So, where was I?
Oh yes, the Travel tale. Now, where to start?
After several flights and too many airline sandwiches to eat, I finally landed in Longyearbyen, the capital of Svalbard. I, along with several other passengers, were picked up at the airport and taken into town where we were introduced to everyone and had a pleasant walk around town and visited the museum.
Our guide for this trip was Mats Forsberg, a Swedish naturalist, wildlife photographe, Polar Historian and..."hang on a minute, I know you don't I?" Mats and I realised that we had met at a small base in Antarctica waaaaaay back in 1984 where we had a bit of a shindig between base members and the staff from the ship Linblad Explorer, but that's another story for another day. Small World.
The other eleven passengers comprised one German, two Dutch, four from Sweden, two from Finland and two Norwegians. With the crew being Swedish as well, this was going to be a trip with a predominantly Scandinavian flavour to it, which was fine by me as it meant I would get to learn a bit about some of their culture and views on the natural world we were about to experience.
We got a champagne reception in town, but one with a slight difference.
Our little ship was the MS Stockholm. She was tied up at the harbour waiting for us to embark.
The lounge was a cozy place and would soon feature heavily in our daily life aboard.
The dining room was snug, but comfortable.
And I got aquainted to the main area from which I would spend the rest of the time away from the lounge.
The wall of the lounge with a photo of the ship from when she was first built.
It seemed that these guys on board knew what we would like.
Or not.....
And away we went, sailing at 1700 out into Isfjorden, with spectacular views of the Arctic wilderness.
But I'm getting slightly ahead of myself here, didn't we do something in town first?...........
)
