Steve and Cathy's Blog

We had spent the morning on our normal shipboard pursuits: Cathy went to the library; Steve wrote in the blog. Steve had finally gotten back to doing some exercise: a half hour of very brisk walking around the pool deck (the fitness track being closed because of windy conditions and the track being wet from the heavy fog we were traveling through). Temperature is 39 degrees.

Anchor at Noon. We eat at 1pm; lay down for half an hour to address some fatigue we believe is part of the long Covid that has been with us since the end of May. Thirty minutes and we’re ready to go again.

We board a tender at 2:15 and arrive in town less than fifteen minutes later for our 3:15 excursion. Walk around town a bit, then hit the souvenir store.

 Qaqortoq has a population of around 3,000, and this makes it the fifth largest city in Greenland. This from Wikipedia regarding the economy: “Qaqortoq is a seaport and the centre of South Greenland. Fish processing, tourism, tanning, fur production, and ship maintenance and repair are important activities, but the economy is based primarily on educational and administrative services. The primary industries in the town are fishing, service, and administration. … Qaqortoq is located in the one of the most mineral rich areas in the world, South Greenland having a wide range of mineral deposits. Mining has been a major economic activity in South Greenland in the past, especially the nearby Ivittuut mine north of Qaqortoq. A gold mine was operating from 2003 to 2013 in Nalunaq, south of Qaqortoq. The gold mine is expected to reopen in 2022.”

Our excursion is entitled “Upernaviarsuk Agricultural Station” and will last 2 ½ hours. It is explained that we will “sail” to and from the island where the station is located. It is also explained that the people by whom we will be guided aren’t really professional guides, because there is just not enough call for such in these small Greenland communities. That’s certainly fine with us, especially after the rousing fun time we had in Nuuk on our tour with Thomas.

We are on the dock at the appropriate time. Now, this is how our 2 ½-hour excursion is described: “This tour includes 1h30min of moderate walking/standing over mostly uneven and natural terrain. Guests who experience motion sickness should take precautionary measures. Walk to Atlantic harbor and board your boat (approx. 5min). Sail to research station (approx. 30min). Listen to storytelling and visit (approx. 1h30min). Sail back to Qaqortog (approx. 30min).”

The first indication that just perhaps the excursion description doesn’t quite match what our experience is to be comes right away when our guide shepherds us across the street into the souvenir shop, except we are directed to the second floor to don survival suits for our “sail.” So for the next fifteen minutes, the eight of us struggle into these suits, with our winter coats on underneath.

With that accomplished, we waddle downstairs and across the street to our boat, which turns out to be a 25-ft long Zodiac inflatable with twin Yamaha 100-hp outboard engines. Ahhh. Now we get the need for survival suits. We are helped aboard. We straddle our seats, grip the steel handlebars in front of us, and off we go.

We ease out of the harbor, and then our captain opens up the engines. Soon we are doing about forty miles per hour across the harbor in 2-3 foot chop. The boat pounds through the waves for twenty minutes. Steve is thrilled. Cathy is terrified.

We do arrive safely, of course, and are hauled out of the boat.

Next step is to get out of our suits, which is a struggle, and leave them on the dock. We certainly are grateful to have had them on as we bombed across the water in the 40-degree temperature. We next meet our “guide” Kim. (Why we put the word guide in quotes will become evident as we continue the narrative of our visit here).

There are eight of us on this small excursion. Six of us are in reasonable shape, but there is a nice Asian couple that are somewhat older than the rest of us (believe it or not), and both of them need the use of canes to get around. As advertised, there is much “mostly uneven and natural terrain.” What the description should have read is “a ¼-mile ascent over a rock-strewn, unpaved one-lane path.”

Kim starts out with about half of us. One person rockets ahead of everyone; Kim chats with another three; Cathy and Steve trail a few yards behind, and the poor couple on canes struggle to negotiate the trail up the hill to the greenhouses, our apparent destination. We are now all strung out along the road. The couple using canes are farther and farther behind, and they never do make it very far up the hill. A real shame. More on that later.

Cathy and Steve join the group, trying to hear the answers to questions the others are posing. There is no prepared narrative. After a few minutes, it becomes apparent that the only information we are going to get is the answers to questions posed. Kim is very friendly and pleasant, and is certainly willing to tell us whatever we want to know – as long as we keep asking questions. He is on this island to run the research station, not to guide us tourists around, so we get it.

We first learn that Kim has been here for all of eight months, and is from Denmark. Prior to his arrival, the station had been closed for two years, probably due to a lack of someone willing to take the job on an island with only 3-6 other inhabitants, with no television, internet or cell phone service available, and where the nearest real civilization is ten to fifteen nautical miles away by boat. As Kim explains, it takes a person who has no problem with living completely by yourself, and he admits to fitting that description. 

As we walk up the hill, we pass by small fields, some of them covered in plastic, some not. We ask what’s under the plastic tarp, and learn it’s potatoes. In the next field, cabbages – large and very healthy cabbages – are growing. Other fields have other crops, although we really do not find out what all of them are. Our fellow guests ask very good questions, and Kim answers all of them.

We get to the greenhouses and enter the largest one. All kinds of vegetables are growing in small plots. Kim lets us guess what they are, and answers yes or no. Or uses some Danish word that no one can understand. 

We walk back outside. It is beautiful. Sun shining on the water, small green fields, tall mountains and a couple of icebergs for good measure.

And it’s SO QUIET. It is wonderful. We see some solar panels and someone asks “Is that for light and heat for the greenhouse?” Answer: “No, they aren’t hooked up to anything.” “And what about those other solar panels we saw near that other large green building? Do they provide power to the facility?” Answer: “No. They aren’t working either. That’s why we have a diesel generator here.”

“How many people work here?” Answer: “Four.” “Including you?” Answer: “Well, yes. But then there are some university students here too. Sometimes they volunteer to help.” “Why are they here?” Answer: “To learn to raise sheep.” “Are you here year-round?” Answer: “Only if I want to be. I’ll probably go back to Denmark for a few months during the winter. I don’t know yet.”

Don’t get us wrong. This is a wonderful experience because it is a beautiful island, it is a most unusual tour, and our fellow guests are lots of fun and very lively. But an intensive educational experience about Greenland agriculture and the precise purposes of this ag station remain unknown to us. 

Whatever. We are having a fine time (except for Cathy on the boat). We return to the dock where our boat is arriving and struggle into our survival gear once again. Working together, we get each other on the boat and head back to town. Now we are facing the wind and the waves, making this return trip much rougher and much colder than the trip out. Twenty kidney-pounding minutes later, we gratefully arrive back in Qaqortoq. 

Our timing is just right. We shed the survival gear – outside sitting at picnic tables this time. Steve brings his and Cathy’s gear upstairs and then the nice Asian couple’s as well. We commiserate with them about how inaccurately the trip was described and tell them that, if they want to go to Destination Services to seek a refund for way underestimating the difficulties that people with mobility issues might have, we have their back. We feel really bad for them. It has been our experience that Oceania doesn’t often screw up, but they did this time. 

As soon as we are ready to return, a tender shows up. It’s got a full complement of guests returning to Sirena, and we are some of the last to be able to get on board. A ten-minute ride back and we’re home. It’s 5:30. 

Dinner at 6:30 at the Grand Dining Room. We return to our stateroom just in time for sailaway at 8:00pm. It has been quite an adventure today, much more than we had anticipated, that’s for sure.

Greenland has been an education for us. Nuuk appears to be booming. In fact, the population has indeed increased from 13,445 in 2000 to 19,261 this year, an enormous percentage increase vividly on display by all the new construction we see and the plethora of new multi-story apartment buildings. While the Inuit population is way, way more evident than Americans are led to expect, much of this growth is due to the immigration of Europeans seeking good jobs and a new way of life. The places we visited are lively and the people welcoming. The scenery we saw was extraordinarily beautiful. Now that we have been here, our attachment to this “region” of Denmark will remain with us forever.