Perhaps you haven’t heard of Svalbard. That’s understandable. It’s a lonely Norwegian archipelago in the Arctic Ocean, far, far above the Arctic Circle. Longyearbyen, the town we visited on the island Spitsbergen, is the world’s northernmost settlement with a population over 1000 (it’s got about 1700). It’s located at 78° North latitude, a mere 813 miles from the North Pole. And take it from us, it’s a trip. Midnight sun! Polar bears! Santa’s abandoned coal mine home!

Longyearbyen is in the polar bear protection zone, so you’re allowed to wander around on your own. At the edge of town you encounter polar bear warning signs, and you’re not permitted beyond that point without some flash-bangs and a rifle (or a guide with those things). And you’re not allowed to carry a rifle without a Norwegian license.

If you have heard of Svalbard, it’s probably because it’s the home of the Global Seed Vault. We sort of got to see it. The day was extremely foggy, meaning our guide couldn’t guarantee there were no polar bears lurking nearby, meaning we weren’t allowed out of the vehicle.

 

Jen got a nasty case of polar mania and waded barefoot in the Arctic Ocean. Kent was smart enough to keep his shoes on. Jen is proud to say she still has all her toes.

One of our novels takes place partially on Svalbard, so this part of the trip technically counted as research. Now that we’re home we need to go in and tweak some descriptions, enrich the prose with our lived experience.

The photo in the lower left has a lot going on. There’s the snowmobile trail sign (Scooterløype), a glacier hiding in the clouds between the two mountains, and, halfway up the mountain on the left, the abandoned coal mine (Mine 2B) where Svalbard’s children are told Santa lives. Yeah. It’s not a lot to look at, but in the winter they put lights in it, so there’s that.

We saw many of the world’s northernmost things. Northernmost sundial: see photo above. Northernmost car dealer: Toyota. Northernmost gas station: Circle K (seriously). Northernmost brewery: Svalbard Bryggeri (Kent recommends the Spitsbergen Stout).

Since we’d pretty much run out of North, we concluded our visit to Svalbard and headed south.

To be continued next week.

Upon Kent’s retirement we took a big ol’ trip, partially to celebrate, partially to break Kent of his “check work email every 10 minutes around the clock” habit.

Our first stop was Norway. We’d been there once, briefly, about a decade ago, and it was great to be able to spend more time exploring. We started in Oslo and worked our way north.

We visited small cities and tiny fishing villages, an aquarium north of the Arctic Circle, and a nature park where we got to go inside the wolf pen and pet real life actual wolves. Somehow Jen was able to convince Kent to leave his new lupine clan behind so we could continue our explorations.

Eventually we made it all the way to Nordkapp, the North Cape, where the Atlantic and Arctic Oceans meet. We had gorgeous weather, which is apparently a rarity, but it was hella windy up on the plateau. We ran back and forth a lot to get pictures of each other with the globe statue. The visitor’s center goes deep underground, with a movie theater, a museum dedicated to a visit from the King of Thailand, a light show, and access to the King’s View, a lookout area built into the face of the cliff where it is considerably less windy.

 

What do you do when you reach the northernmost point of continental Europe? If you’re Rune Skelley, you keep going north, of course! More on that next week.