The White Sea

Tromsø (again)

Stopped in sleepy Tromsø before our flight to Amsterdam.  Said goodbye to friends and family on The World and watched her sail out of town. And thus ends our expedition to the The White Sea.

Honningsvåg

Sunday, June 16, 2013 Honningsvåg is a sleepy town with one main tourist attraction, the North Cape.  Instead of driving out to most northerly point of mainland Europe, which is not part of mainland Europe, we went for a lovely…

Murmansk

Saturday, June 15, 2013 Murmansk is the home of the Russian Navy’s Northern fleet as well as nine nuclear powered ice breakers.  In the morning we went for a city highlights bus tours stopping to see Alyosha the defender of…

Furthest North

Our Journey will take us half around the world, but today is likely to be the furthest point North we will go. The ship made it to North 80° 24′ 13.23″, East 52° 4′ 16.82″ before turning around and heading South…

Franz Josef Land

Wednesday, June 12, 2013 After a day at sea we arrived at Franz Josef Land. Look it up. We were far north on the map, very far north actually. Never even thought about getting here. But then again… this was…

Novaya Zemlya

Monday, June 10, 2013 Monday, June 10th Morning Activities Today we truly ventured north.  We woke very early to discover the ship had discovered ice.  Ice conditions prevented a landing at the abandoned Soviet research base.  Instead the captain took…

Cape Kanin

Saturday, June 8, 2013 Cape Kanin is the last outpost of the White Sea and mainland Russia before we head north into the Barents Sea. We did a little Tundra hiking before our 2 day sea voyage to the next destination.

Chapoma and Pyalitsa Rivers

Chapoma River If you believe the guides, apparently we were the first westerners to visit this Chapoma River village.  We saw first hand how hard life is in these remote lands.  There is no wharf for large boats to land…

Zayatsky and Anzer Islands

Thursday, June 6, 2013 Zayatsky Island This was our first ‘real’ expedition outing as we got into the zodiacs for the first time this trip to join the Expedition team and local guides for a walk to view a chapel…

Solovetsky Island and Monastery

Wednesday, June 5, 2013 We visited Solovetsky Island and Monastery on a cold summer’s day.  This spiritual home to the Russian Orthodox Church was the greatest citadel of the church in the far north until it was turned into a…

Heading to the White Sea

Sunday to Tuesday, June 2-4, 2013 We left Kirkenes, Norway, at 6:30pm on June 2nd and arrived in Arkhangelsk, some 38 hours later on June 4th. Since this was The World’s first port-of-call in Russia on this trip, it took…