Wednesday 12 June 2013

Uummannaq - Côte d'Azur du Nord

It was hard to believe that we were actually some 590 kilometers above the Arctic Circle today. People were walking around in shorts and t-shirts today and when sitting at the little café Emma by the harbor in Uummannaq we might as well have been sitting outside a café by the Mediterranean coast.

Photo; Esther Kokmeijer


The magnificent Uummannaq Mountain with its very characteristic heart shape is an ever impressing sight. Landscape wise it is definitely the highlight of the journey and the town and the area is all over Greenland known for its beauty.

Photo; Esther Kokmeijer


Some of us had an amusing and educational talk with a local hunter and fisherman named Ole Quist.  He is now 63 years old but as lately as in December last year he shot a narwhale and if weather permits he will be out fishing for halibut every day.


Photo; Esther Kokmeijer
 Uummannaq is also known in all of Greenland and Denmark as the home of Santa Claus. This is because of a very famous Danish Christmas TV-show that was shot in Uummannaq in 1989. For the show a cozy little hut was built and that hut was the destination of many of us today. It was situated beautifully in a little bay about an hour walk from Uummannaq. On the way we had a fantastic view over the amazing Uummannaq fiord.


Photo; Esther Kokmeijer
 Late in the afternoon we went to the picturesque little village of Ukkussisat 50 km. north of Uummannaq. Some of the locals came to the ship and gave us a splendid show of the Greenlandic national dance – the Greenlandic polka.

Photo; Esther Kokmeijer


Afterwards the dance show we took our PolarCircle boats and spend the evening in the tiny and very cute village.


Photo; Esther Kokmeijer

And now as the sun is shining and it looks like it’s late in the afternoon it is actually midnight and we are slowly sailing south again, back to the impressing icebergs of the Disco Bay.


Photo; Esther Kokmeijer