Last Updated on April 30, 2023 by PowersToTravel
This summer included one of my bucket list events – the long awaited trip north to Svalbard.
I had wanted to visit Svalbard since I had returned home from Antarctica in 2007. I had learned that the Polar Star (no longer in service) traveled in the summer to a small archipelago far north of the Arctic Circle above Norway to introduce its guests to the illusive Polar Bear. Spitsbergen is actually the largest island of the archipelago. Longyearbyen is name of the Norwegian town.
Americans don’t seem to have heard of Svalbard, Spitsbergen or Longyearbyen. Europeans have.
Svalbard is located at 78 degrees north. We live in Rhode Island, and there’s a restaurant here called “42 North.” I now smile to think we have been 78 degrees North, further north than anyone in Alaska. We’ve been to the northernmost post office in the world; we’ve stayed in the northernmost hotel in the world. We’ve watched the midnight sun at almost a 45 degrees angle in the sky.
I had been unable to convince any of my friends or family of the value in travelling from the US to Oslo then Oslo to Longyearbyen to experience the Arctic summer. The dream of Svalbard had faded over the years.
Last fall I began to think about introducing my husband Greg to Norway. While I’d visited Norway four times before I met my husband, he had not been to Norway. I wanted to show him the fantastic scenery and unique Norwegian culture. Bergen? The Fjords? Oslo? The Lofoten Islands? The Far North? There was so much to see. At one point I had looked at, and discarded, the Hurtigruten trip to Kirkenes, with its Lapland dogsledding and midnight sun. It became far too expensive when you added in the excursions, and there would be far too many other people around us all the time.
So, I planned our trip. I explained to him the various places we would visit. At one point I must have had 10 or 15 different spreadsheet tabs, each with a different option to the trip. After listening to my final itinerary, he then asked that “out of the box” question, “Do we get to see Polar Bears?”
“No, we don’t get to see Polar Bears. They don’t have Polar Bears in Norway!”
Suddenly I gasped, “Oh yes they do…. in Svalbard. Maybe… Maybe… We could go to Svalbard too!”
I investigated the cost and time impacts to our trip, and sadly learned about the high cost of the adventure cruise ships. It had been a long time since my Antarctic adventure, and costs had certainly skyrocketed since then.
I remembered the time, in the late ‘90s, when my mother had thought that the only way to see the north of Norway was to go on a Hurtigruten ship, but I had learned there were actually roads and ferries. I had then succeeded in planning and executing a wonderful trip to the Lofoten Islands, in 2001.
If that were true for the mainland, maybe one could do the trip to Svalbard without the cruise ships, too. I started to investigate flights to, and hotels in, Longyearbyen. I became excited by all of the land-based adventures offered by Spitzbergen Travel, a tourist agency used by Hurtigruten.
From my web-surfing, I learned that while Polar Bears are occasional visitors to Longyearbyen in the winter, and everyone has to be accompanied out of town with a licensed gun bearer regardless of the season, there are seldom Polar Bears near the inhabited areas in the summer. But I did learn that there are many boat trips throughout the fjord region to glaciers and snowy locations.
I planned the trip for the end of June; I didn’t want to get too cold, but I always try to travel during shoulder seasons to avoid the crush of tourists. I think, in retrospect, that May was more of the shoulder season and June the beginning of the high summer season in Svalbard. I also knew that the snow on the mountains around Longyearbyen would have melted later in the summer, and I wanted to see the Arctic somewhat snow-covered. Lastly, I wanted to maximize my chances of seeing a Polar Bear by arriving earlier rather than later.
I made our reservations in October, for the trip the following June. I studied all the adventures on Spitzbergen Travel and tried to find those that suited our level of fitness. I planned two adventures for each day, at least one a boat trip. I wanted to be out on the water as I knew that gave us the best chance to see my Polar Bear, and other wildlife. I was able to plan a morning/early afternoon event, such as Dog Carting or ATV riding, then a lunch and nap-time, then a dinner boat trip, returning back to the hotel around midnight. Then it would be up for breakfast and an eight to nine am start again. With that afternoon naptime built in, we were able to comfortably enjoy our adventures.
We were able to stay in very nice accommodations, the Radisson Blu Hotel, eat out every night (either on the boat or at the SvalBar), go out on two expensive guided adventures a day, all at half the price of the cruise ships. We could have even traveled much less expensively by staying in a hostel and making our own meals, however we wanted private en-suite bathrooms, and to spend all our time out and about, and not in the kitchen.
Upon our return, I compared our costs to one of the usual adventure cruise ships, and theirs was $6000 per person, not including airfare and tips, for an eight day trip (with a day on either end for air travel.) We did it for less than $6000 for two people including airfare, tips and souvenirs.
Although being based in Longyearbyen we could only go out on day trips, and therefore not see the other parts of the islands, I felt at the end of the trip that we had experienced 100% of the adventure: Dog Carting, ATV riding, boat trips to see the Russian ghost town Pyramiden, glaciers, bird-cliffs, Ny-Ålesund, the northernmost settlement with a post office in the world.
We saw Walruses, on land and swimming, Bearded Seals, Svalbard Reindeer, a Blue Whale, a pod of Beluga Whales, Minke Whales, a Fin Whale, Eider Ducks, Puffins, Little Awks, Barnacle Geese, Guillemots, and most amazingly…A POLAR BEAR.
I’ll leave you hanging right there. It’s not the end of the story, just the end of the day for me!
Diabetic Tips
It was a pleasure not to have to worry about heat and insulin when traveling in Svalbard! I always made sure the pump reservoir didn’t get too low. I felt so safe with the guides I really had no concerns. The biggest problem I had was where to stash my glucose tablets and juice during the dog carting. You’ll see the suits we had to wear on a different post. There was a pharmacy in town, and a health center. No worries in Svalbard.
Related Links
Wiki Article – Learn about Svalbard – where it is!
More about the following tour operators on later posts.
Spitzbergen Travel – I booked almost every trip using their booking engine. Every coordination was flawless. Be sure you understand that in Europe the dates are written as DD/MM/YY, not MM/DD/YY as they are in the USA. On the most magnificent of our adventures in which we met MY polar bear, we had an added guest who had mis-entered his date and time when booking the adventure. Luckily for him there was another guest being picked up from the same hotel, because otherwise the van would not have known to stop for him. “We don’t have you in our list,” the coordinator said as he studied his clipboard. “Let me see your paperwork.” (Lesson Learned – always carry a hardcopy of your confirmation email.) “Oh! You are scheduled for next month! We have room today, so you’re lucky. Just jump in.”
Spitzbergen Guide Service – The Ny-Ålesund trip is a long but rewarding trip. The boat was very comfortable, and included the all-important WC. (Update: I went to check their website in 2023 and found they are “Permanently Closed”. So sad.)
Better Moments – We went on two of their trips, and they introduced us to our POLAR BEAR!
Green Dog Svalbard – We took a tremendous trip on our dog cart with our string of sled dogs. It was an extraordinarily memorable trip.
ATV Safari – Great fun even for a newbie like myself.
Food:
Svalbar Pub – great food, good prices.
