Nordfjord & Briksdal Glacier
Like every great adventure, an expedition must start somewhere. This voyage “Beyond the North Cape” began yesterday in Bergen, where we embarked the National Geographic Explorer on a rare, warm sunny day.
Bergen, which only sees the sun about 60 days a year, is at the same latitude as Anchorage, Alaska. At 60º North of the equator, its maritime climate is influenced by the warmth of the Gulf Stream. During our voyage we will follow the extreme reach of this oceanic current north beyond the Arctic Circle to the Svalbard Archipelago, only 600 miles from the North Pole.
We begin our journey by exploring the fjords of Norway. Fjords are glacially carved valleys flooded by the sea, and today we are at the far end of Nordfjord. We are here to visit the Briksdal Glacier, a river of ice flowing from the Jostedal Glacier, reportedly the largest glacier remaining in continental Europe. A short drive through the picturesque Olden Valley brings us to the trailhead for our hike up to see the impressive wall of ice where it spills into a small lake.
Like most glaciers in the world today, the Briksdal Glacier is experiencing an alarmingly rapid decline. Less than 10 years ago the glacier almost filled the lake. Today, the lake is almost completely free of ice. The wildflowers along the trail are in full bloom and around each bend we find yet another cascade along the river as it tumbles down to the valley. Not surprisingly, the photographers among us are the last to arrive at the lake.
This afternoon the National Geographic Explorer navigates out of Nordfjord to the outer reaches of the coast where we visit Selje Abbey, the oldest monastery in Norway dating back over 1,000 years. We go ashore to explore the fascinating ruins with its commanding view of the scenic coast. Others explored the rocky shoreline by Zodiac where a number of seabirds are spotted, including oystercatchers, black-backed gulls, and northern divers.
This evening many of us linger to catch one of the last sunsets of the voyage. In a couple of days we will cross north of the Arctic Circle and we will enter the land of the midnight sun. As we cruise past the storybook villages along the shoreline we see countless bonfires, part of the mid-summer celebration that marks the longest days of the year.
As the sun finally sets at 11:33pm, the mythical green flash appears just as the sun sinks below the horizon, certainly a good omen for our voyage.
