Another day. What will it bring. We were all up at 7am to see the longest glacier in the northern hemisphere. We followed it for almost an hour and it calved once with a rumble and falling ice. Of course we only saw the aftermath as you don't know where to look.
Saw glaciers all day. Went through some narrow areas between Spitsbergen and Edgeoya. Very beautiful. More glacier ice but not a lot of floating ice at this time of year. Not like last night when there was a lot of ice floes fortunately so those bears could get a rest. There used to be a lot of ice floes here and ships couldn't come here. But the glacier ice recedes one meter a day. That is really scary.
Once the guides said there were reindeer on shore. We rush out to the guides trying to explain where the reindeer are. Can't see them as if the alleged creatures are really there I would want to see the antlers. Just dots way far away. I don't think they should notify us of something that can't be recognized. It gets our hopes up and then everyone is disappointed. This happened twice.
In the afternoon we were scheduled to search for the elusive polar bears again. But they were not to be found so we had a zodiac ride to some huge and beautiful rocks that were covered with birds on cliffs and ledges with one egg per female bird. One parent stays with the egg and one goes for food. We saw a full kill of a guillimont by a gull. Then the gull sucks out the insides of the bird.
The eggs are pointed on one end and roll around and not off the cliff. There is no nest. How is it that this all works out this way? I find it fascinating.
Birds were all over the place - many in the sky, perched all over the large beautiful rocks, and feeding
the in water. When the chick is 3 weeks old the father goes down to the water and the chick is sent down for it's first fly away to the Father waiting in the water below. Then it spends 5 months with good old Dad till it is on it's own.
In 3-4 months all the birds leave to go to Greenland for the winter.
It was a nice outing but not what I was hoping for.
It's 10:16pm right now and the sun is in the sky so one really wouldn't know what time it is. We are stopped around some rocks and glaciers and it's pretty quiet here.
Love, J
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