known….accompanied by a nice sunset.

At the next morning’s briefing we sadly learnt that due an approaching front of 70 mph winds and major swells in Drakes Passage we would not be able to land at Cape Horn and instead we were going to try and stay ahead of the storm and head straight for South Shetland Islands – go news was this would give us an additional day for landings in Antartica. Bad news was the Captain made it clear we would still face some major winds and swells and to put everything in our cabins on the floor or in closets. Below, green is good and red/purple is bad…

We spent the rest of the day viewing lovely mountains, glaciers and waterfalls….

The evening was rainbows and cruise ships all going in the other direction…..mmmmhhhh…

Oops…

So, it’s now time to strap down for a bumpy night…….