Greenland blog 04: Scrum in the fjord

Kangerlussuaq airport, looking down the fjord, Greenland. Image copyright Margaret Sharrow, 2008

Having landed, my perspective changed back to that of a land-dweller, and I was dealt my first and only disappointment in Greenland: it suddenly looked all too much like the Scottish highlands. Why had I bothered to come so far, at such expense, I thought peevishly, when I could have stayed in the country I love and call home, and seen much the same scenery? Now this narrative is not meant to be about my own psychological blips and foibles, but forgetting that I’d spent a less-than-luxurious night on a bench in the food court at Copenhagen airport, my perspective was a little skewed at the sight of ruddy snow-capped mountains rising up on either side of the airstrip, a fjord stretching away very much like a sea-loch in Wester Ross. What wasn’t obvious from my perspective was just how long the fjord was (190 km, nearly three times as long as 65 km Loch Fyne, Scotland's longest sea loch), which accounts for the climate in Kangerlussuaq being somewhat warmer and more stable than almost anywhere else on the west coast, except for the similar fjord at Narsarsuaq, which is much further south.

There wasn’t much time for negative thinking, as action was called for: we emerged down a staircase directly onto the tarmac (ah, this was what flying was like in the 1960’s) and walked less than a hundred metres to the terminal, passing a sign with fingerposts giving the distances to Moscow, London, Washington, etc. Once inside the claustrophobically tiny terminal there was no attempt at customs but an immediate scrum inside the duty free. Toblerones, cigarettes and especially alcohol flew off the shelves while staff at two tills stoically coped with queues bursting in and out the turnstiles. I was worried about my luggage in the hold, or missing my next plane, but needn’t have been; by the time I emerged clutching a single bottle of white wine (encased in some ingenious Scandinavian fishing-net type plastic mesh to prevent breakage) my bag had been magically transferred and it was time for a gentle stroll back onto the tarmac, and to board a Dash-7 standing ready, bound for Nuuk.

26 August 2008 09:49 recalled 8 January 2011


Want more? Then please VOTE FOR ME TO BE THE OFFICIAL BLOGGER & ARTIST ON AN EXPEDITION TO THE NORTH POLE! http://www.blogyourwaytothenorthpole.com/entries/166

and stay tuned for another episode tomorrow!

Just touching down at Kangerlussuaq

I wasn't going to stay. I was just passing through. I was on my way to Nuuk, the capital of Greenland, but it is not possible to fly directly to the capital, because the airstrip there is not large enough to accommodate jumbo jets on international flights. But the airstrip at Kangerlussuaq is, because the place was built as a US military base with an eye to catering for the supersized might of Uncle Sam.

And yet, it was to be my first moments on Greenlandic soil (or tarmac, to be more precise). After shooting enough aerial footage on the descent to mount an exhibition (there, I'd justified my trip already, I could relax [!]), the excitement levels were soaring way out of control, the closer we got to terra firma. And then we landed.



Hmm. The equipment on the ground looked much like any other airport round the globe, if the operators were definitely Greenlandic.



And those hills rising up along the valley - they could be anywhere in the north Atlantic, say... Scotland, where I'd been so many times? I had come to earth with a bump. Still, the airport was as tiny as any remote airport could be expected to be; and I had the duty free to negotiate.



The latter turned out to be far more arduous than customs and immigration (an empty desk). Having ascertained that my luggage was transferring from jumbo to Dash-7 of its own accord, I drew myself up and plunged into the scrum that was the duty free. Even with two tills working at full speed, it seemed to take forever until I could emerge, clutching my bottle of (relatively) cheap white in its peculiar string vest: a Scandi-invention that I realised provided grip when pouring while simultaneously preventing clinking in the shopping sack (should I have been so pecunious as to purchase more than one bottle).

Boarding the Dash-7 I thought again how handsome the Air Greenland fleet was, with its glossy candy-apple-red planes with the white abstract snowflake logo. Inside the single aisle terminated abruptly in a beige wall fronted by a row of seats facing away from the direction of travel. I figured that nobody would want to sit there, so I found a window seat opposite these but facing the correct way for my purposes. And I had plenty of room to open my day rucksack and pull out the first two cameras. The man next to me was lost in reading the paper (bilingual Danish and Greenlandic) and paid little attention to me, or, once we took off, the spectacular scenery. Which was just as well, because after a cursory look at the safety card (complete with nonverbal instructions on how to survive turning into an iceberg) I was glued to the window. My first journey with turbo props!

Nuuk airport bus

Nuuk airport

Adventure from Day 1:

Margaret emerges from Nuuk airport and locates the bus stop, and then another bus stop. Soon a bus pulls up, to the other stop, and I race over through sandy gravel, trailing my wheelie luggage. (Everyone else on the flight had wheelie luggage as well, so not all sturdy backpackers as I feared.) The bus driver says he will be back in ten minutes, and to wait at the other stop. I say OK and go back.

A Nuuk bus stop

Ten minutes later, he reappears, having gone past the airport to Nuuk's second suburb, and back again. I board. He is wearing a blue Manchester United t-shirt and yellow reflecting shades. I am wearing a down puffa jacket covered in fake fur. We stare at each other. 'You have to put the coins there,' he says at last, indicating the stand in front of me, 'and then pull on the lever to get the ticket.'

'Where are you going in Greenland?' he asks, and when I tell him I am starting by staying four days in Nuuk, he says, 'Oh, don´t do that! Why would you want to do that? Nuuk is terrible. You want to go up north, and go dog sledding.' Meanwhile I am being driven past brilliantly coloured apartment blocks backed by spectacular mountains, all glowing in brilliant sunshine the likes of which I haven't seen in Britain, even in June. 'I don't know,' I say. 'It looks pretty nice here!'

Each bus stop in Nuuk has a handy individual number that co-ordinates with the bus route map.

Margaret's itinerary

This page will contain a list of places I went to.

For starters, the bare bones:

London - Copenhagen (overnight in airport) - Kangerlussuaq (transfer) - Nuuk (4 nights) - coastal ferry (4 nights) landing at: Sisimiut - Aasiaat - Ilulissat - Aasiaat - Sisimiut - Nuuk - Qaqortoq (3 nights) - Nanortalik (7 nights) - Narsarssuaq (4 nights) - Copenhagen (overnight in airport) - London

Flights were with Sterling Air (defunct the month after I returned) and Air Greenland.

More details:

• To London by National Express coach.
• Flew from Gatwick (home of the charter airlines).
• Decided ahead of time to spend the night in Copenhagen's Kastrup Airport, due to late arrival time / early morning departure.
• Flew Air Greenland to Kangerlussuaq. Nuuk, although the capital, does not have enough flat land for an airstrip large enough to accommodate jumbo jets, so international flights arrive at Kangerlussuaq, a former US air base at the head of a long fjord about an hour's flight north of Nuuk. My transfer to Dash-7 plane lasted less than an hour.
• Arrived at Nuuk airport a little after noon and caught the city bus to the tourist information centre, near the colonial harbour. Got a booking for a bed and breakfast in one of the suburbs, and ended up getting a lift there in the tourist office pickup truck. Four nights in Nuuk. Activities included walking, forward trip planning, bus tour, visiting Nuuk's beaches, cemeteries, harbours, shopping, cafes, arts centre. Oh, and photography!
• Taxi to harbour to catch AUL coastal ferry. 4 nights on ferry in couchette (4 beds in shared room).

more to come...