78°North

About 1300Km from the North Pole and 1300km from the Mainland Norway

About 2400 inhibitants and 3000 polar bears..

Welcome to Svalbard

28/2 - 4/3 2013
Svolvær - Tromsø. By car. Approx 6 hours (winter time). The road trip was fun, as it should be. But we didnt have so many games part from the old and silly "hold your breath while driving through tunnel" and "stop to shop and eat" which is dangerous and fun sometimes.
So after 6 hours of this games including falling to sleep alot we finally arrived in Tromsø.

We had a beer while waiting for our flight. Not in the bar, but from our luggage. We rested our bones from all driving (Francis drove all the way). We arrived in Longyearbyen later than expected. Well, thats only cause our flight were delayed for a bit. Maybe something didnt work properly. And I guess no one wanted blood on their hands with us ending up like in the classic movie "Alive" from 1993.

When we arrived everyone panicked, I couldnt understand why? The polar bear in the entrance were fluffy and stuffed. Stuffed and dead. So I calmed everyone down before we went on the transit bus. The bus driver smelled tobacco and he acted like a santa claus, a oncle or a grandfather. Anyways, he drove arround in Longyearbyen to deliver (He drove to every hotel to drop of people).

Very very late we arrived at our hostel/hotel Guesthouse 102. Our place was used of the miners while working season(or all year around). Every room were used by 16 minors, which is very tiny. Theres 2 bunk beds aka 4 beds/room. Half of them were sleeping/resting bones and the other half were working.

Early Early in the morning me and Karin left for our big trip. We booked in advance a snowmobile trip on 10 hours to the fancy east coast. The place which is the best place to explore, see or spot polar bears (so they say).
It was very cold, still only -20°C, but as soon as the gloves went of it took a minute to freeze the hands of.(5 min to heat them up.) It was very hard to make the food, since I couldnt make it with gloves. Freezy indeed. Well, we didnt see any polar bears, but we explored something more less fantastic. Tracks. Tracks of a polar bear, and possible a polar bear home. We also spotted snow, amazing arctic desert, reindeers, nicely colored glacier and little bit more of snow.

When we came back we were exhausted we had a beer and cocktail together with Manu and Francis.
Few seconds after, we all snored and slept like babies. I didnt dream about leprechauns with down syndrome.
At one point me and Francis woke up at the same time, stared at each other, and went to toilet. I knocked on the toilet wall, but didnt get any respond.

When we woke up we all had nice breakfast together. Bread with seals and melted snow. The adventure of today took place just outside our hotel/hostel. We got snowshoes and nice hot caps. We walked and walked, and walked and walked. It was nice. We explored snow and more snow and glaciers, still no polar bear.
Just before our destination we had a long break with food and bevareges. Someone lost their cap, It never stopped to roll down the steep hill, its probably still rolling. Our guide told us a storie about "Trollsteinen", it was the best story I ever heard. Our hike up and down "Trollstein" took about 8 hours. And I believe we all could feel and smell it. (if someone insist to hear/read the story I promise to post it at some point)

After a nice warm clean shower and a short/long nap we walked down town for some beers. I tried the local dram "Svalbard tørrfisk akvevit" (Svalbard dried fish akvevit). It didnt tast like the label, but i was anyways I was satisfied. Me and Karin went home early to get a nice sleep.

We started the last day in the arctic paradise at 0900 hours. Me, Karin and Manu decided to hike up the hill to "Santa claus mine". The mine closed at some point in the 80s i reckon. We hiked up and explored the old facilities, it was very interesting. Then we slided down the hill on our bums. The hike took about 40 min up and 2 min down.

After we had a shower and a nap, we decided to hitchhike down town. Successfully we got a ride all the way to "Svalbar" for a Svalbard burger. It was delicious. Next time I want to eat more seal. Maybe a seal burger.
After a while of digesting we went to next place. Karlsberger. A bar specialized in whiskey. I tried 2 different labels (Laphroaig 10 years / 58Nok) and a "arctic ice tea". Then we took a cab to our hotel/hostel to pack our bags.. Then we slept till we woke up. Early in the morning we took of to the airport, Tromsø and car 6 hours to Svolvær.