Greenland – Day 7

Monday? We’ve been gone for seven days already?!

We were up numerous times during the night hoping to see the Northern Lights, but to no avail. Thankfully this was our ‘late day’ so sleeping in was an option. Our first scheduled event wasn’t until 1:45 pm so we slept in and ate breakfast late. Which was much to our advantage. One of our travel mates was looking to go to town and asked if we wanted to share a taxi. Instead of a taxi, we hopped the city bus (cheaper option, 15 crowns vs 75ish krones, and we knew the bus schedule for our hotel). Taking the bus we went into town and the three of us walked through numerous shops.

First up – the unique department store/grocery store across the street from the grocery store we visited a couple days ago. As far as selection, it could be compared to Walmart rather than a department store, but nothing as big as a Walmart. Lots of groceries, but small sections for household goods, health & beauty, toys, etc.

A few days ago, we had mentioned the vehicles we saw in town, including front end loaders with tire chains. Seeing these again today, we decided to show you a picture, as the tire chains for this type of tire is just flat impressive.

Our next stop was a bit of an upscale store, selling clothing and home décor. While waiting for our travel mate to finish browsing, a man behind the counter asked where we were from. He recognized “Missouri”, which was surprising as most people recognize “Kansas” and not “Missouri” thanks mostly to the Wizard of Oz. It turns out he was a foreign exchange student in the 90’s. He asked to be placed with a family in the south and was sent to Minnesota…. South of Canada, yes, but not the “south” he was looking for. It was much like Greenland for him, weather wise. He said he had a great time, spent Christmas in Iowa with his host family’s extended family, and took a bus trip from Minnesota to Arkansas giving him the chance to see more of the US. He also spent time in NYC while in transit. Small world!

The third shop was another hybrid shop. The majority was clothing, some home décor, and the entire back section was nearly its own store. When you live north of the Arctic Circle you need warm clothes, and this was one of the places well stocked with cold weather items. They had the normal coats, boots, mittens, cute little outfits that make tykes look like stuffed marshmallows, and an insulated miniskirt. No kidding – take the setup of an insulated puffer vest and sew it into a miniskirt. Seems a bit pointless, but we aren’t the fashion police.

The fourth stop was at Canada Goose, a clothing and coat store. Canada Goose coats are some of the highest quality and warmest you can buy (it is what our guide wears), however, you pay for that quality and warmth. After checking a couple of coats that were running around $1,200 we quickly decided our Lands’ End coats from Maine were quite warm enough.

The fifth stop was one we visited a couple days ago but only for a few minutes. Their specialty is somewhat upscale merchandise made from items in/around Greenland. Beautiful leather mittens made from lamb’s leather and lamb’s wool, jewelry made from Greenlandic rubies, artwork, and many items made from bones, antlers, seal skin, etc. It is a beautiful shop. Our travel mate was eyeing a few items, including a bracelet made from muskox antlers and minky whale bones. The person at the store inquired where we were from, and then advised us that the bracelet was not allowed into the US. Anything made of animals “from the sea” is banned and cannot come into the US. Our new friend opted for the very warm leather mittens (made completely of sheepskin), leaving the beautiful bracelet behind.

Our last stop was again somewhere we’d been, and we had another unique and enjoyable experience today. Our new friend saw a carved ring last week at the craftsman shop we visited Saturday and wanted to stop and buy it. The stock was less than 50% of what it was on Saturday, and the ring selection was nearly wiped out. She asked about a polar bear ring (carved using muskox bone) and disappeared into another room. When we finished browsing and joined up with her, she was holding sizing rings and talking to an artist who said he could make a ring today and later deliver it to our hotel, adding that the hotel knows him well and he frequently delivers orders to hotel patrons. They settled on the design and delivery, so she was set.

He was an extremely friendly man, telling us before we left about famous people who have visited the store, most notably Leonardo diCaprio. He also mentioned Martin Clunes, who is a British actor. Many may not recognize the name, but we watched the entire “Doc Martin” series of which he was the star so we’re familiar with, and fond of, Martin Clunes. Martin Clunes makes a lot of travel documentaries, and interviewed this artist as part of a trip to Greenland. He was very proud to show us the pic of him and Martin!

As we were running out of time, we caught a taxi and headed to the hotel. We had a short period of time before our excursion, so we grabbed a quick bite and prepared for the afternoon.

“Today is gonna be the best day ever. How do I know that? Because every day is the best day ever!” Why are we quoting a line a dog said in a movie? Because we saw dogs….and it was the best day ever!!

We had the opportunity to visit a sled dog camp!! Before going on, let us give some background on Greenlandic Sled Dogs else you’re going to feel sad and/or appalled at their living arrangements. Greenlandic Sled Dogs (GSDs) are one of the oldest breeds in the world, having been traced back 10,000 years. To keep the line pure the only other dog allowed north of the Arctic Circle are police dogs. So, they are not pets, they have a job to do, and they are bred to survive subzero temps. They live outside, sleeping on pallets or rocks or doghouses, and are chained apart from each other. This keeps them from killing one another as they fight for dominance to determine who is the alpha of the pack and subsequent hierarchy.

Now that we’re past that part – we visited Frank, who owns 70 GSDs! Rather than being a single owner of a single sled team, he and his partners are running this as a tourist business, specifically geared to providing tourist sled dog experiences. Because it is tourist oriented, unlike a private owner (who also will do tourist experiences), their business plan is heavily oriented towards friendly dogs, who are “socialized” to be friendly to new/different people.

During off-season, when the dogs are not pulling sleds, he allows tours to stop by and provide socialization with/for the dogs. Before meeting the dogs, he explained how Greenlandic sleds work as they aren’t the same as those used in Alaska (where they are on a single line, with pairs situated down the line). Rather than have all dogs on one harness, each GSD is on a separate lead allowing them to “fan out”. The sleds are made from plywood, and the parts are bound together with seal leather rather than nails. The leather strapping has give, allowing the sled to flex when traveling over rugged landscapes whereas nails would allow no give and a sled would quickly fall apart.

Here is a picture of Frank, showing us a “brake”. You just throw this under one of the treads (or both), and while it won’t stop the sled instantly, it slows down the sled while he gets the dogs to quit pulling. He indicated that you could also use it as a parking brake… besides keeping the sled from free-sliding, if the dogs decided to go, it gives him a few extra seconds to react.

And now, onto the dogs!!! The first dogs we met were some pups that were 10-12 weeks old. They were adorable, a bit mischievous and curious, and allowed to roam. This is an example of how hearty these dogs are – ice does not affect them.

Both Tim and Jay got suckered into giving belly rubs. (Well okay, let’s be honest, there wasn’t much suckering going on as of course both were happy to do so.)

Once a dog hits 6 months, by law they must be chained and are therefore assigned a spot and chained else “they start getting into trouble”, such as wandering off property. Sometimes if they begin getting too adventurous (and roaming too freely) they may get chained a little early. None of the dogs were aggressive (to humans) although they would sometimes go crazy if one of their brethren got too close to what they considered their area.

Most were very excited, jumping up and down waiting for us to get to them, and wanted to “cuddle” with us, meaning they want to jump up and put their paws on your chest. We were allowed to pet any and every dog, so long as the dog was receptive as we approached. A couple of dogs were a little shy, but many were in your face with that “come and pet me” excitement. They loved butt scratches, ear rubs, and belly rubs like any other dog. There was one pair (a male and a female) that were essentially chained together, so Tim was able to get double the petting done at a single time.

Their living conditions are hard to accept, since we’re used to dogs being the center of people’s worlds, but this is the world of the GSD. What helps is that their owner, Frank, truly cares about the dogs. The dogs have names, he knows their personalities, and knows the mother/pup and sibling relations of each dog. We would go so far as to say these are coworkers he is deeply fond of, not “just sled dogs”.

The trip back was different for each of us. The option was to ride the bus back to the hotel or walk back. Tim opted for the bus, Jay opted for the walk which was indicated would be 45 minutes. The walk turned into a hike over the mountain (strong term, it was more like a rugged, challenging hill) moving over and through rocks, ice, and icy vegetation.

There were amazing views of the bay, the city, and the airport! We took a wrong turn and had to redirect, so the hike turned into a nearly 75 minute “walk”. The others who opted to walk are all experienced hikers but Jay did relatively well keeping up. It is unlikely either of us will ever become a hiker, but after the past few days we can safely say we have hiked multiple times in Greenland.

Due to incoming storms, our flight to Nuuk tomorrow was moved up to hopefully get us into Nuuk before the storms arrived, so our tour leader was nice enough to reserve a table in the hotel restaurant for us. Not an organized meal, but a nice sit-down a la carte dinner with most of the others.

Let’s talk about the flight to Nuuk. As noted, it was moved up with the intention of getting us to Nuuk before the bad weather his. Bad weather as in rain with 16 mph winds that were predicted to gust up to 69 mph, for the two days we’re in Nuuk. Our two big activities in Nuuk were via boat (Northern Lights chasing and another village visit) and were cancelled in advance. Who knows what the next two days will bring, but we are confident there will be more stories to tell!

And yet another story to tell tonight! We were in our room working on this blog and someone knocked on the door around 10:05 pm. We immediately knew it was our new friend alerting us that the lights were out. As we had expected them much later, we didn’t have our wool long johns or gaiters/scarves on, and it was windy and miserable. The lights were different than two night ago as they were settled over the city – no obvious movement and never increasing in intensity. We stayed out as long as we could taking pics but had to give into the elements as the lights faded. The plan is to continue to monitor from our hotel room, and our woolens are laid out in case we have another knock on the door! Here are a couple of shots.

We hope to have a few more NL pics to share with tomorrow’s blog, but Mother Nature is much like a honey badger, doing whatever she wants. We are at her mercy.