We woke up to cloudy weather and 9 degrees C. outside with calm winds. Today we disembark our ship and return by charter to Oslo. Luggage was gone off the ship by 7 AM and we left the ship after breakfast at 8:30. Our flight does not leave until 1:30 so Lindblad had planned for some additional touring in Svalbard before heading to the airport.

The first stop was at Camp Barentz, where dogsled animals are raised, trained and housed. We were given some information about the dogs who prefer living outdoors year round because they tend to overheat. The dogs were a friendly bunch and loved to be petted, which some people did. On the site was also a replica of the cabin used by the 16th century explorer, Willem Barentz who hunted here. As you would expect it is minimalistic in its furnishings. The last part of the tour was to see a brief slide show presentation on polar bears as we ate waffles with lingonberry jelly or brown cheese. Coffee or tea was also available.

From there we returned the short distance to town and were taken to the Svalbard museum, which focuses on the history and wildlife of the area. There are many artifacts and stuffed animals of the wildlife that live here. Most of the exhibits have English signage so we were able to understand what we were seeing. It is extremely well done and well worth a visit.

It was now 11:15 and time to get to the airport. This turned out to be the worst part of the morning as two charter flights were trying to check in at the same time. It took one hour to check our luggage and get our boarding passes. I guess it does not matter much as we would have still had to wait for departure even if we had checked in quickly. I doubt if there are many commercial flights to Svalbard. The only thing I saw during my time at the airport were these charter flights bringing people to/from the expedition ships.

The flight left about 20 minutes late but we arrived pretty much on time. We had to recheck through immigration (even though Svalbard belongs to Norway) but it went quickly and smoothly this time. Our airport hotel (Radisson Blu) and final dinner was supposedly only 280 steps away. We tried counting to verify that but lost count on the way. Anyway it was quite close and the airport provides free luggage carts which you can leave at the hotel, even taking them to your room. Keys and check-in was prearranged (a nice advantage of being on a tour) so we were in our rooms quickly to rest and prepare for dinner. Dinner was listed as a buffet which I was leery of since it was at a big hotel but ended up pleasantly surprised at the quality and variety of the offerings.

We bid farewell to our fellow travelers. Steve was headed back to Seattle and work; Zoe and Julie were headed to Paris where they had tickets to see the quarter-finals of the Women’s Soccer World Cup (USA versus France, no less) then on to Bilbao, Spain for another two week Spanish immersion course (they did one last year) and Yvonne and I are headed for a 5 day “Norway in a Nutshell” tour of the fjords. More on that tomorrow.