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Svalbard part 24 |
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18 - 25 August 2003: Today we took a little trip. A friend of ours was able to borrow a boat at the UNIS because she belonged to the staff. We were also allowed to use the "UNIS staff cabin". A beautiful luxurious cabin in Kapp laila. Kapp laila is about 20 kilometers away from Longyearbyen. We left on the 18th of august around 6 in the evening. 
Birdcliff FuglefjellaBecause the boat was so small we had to make two trips to bring all the luggage and people. Again we were very lucky with the weather, the sea was calm and the sun was shining brightly. 
Birdcliff FuglefjellaOn the way we had a wonderful view of the birdcliffs of Fuglefjella. The big rocks with the bright green vegetation under it (because of the nutrients in the bird guano) looked amazing. Unfortunately the birds weren't there any more because they had finished with their breeding. But we saw a lot of nice species in the water like Black Guillemots, Brunich's Guillemots and more puffins. 
Birdcliff Fuglefjella |
Kapp lailaAt 11 o'clock in the evening we were all in Kapp laila (including our luggage) so we could start our dinner. We already saw some common seals in the water but now that the tide was getting low it became clear to us that the whole bay was filled with seals. We counted more than 20 seals on a dry beach 
Skull of a whaleAfter dinner we took a very nice walk along the coast. On the beach we found the skull of a whale. We also saw a Long-tailed Skua flying over. Back in the cabin we found a guestbook. In the guestbook they described how they repaired the door that was destroyed by a polar bear a couple of months ago. The story was complete with some hair that the polar bear had left in the cabin. A little exciting to think that there really are polar bears walking around here. 
Birdcliff FuglefjellaThe next morning we woke up at 11 am. Afterwards we had a nice breakfast and we discovered that our boat was lying on the beach because of the low tide. We decided to push the boat into the water. Because the sea was totally calm again we decided to go all at one time in the boat to Longyearbyen. This went fine. On the way back we saw many puffins and guillemots in the water. There were also fulmars flying close to the boat and suddenly an arctic skua flew very near the boat for at least 20 meters. The other days we were busy doing fieldwork and entering data at the UNIS |
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