What A Long Strange Longyearben It's Been

We landed in the frozen north of Longyearben mid-day.  The airport setting is one of the most dramatic we’ve been to.  Certainly the most dramatic since Queenstown, New Zealand.  Surprisingly, the airport was packed (it’s not that big, and after we landed, there was another flight getting ready to go out. . .a full flight from the looks of it.

After piling on the bus, we headed off to Camp Barents, a sled dog camp on the far outskirts of Longyearben – 16 kilometers from the airport.  We passed quickly through the town of 2200 people – largest town this far north in the world.

We were met at the top of the driveway with two people toting rifles.  It’s a law in Longyearben that everyone must carry a gun wherever they go.  Many carry both a rifle and a handgun.  There is a relatively low number of self-defense polar bear shootings.

(Polar bear hunting was made illegal in the 1970s in a major treaty among all polar bear countries.  The polar bear population of the great white north has gone from around 5,000 back then to around 25-26,000 now).

Anyhow, we petted the dogs, listened to some of the mushers talk about their jobs, and gawked at the reindeer until it was time for lunch.  Lunch was inside a huge tent, where we munched on reindeer sandwiches (or salmon sandwiches). . .Pierre had one of each, and said the reindeer sandwich was better.  I had grabbed a reindeer sandwich, figuring that if I didn’t like it, I could throw it out and grab a salmon sandwich.  My first bite of reindeer was pretty tasty, so I happily downed it, along with a Norwegian beer whilst a guide talked of life with polar bears.  

(Using the family text, I let our daughters know I had reindeer for lunch.  Julia was appalled that I ate Rudolph.  Carol replied to say it was Sven from Frozen.  Julia was perfectly fine with that!).

Our next stop was the world’s northern-most brewery, Svalbard Brewery.  We trundled past brewery equipment and the strong, sickly smell of hops into a room with long tables for eight, and three small glasses.  The beer is pretty good – I’ve been drinking the Pilsner onboard the ship.  And, the woman who gave the talk was pretty interesting.  The whole time of course, I’m thinking. . .”I’m having beer in the furthest north brewery in the world!”  That’s clearly worth some coolness points.

We had two busses driving us around Longyearben, so whilst we were at the brewery, the folks on the other bus were shopping in town.  Once we finished, it was our turn to head into town and shop.  While you think you’ll get on the Nat Geo Explorer right away after landing at the airport, the staff needs time to unload the luggage and take it to our rooms (it IS nice to have the bags waiting for us when we enter the room).

Not shockingly, the town is small (if that’s surprising to you, reading comprehension is not your strong suit).  We walked into the main store, bought a Christmas ornament and a postcard to send to my mom (hi mom!), then walked down the street to the post office to mail it.

The stores all have the big stickers of guns with a line through it, so the locals have to leave their guns in the car.  Apparently there are not many polar bears rampaging through the streets of the town.  We wandered down to the end of the commercial street, and then through the indoor mini-mall.  And then it was time to head to the ship at 4pm.

The Explorer was no longer docked at the pier, so we got to take the zodiac boat out.  So that adds to the coolness point total.