Sondre Stromfjord

From Ottawa we flew north to Iqaluit (once known as Frobisher Bay) at the southern end of Baffin Island, then after a refuelling stop northeast to Kangerlussuaq in western Greenland. Kangerlussuaq is at the inland end of the 180 km long Sondre Stromfjord. Like many of the Greenland airports, Kangerlussuaq owes its existence to US military endeavours both during and after the Second World War, when it was variously known as Bluie West-8 or Sondrestrom Air Base.

It’s also a convenient place for me and about 90 fellow travellers to meet up with the Akademik Ioffe – an ice-strengthened Russian hydrological research vessel (or polar spy ship) - run by .

Over the next 12 days we’ll be heading west across some 2000 nautical miles (and four time zones) to reach Cambridge Bay on Victoria Island, and visiting at least some of the places that Franklin reached as he sought the Northwest Passage in 1845-7, and that Amundsen visited as he successfully traversed the Passage in 1903-7.

First stage was to head SW down Sondre Stromfjord until we reached Davis Strait.

Blip: 1114
Picture of the Day: 3156