Filling in some gaps in Spain, a Greenland cruise and I'm getting a tattoo!

[Flashback]

Actually here is one....... it ended up arriving 3 days later and not to where it said it would be. It then wasn't send up to the town I was told it would be and finally was told I'd get it............... when we finish the cruise. Hey ho. No compensation given, but I did sprain my ankle quite badly so they covered that bill.

 

[RooFlyer]

I can confirm @Flashback 's travails with his bag. I mean - how does a charter flight to a cruise starting in a very remote port take off without every bag checked as being on board? And then the faffing around as to where it was and where it would go - only to find that it went to Nuuk!

Ilulissat - its a popular spot due to the Ilulissat Icefjord (UNESCO world heritage) that is another prolific 'calver' - the greatest in the northern hemisphere. A bit unusual in that the front of the glacier is some way up the narrow fjord and massive icebergs clog the channel, often being grounded along the way until they melt a bit, re-float and are released into the sea, at the town. Hence all the (relatively small) icebergs as we approached last night.

We woke up to an overcast day, bit of fog and some rain forecast.



In the right background are the icebergs flowing out of the ice fjord, left to right.



Activities offered were boat trips amongst the icebergs, flights and walks of various length. The boat trips and flights were all expensive, so @k_sheep got busy and booked us nine on a private boat trip, for ???half the cost.

We took the boat zodiac into the port, which was very busy. Ilulissat is Greenland's thirst largest town and is growing rapidly, with tourism and fishing being the largest industries. In the town 'tours and activities' are advertised on every second building.





We went out on a 10-seater open motorboar/zodiac . I was a bit apprehensive at first, thinking of three hours exposed to the rain, but the rain held off and it was a remarkable adventure.













@k_sheep and +1 bravely took the front seats, completely exposed. It was cold!

 

[RooFlyer]

As it turned out, a very large berg that was grounded and clogging up the ice fjord re-floated the day before yesterday, so we were able to penetrate far into the fjord compared to cruises to date, this year. This is a record of all the cruises done this year, leaving from the port on the right. The ice fjord is emerging at the bottom right. We are at '1' in the lower centre, with yesterday, just 2 cruises that weren't forced to cruise the outer reaches.



Basically it was zooming amongst massive icebergs

Fishing for cod on longlines.



Returning to town

 

[RooFlyer]

Like I said, its a very busy port. There are possibly more boats than cars





The group re-gathered in the gin palace for a de-brief and G&Ts, with the Ts by this time kindly supplied by @Flashback . I was sitting by the balcony door, when I heard a whooshing noise. Thar be whales!





Three humpbacks gliding by, very close to the ship

Later, we weighed anchor and again glided and manoeuvred our way out through the ice pack.

Hard to see, but the view from the observation loun ge was 180 degrees of icebergs.



And the view down below would normally be a but unnerving.

 

[RooFlyer]

The next day we spent moored off some small town where a ship Vs town soccer match was held and you could also participate in 'Milkaffe' - go to someone's place for coffee and cake. Neither of those interested me, and it being a cold and overcast day, I stayed on board, nothing to report.

We got our de-boarding briefing which, like many of the briefings, was just a bit vague. There is no printed program on this voyage/ship - you have to rely on a simplified presentation on the TV.

Overnight we had sailed calmly up the Kangerlussuaq fjord and were moored in the navigable head of the fjord. Zodiacs to get off, then 25 min bus to the airport.

Unusually, air check-in and immigration was to be held on board. I guess there was a reason for this, but its not an ideal situation.

Checked bags outside your door by midnight, as usual. But they were only taken down to the theatre. At 6:15am the first 3 colour groups were told to assemble at the theatre to start check-in. So about 50 people were there. No, no we'll do it by individual colour groups - you are too early. No, we are not. We've done exactly as we were told. And of course a proportion of the pax were oblivious to all this and simply joined the queue.

So then you had to collect your bag from one part of the theatre (amongst all the fixed chairs and benches), trundle it forward with you to the check-in 'desk', then part with it, duly tagged, then have your passport stamped.





We saw bags being loaded into a container on a barge tied to us. Good sign - or so we thought.





An hour or so later, first call to get on zodiacs. Then nothing .... nothing ..... We make our way down to the mudroom to find 5 zodiacs ready. We told them about no calls upstairs. The exped leader, who makes these calls is also departing, so I think that led to come non-communication.






At the airport, no one said, but join the security line. This is where it really went off the rails. Long line, 1 x-ray machine. High number of pax clueless about what to take out etc - & no-one saying. Result? Just as a bag is about to go under the ex-ray, Q about liquids & gels, computers made. Oh, so then in >50% of cases, bag had to be opened and rifled through, right there. Sometimes twice. God, it was painful to watch. The next guy didn't learn anything from the guy in front, so same result. And again. And again.



And there are check-in counters there, so still don't know the reason for on-board check-in.



The bird



Then we were delayed on board for an hour as there was some sort of issue in getting the bags off the boat. WTF?

Eventually away, me in 2C again and @k_sheep took this pic as we flew over Greenland. Text book medial moraines.

 

[SuePa]

They messed up our disembarkment, too.
Our flight to Copenhagen stopped in Reykjavik and somehow, 7 people who should have still been on the plane were missing. We sat on the tarmac for almost an hour while the flight attendants walked up and down mispronouncing names, trying to work out who was missing. I'm not sure what was resolved, but no-one reboarded and eventually we took off.
Then, when we finally arrived in Copenhagen, there was another delay while the border officers huddled in the booth, occasionally calling out questions and talking on the phone. One officer came out and waved all the Schengen passports through and eventually told the rest of us that the wrong passport stamp had been issued in Greenland and they needed to find out what to do about it. They finally decided to give us all new stamps and we were allowed in. It was well after midnight by the time we got to our hotels.