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Audley in the Arctic
We work with a number of carefully selected
cruise companies whose journeys of adventure
include, amongst other places, the infamous
Northwest Passage, the Inuit capital – Iqaluit – on
Baffin Island, a Viking route that combines
Greenland and Newfoundland as well as dedicated
cruises to the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen.
Accommodation on these ships is simple but this
is compensated for by the smaller, more intimate
size of the vessels. Fascinating expert guest
speakers bring natural history and anthropology
to life and also conduct shore-based activities to
some of the planet’s most fascinating and remote
regions. Most days will see you getting off the ship
once and often twice a day in small, guided groups.
Cruises, lasting seven nights or more, can be
seamlessly woven into tailor-made journeys
through Canada and Alaska.
History and Culture
The Inuit have been in the Arctic region for
millennia, having arrived, it is thought, when
their ancestors followed herds of game across
an ice bridge that crossed the Bering Sea.
Expedition cruises reveal how the different
cultures fished, hunted, sang, danced, and carved
exquisite sculptures during your visits to the
small settlements that dot the remote coastlines.
In some locations Nordic culture prevails,
particularly in Spitsbergen and Greenland where
you may encounter brightly coloured houses,
fascinating museums and a quiet appreciation of
the significance of the early exploits by Viking
navigators in the 8th century. It wasn’t until the
early 19th century that European expeditions set
out in search of the famous Northwest Passage,
the seasonal route that connects the Atlantic
and the Pacific oceans. Sir William Edward Parry
led several expeditions, but success had to wait
for Amundsen’s voyage in 1905. Hopes that the
route could provide speedier trade between
Europe and Asia proved impractical, due to the
sea being frozen over for most of the year, but
the inspirational spirit of adventure can still be
felt in this remote and hazardous part of the
world. The final resting place of several of Sir
John Franklin’s crew, near Resolute, is a solemn
reminder that this is truly an untamed wilderness.
Musk oxen
Beaufort
Sea
Cambridge Bay
Bathurst
Inlet
Spitsbergen shoreline
Wildlife
Magnetic
North Pole
Victoria
Island
Arctic
Ocean
Resolute
King
Elu
William
Island
Inlet
NUNAVUT
North Pole
Ellesmere
Island
Devon
Island
Lancaster Sound
Somerset
Island
Igloolik
Cape Dorset
SPITSBERGEN
Baffin Island
Diverse and highly adapted to their environment,
the wildlife of the Arctic is a major attraction.
On any Arctic cruise you are likely to see a
mixture of marine and terrestrial wildlife in
abundance. Marine animals include a variety of
seals and walrus as well as many types of whales
including the beluga – meaning ‘white one’ in
Russian, humpback whales or even the rare
narwhal. A likely sighting is of polar bears, adapted
for a marine lifestyle and officially classed as a
marine mammal. On land musk oxen, which are
neither oxen nor possessors of musk glands, can
be seen sharing territory with huge herds of
caribou that calve in the spring. Seabirds are
found in fantastic numbers: ornithologists are kept
in seventh heaven for the duration of the trip.
Davis Strait
IQALUIT
Kuujjuaq
Longyearbyen
GREENLAND
LABRADOR
Qaqortoq
Labrador
Sea
0 350 miles
0 563 kilometres
Scenery
Inuit children
Arctic Expedition Cruising
Telephone: 01993 838 700
ICELAND
REYKJAVIK
L’Anse aux Meadows
Bonavista
ST JOHN’S
NEWFOUNDLAND
There are steep sided fjords and cliffs that are
home to great bird colonies, but these in turn
can be dwarfed by some of the coastal mountain
ranges that are topped by icefields. Low lying
tundra is blanketed with fields of blooming wild
flowers in the summer while glaciers and sea ice
can be blindingly bright as you land to explore.
On the sea, ice floes can cover hundreds of
square kilometres while vast icebergs make their
solitary journeys along the great ocean currents.
The joy of the region is the overwhelming feeling
of being in a true wilderness at the dawn of time.
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