Greenland... to go or not!!

 My interest in going to Greenland started when I read about their new Nuuk International airport with flights from either Copenhagen or US East coast. So I started researching my options! Greenland Travel seemed the best bet with 8 day tours.  They are owned by AirGreenland which in turn is owned by the government of Greenland. The tour sounded great, 2 nights in Nuuk with an ice fjord boat trip and a trip to an outlying small island catching one's fish lunch en route! Then on to Disko Bay in the Arctic circle to check out icebergs and glaciers.

The flight from Copenhagen was scheduled to leave at 8am so I booked into the airport Clarion hotel for the early morning check in. First indication there might be any problem was an email at 11pm saying there was a possibility that the flight might be cancelled but to be at the airport at 6am in any case. It was cancelled and so this meant sitting in a hotel lobby until rooms became available! Next morning's flight was fully booked ( initial annoyance dissipated when we found out it couldn't land at Nuuk and had to return to Copenhagen!!) We were put on a charter flight that evening which also could not land at Nuuk!

Thick clouds! We circled for around one hour with pilot telling us (often!!) that he had plenty of fuel!!

After one hour the pilot decided we were abandoning Nuuk and going to a different airport in the Arctic circle, Kangerlussuaq. This had been built during WW2 by the US and prior to new airport had been the main airport for international flights. Our arrival was 2am and apparently all airport staff were  in bed apart from a duty officer. However we were happy to disembark! A 4 hour flight had  become 6+ hours!

So there was a little  chaos on arrival! Only one small hotel... but plenty of what they termed hostels. These had been the military barracks during the war!  So not exactly luxurious. Judging by the fact that the bedlinen was relatively fresh it would seem that this was often needed!

Next morning ( just a few hours later actually) we were picked up to go back to the airport to see what might be in store for us! In chatting to a person at the airport I heard that landings at Nuuk were held up all the time as there were a few problems with the actual new airport.... only one runway, built on a slope and not in an ideal placement to prevailing winds, and no radar!!

We were lucky to get on a small plane to Ilulisaat, our next stop to check out Disko Bay.

View from the Hotel Arctic  bedroom made up for the hassle of getting there!

  

Next morning we went on a hike to check the icebergs from dry land! Amazing!

The Isfjordscentret was an interesting building with a nice cafe!

Then a little walk around the town......

I was not tempted to go out in a kayak!

Our evening iceberg boat tour at 10pm was interesting.... not exactly dark but it was in the rain!

...some of the icebergs were a little too close and uncomfortable! Particularly as we had just been told the iceberg which took down the Titanic had come from Disko Bay! These icebergs had been around for about 30 days having come from the glacier just south of of the town

Next day it was off in search of whales....... 

...so back among the icebergs.....

We did eventually find them...........

Next day it was a 3 hour boat ride to check out the very large  Eqi glacier.........

It was a little alarming to see the large icebergs which had dropped off recently floating slowly by!! We did hear cracks but didn't see any calving.

There are no roads in the area around Ilulissat... except around the town and to the airport! So back again on a boat to check out the small village of Oqaatsut  and to have lunch in the H8 restaurant.

The H8 on the roof was the navigation used by the US in WW2!

where we were booked in for lunch.......

Lunch was a little dry! 

The village was very small, about 30 inhabitants... with a communal shower!

We were supposed to be leaving the following morning but the daily notice at the hotel reception was somewhat negative..........

We were told not to bother going to airport.......and fortunately were able to stay in the same hotel that night.

Next day we were told to go to airport but unfortunately after arrival there the flight (and others!) was again cancelled.

On returning to the hotel we found they had absolutely no rooms available. Too many cancelled flights! The choice was to go to local high school to sleep in refugee type cots or for 4 of us to share a one bedroom small apartment! We 4 had only met 5 days prior!! But fortunately got on well!

The view was still great though!

And ironically we had a view of our prior hotel!

Access was a little treacherous.........

We were very happy to hear we had been changed over to an Icelandair plane to leave the following day! ! Returning via Reykjavik .....we were not too disappointed to never see Nuuk!

The Nuuk airport still seems to be having problems! A United air flight going there in August had to turn back after 3hours in flight and all international flights were disrupted for several weeks as their security checks weren't adequate! Per an article in The NY Times!