Svalbard Photography Tour II

Itinerary

What makes this tour special is that it will have a “flexible” schedule, meaning if we find polar bears we can stay with them to maximize photography opportunities. Travel with a small group (12 guests maximum!) on a very comfortable and welcoming boat, and go off the beaten path to remote locations that the 100-500 passenger cruise ships cannot travel to.

As with all wildlife, polar bears are not guaranteed. This trip is weather and ice dependent. Each year is different. This is a great opportunity for anyone who has always wanted to visit this region of the world.

Monday, July 31 (D)

Arrive in Longyearbyen, Norway. Transfer to the MV Polaris I and board the ship at 6:30pm. It’s time to head north and begin our 11-day, 10-night polar expedition!

MV Polaris I – See Accommodations for full ship details.

Tuesday, August 1 – Wednesday, August 9 (B, L, D)

Spitsbergen, located in the Arctic Ocean north of Norway, is the largest island of the Svalbard archipelago. Very mountainous, the island of Spitsbergen (which means ‘pointed mountain’), presents all the characteristics of the polar environment. It offers stunning panoramas, gigantic glaciers plunging into the sea, steep mountains, and also flowering plains and welcoming tundras. It is home to very diverse arctic fauna: polar bears, bearded seals, walruses, reindeer, polar foxes, whales (belugas and minke), as well as many birds such as common eiders, arctic terns, puffins, Guillemots, little auks, bunches, geese, ivory gulls, and phalaropes.

Every day we ‘ll be in a different place, sailing along the coast with many stops to the north of the island. Apart from the first and last day, our sailings will consist of Zodiac landings of a few hours, sometimes lengthened by encounters with bears, whales, or seals. We will spend our nights anchored at the foot of glaciers or in beautiful, peaceful bays.

Notes from the Captain
As we are a French ship, of course we attach a very high importance to the food, and our chief cook is a very good chef. We also have a good selection of French Wines onboard. All of the crew has been sailing on Polaris for many years, and they are all enthusiastic and very involved in the activity, always trying to make the guests happy and always ready to talk with them.

We have an open bridge with seats for guests, so it’s always a pleasure to share our experience with them.

The outside deck is absolutely perfect for wildlife sighting with a large sundeck. The restaurant and lounge/bar have large heated panoramic windows.

The embarkation in the two zodiacs is done thanks to small stairs and a pad, very easy and safe, even for older guests.

When it comes to polar bears, of course it’s unpredictable, but we have very good chances to see several bears, sometimes very close from the zodiacs. The usual routings we do are the Northwest coast, Ice Edge, Hinlopen, and Nordauslandet, seven Islands and back. Of course everything depends on the weather, ice conditions, and wildlife! We sometimes change plans several times per day, when we meet a bear, a whale… We are a member of AECO and keep in touch with some other ships happy to cooperate for sharing information about wildlife. And because we are a small ship, we do not have to establish precise sailing plans in advance.

We have guides with a lot of experience onboard Polaris in Svalbard with good skills for driving zodiacs and also good for scouting polar bears. Good bears spotters are the keys to success if the main purpose of the trip is finding polar bears.

Regarding sailing in the ice: when we sail to the ice edge, we follow the edge most of the time looking for bears. Following the edge is the best option because we keep a good speed and we can scout huge areas with the scope. Of course sailing to the ice requires calm weather and good visibility; otherwise it’s really a waste of time. We can push ice with the ship and sail into 5 to 7/10 sea ice. This allows us to get close to the orange and red ice which are the most interesting to find polar bears. But we can’t “break” ice; there are no small ships able to do so. Even the big ships in Spitsbergen stay along the edge, except Ortelius which is the only one designed as an icebreaker.

When it comes to overnight on the ice, we can do it when the conditions are good or when we want to stay close to a bear with a carcass for example, this is possible. We can either stay adrift or moor on a big ice floe if we find a good one; it depends on the winds, tidal stream, ice around, etc. If we consider that there is any risk for the safety, we prefer sailing away and coming back in the morning.

One other important thing about sea-ice: people are always very excited when sailing to pack ice, both for the beauty of the ice itself and the good chances to see walrus and seals on the ice and also because they believe that there are better chances to see polar bears on the ice. This last point is not really true unfortunately. If we see polar bears on the ice, it’s most of the time quite far from the ship, and it’s not at every trip that we have curious bears approaching us. We usually find more bears on land which are easier to approach, or on the ice in the fjords. But, as usual, we never know what we’ll see, and this is why it’s so interesting.

Notes from Tanya
We have been to Svalbard with groups on very small boats and a mid-size ship; there are positives and negatives to both options. Based on our experience, Dan and I believe that chartering our own boat that is a good size with plenty of staff is the way to go. We can adjust the schedule during our journey based on what we encounter and where. We will have access to areas large ships cannot explore.

Remember, Svalbard is Land of the Midnight Sun, which means long days to look for bears. Our goal is to search for bears, and it would be nice to find some walrus and whales along the way too. We do not plan to have this trip as a “see all Svalbard has to offer” type of tour. We want a group that is willing to put in the time to look for bears and understand that finding bears is not always easy. We will base our decisions on the captain’s experience, his contact with other ships, weather, and ice conditions. Our goal is to try to find polar bears and get some great photo opportunities.

Thursday, August 10 (B)

Disembark the MV Polaris I today at around 8:00am. Transfer to the airport to begin our journey home.

SCROLL DOWN TO SEE GALLERIES FROM EXPLORERS ON PAST SVALBARD TRIPS.