Our day started with an early morning wake-up call. We found a polar bear ice flow and we got as close as a few hundred feet away. Everyone was out on deck taking advantage of the excellent photo opportunity this great moment had to offer. An hour or so later, we arrived at our destination for the morning adventures, the huge ice cap of Nordaustlandet, the biggest ice cap of Svalbard and running 130 nautical miles along the coast.

Arriving at the ice cap we lowered the Zodiacs and kayaks and spent the whole morning exploring the coast of Nordaustlandet. Everyone had a great morning, and several guests were kayaking for the first time in their lives and could not believe how easy and comfortable it was. There was a bit of a current running along the shore so we decided to follow the group of kayakers with the platform to maximize their time along the ice cap. Awaiting us back on board was a Scandinavian buffet lunch, and while enjoying the herring and salmon the Caledonian Star set a new course towards Freemansund. A few staff members stayed on the bridge scouting for more polar bears in the pack ice as we headed south.

Not long into our afternoon nap there was another announcement from the bridge; "We have another polar bear on an ice flow." The events were endless, this time the great mammal decided to stay on this small piece of ice and check us out. This was the best view ever for many of us on board. The picture at left was taken from the bow of the ship with a pretty standard digital camera. Anyone with a regular 35-mm lens still camera would have gotten great pictures.

It's a nice feeling leaving the pack ice knowing we could not have had better sightings of the polar bears and walruses. At cocktail hour we enjoyed watching the highlights of the trip on the TV monitors, accompanied by an underwater video taken by the divers under the pack ice.