Magical midnight sun in Ilulissat, Greenland

Have you ever met someone who has been to Greenland?

Before going on this trip, the only person I knew who visited this magnificent island was the photographer who was leading this trip!

Simply put, it is not a common travel destination and when I was sharing with others that I will be visiting Greenland, people either confused it with Iceland or said 'wait, you can go there?'.

Yes, you can go to Greenland. No, it is nothing like Iceland. And yes, it is an absolutely spectacular, one of a kind destination.

I have been wanting to go to Greenland for almost a decade and I felt like I needed to make it a priority and book the trip sooner rather than later.

I have not taken any time off in the summers for about a decade. My work has some seasonal ebbs and flows and my summers are crazy busy, working 6 days a week. Plus, Vancouver is pretty stellar in the summers. Because of that, I would often travel in the fall and winter and stay put in the spring and summer.

Greenland photography trips often happen in the summer, especially when you are chasing the midnight sun... So due to both timing and finances (this trip is not friendly on the bank account), I postponed booking the trip for later, which was some undefined time in the future.

But you know what? Later is not guaranteed and before you know it, the opportunity may pass you by, so just book the darn trip, okay?

Taking my own advice, when the opportunity came to go to Greenland with photographers I know and trust, I paid the deposit without thinking twice. Managing my summer work schedule and saving for the remainder of the trip became a problem for the following year (these trips often book over a year in advance).

As the trip dates were approaching, I just worked extra hours before and after the trip to make sure I am not behind on anything (including adding a bike fit appointment at 8pm the day before my flight... ha) and you know what? Everything was okay! I do acknowledge that I am lucky to be self employed, having the ability to set my own hours, so that certainly helped.

How do you even get to Greenland?

Ooof. Getting to Greenland from Vancouver is not a quick and easy journey.

You would think that getting to Greenland from Canada would be relatively straight forward, right? Afterall, its our Northeastern neighbor and I was going to Ilulissat, which is on the west coast.

Guess again.

There are only two airlines that fly to Greenland - Iceland Air and Greenland Air. I couldn't find good flights from Vancouver to Iceland and I always wanted to check out Copenhagen, so I opted for Air Greenland, which flies from Copenhagen. I flew to Copenhagen via Montreal (15 hours), just to fly for ~6 hours back towards Canada again, then away from Canada back to Copenhagen only to fly over Greenland again on the way home. Yeah, it was about as fun as it sounds.

The route looked like this:

Vancouver -> Montreal -> Copenhagen (4 days) -> Kangerlussuaq -> Ilulissat (6 days) -> Kangerlussuaq -> Copenhagen (1.5 days) -> Frankfurt -> Vancouver.

Was it worth the effort and the cost? Hell yes!

I got to spend 4 days in Copenhagen before heading to Greenland and then another day in the city before heading back home, which was a nice bonus (and a story for another time).

There are actually two international airports opening in Greenland in the next year or so - in Nuuk and Ilulissat, so it should make it easier to fly there, especially from the east coast of Canada. To be completely honest, after experiencing Greenland first hand, I really dread that.

I think it might be a good thing that it is a bit of a mission to get there (not to mention the high cost). It's not like I don't want people to go to Greenland, I think tourism is a good thing and Greenland is awesome, but I worry about infrastructure, as well as the preservation of the environment and the culture (not to mention the delicate political climate with a certain USA president who seems to think Greenland could be for sale 🤬 and the fact that Greenland is under Danish rule, with the challenges associated with that). I worry about too many flights (and people) coming in. Tourism is important, but how much tourism is too much? I don't have the answers, I am just wondering out loud...

Politics aside (I wrote some thoughts about that through the lens of my Myanmar trip here), lets start with a few photos to break things up and move on to the some facts about Greenland, shall we?

As with all my posts, there is a link to a full photo gallery at the bottom of this post.

Greenland Basics

I added some links for more information about Greenland at the bottom of this section, if you are interested.

Greenland is also known as Kalaallit Nunaat.

The capital city is Nuuk, where just over a third of the islands ~55,000 population lives. The island is under Danish sovereignty and is inhabited mostly by Inuit. People mostly live along the south west and east coasts of Greenland.

There are no roads outside of the towns in Greenland, so road trips around this massive island are not possible. To commute between towns, you need to fly, use a boat, or by sled pulled by dogs (no, I'm not joking and no, it's not just for tourism. It's a viable source of transportation in Greenland).

Greenland is the largest island in the worlds at over 2 million km². To make things more impressive and unique, ~80% of the island is covered in an ice sheet that is older than 100,000 years old and several kilometers thick. Icebergs are formed where chunks of ice break where the land meets rivers and the ocean and let me tell you, these icebergs are impressive! They look like massive ice mountains, just floating in the ocean.

Of course, it's latitude is so high that the days are very long in the summer and extremely short in the winter.

The environment is harsh, so a lot of food needs to be imported. The food that is not imported includes a lot of meat (reindeer, lamb, mutton, and muskox) and fish (Arctic char, red fish, rockfish, cod, and halibut), given Greenland's culture around hunting and fishing.

We spent almost all of our time on the water but apparently, despite all the ice, there are over 520 plant species native to Greenland. Mostly blueberries, crowberries, birches and willows. The vegetation is only as tall as 50cm and if there are trees, they are only 3-4m.

As for wildlife, on the land there are polar bears, muskox and reindeer and a few species of spiders (and a lot of mosquitos). In the water, there are humpback whales, beluga whales, seals, Greenland sharks and fish like halibut, arctic char, Atlantic cod and Atlantic salmon. There are also puffins!

5,000 years ago, people started migrating to Greenland from North America across the frozen sea, so Greenlandic Inuit are descendants of Inuit who migrated from what is today Northern Canada (and Alaska). At least six different Inuit cultures migrated over the course of thousands of years, with the latest migration believed to be around 800 CE. There were also Norse settlers who was there between 982 CE and 1500 CE. The English and Norwegian visited in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries.

Greenland became a Danish colony in 1814, and was granted home rule in 1979. Similar to many other places that have been colonialized around the world, there have been issues with how Denmark treated Greenlandic people over the years. I consider Greenland a country, and I hope it will become one.

Fun fact - You don't get a Greenland stamp in your passport, but I went to the post office in Iluissat and they stamped my passport. I got a surprised look and a few questions about that from border control when I arrived back in Canada.

Information about Greenland - Links

Iluissat, Greenland

I was based in Ilulissat throughout my time in Greenland. It is Greenland's third largest city (4,600 people) and the biggest tourist draw in Greenland, for good reason, meaning there is fairly good infrastructure, relatively speaking, with hotels, etc.

We focused on photography, but even in our spare time before heading on the boat for the night, there were no traditional activities on offer that I could see, which is something to take into account while visiting. There is an Inuit Artist Workshop in Ilulissat, where you can visit Greenlandic artists and buy their work.

I would love to visit again and explore more remote places, but you gotta start somewhere, no?

Ilulissat is home to the Ilulissat icefjord, which is a UNESCO World Heritage site (it is believed that the Titanic iceberg originated there). There is little hike along a wooden pathway that leads to stellar views of the ice fjord.

It was a great place to practice flying my drone, although it was a bit challenging at times because of the height restrictions and the size of these icebergs. That was the only location I flew the drone from land, the rest of the time I flew it from a boat, which is a challenge on it's own (but it was super cool to see ourselves in the boats from the sky).

Sailing through the icefields

I don't know about you, but it's not often that I experience both sunset and sunrise without sleeping in between... In Greenland though, there is daylight 24/7 in mid to late July (which is when I was there). 24 hours of light? Let me tell you, it's weird and disorienting AF, but in a magical kind of way.

Midnight sun means that sunset and sunrise are beautifully blended into one, creating absolute magic and spectacular color displays, especially when experienced sailing through endless ice fields. I have no idea if these photos were taken during sunset, or sunrise... And I guess it does not matter.

Sailing among the giant icebergs felt like sailing at an undiscovered and isolated pocket of the world. As you stand on the boat, camera in hand, freezing cold (yes, even in the summer. It was -10 degrees in the ice fields), staring at your surroundings, you can't help but feeling kind of small and exceptionally lucky to be there, soaking it all in.

The icebergs are massive. And they move, sometimes faster than expected. There was one massive iceberg that was hours away from town, but the next day, we reached it within 40-60 minutes or so...

My favorite was sailing back to town at 4 or 5am each day after being on the boat the whole night. The excitement of shooting every iceberg in sight was replaced with a feeling of calmness, the light is soft and everything is just so quiet.

Oqaatsut, Rodebay (Red Bay)

A tiny town with a population of ~30 people... We wandered around, took some photos, and had a fantastic meal at H8, which is a tiny restaurant. You need to be reserve it well in advance and while I read reviews that lunch wasn't anything special, dinner was fantastic. The menu is three set courses that you need to order in advance (no issues with gluten free for me, down to really good GF bread).

Rodebay (Red Bay) got it's name from the blood that filled the bay because it was a spot for whale butchering in the past.

Greenland Huskies

Do not approach the huskies. In Greenland, they are work dogs, not pets - During winter time, sleds pulled by dogs are a mode of transportation. You will see (and hear) plenty of huskies in the towns. I am pretty sure there were more dogs than people in Oqaatsut!

Responsible tourism and a few additional considerations

I had so many people ask me if I rode my bike over there, and they couldn't believe that it was not really possible (because the whole no roads thing). Apparently there are some MTB trails, and you can ride over ice with a fat bike, but it is not straight forward or easily accessible and would have to be a whole other trip, with a fair bit of preparation. The airlines are also pretty picky about baggage weight and the cost of flying with my bike (or getting my hands on a fat bike to ride on ice) would have been pretty high. I found this article to be interesting though.

Don't take a cruise. Please don't do it. I'm not a fan of cruises in general, but in Greenland it seems even more tone deaf. It is so bad for the locals and for the environment, especially since Greenland is at the fore front of feeling the effects of climate change. I couldn't help by thinking about how Greenland is affected by climate change every single day I was there.

As you recall, I mentioned that I have mixed feelings about the international airports opening in Greenland and more flights coming in from the East Coast of the USA and Europe. Since there are no roads between towns and there is a lack of infrastructure, there is limited capacity for more tourism and things need to be developed gradually. I am worried that there aren't enough hotels, restaurants, etc and there is no way to build more without ruining nature. There just isn't enough inhabitable space to accommodate it all.

In addition to all that, will that benefit the locals? If you plan on visiting Greenland, please consider how tourism affects the locals, aiming to leave a positive footprint on the local economy and community. As an example, we all purchased goods like clothing and non perishable foods and then donated them to the locals - This both injects cash into the local economy by buying local, and helps those in need at the same time through the donations.

The natural environment in Greenland is challenging and harsh. There will be travel delays due to the environmental considerations, like fog... There will be flight cancellations and delays, sailing delays, etc. You need to be a patient and understanding traveler in Greenland and roll with the punches, even more so than in other destinations.

Will I go back to Greenland? Very likely. Probably to catch the Northern Lights for something that is the polar opposite to my summer trip.