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Tuesday 22 August 2017

The Eternal Fjord

The Eternal Fjord

It seems that the Eternal or Evigheds Fjord is one of the most famous in Greenland. It had been the subject of novels and of adventure literature for half a century or more. Tillman brought his beloved Mischief here to climb a few mountains and we chose to pay homage to his anchorage.

Leaving the delights of Hamborgerland behind we went north briefly before heading east up the long Fjord. A couple of knots of tide was against us most of the day and frigid air rolled down off the icecap. To the south the peaks were already gathering cloud but to the north was clear.

The Eternal Ford doesn't quite go on for ever but it's pretty long with many twists and turns along the way. Seven major glaciers snake down into it but I suspect none calve into the fjord itself as we encountered no ice.

Ten miles in we turned south and entered a broad bay with some rock islands guarding an inner bay to the east. We had heard that there might be strong winds to come so we took great care to dig the anchor in as far as we could. It went in easily and stuck hard.

The winds never came but the rain and the mist did. So too did the Ocean Endeavour, a small cruise liner with 80 staff and 120 young Canadians on board. As a youth development project they were touring the Arctic having started in Resolute Bay 2 weeks earlier. Much grey, wet weather had been encountered and the Eternal Fjord was to be no exception. The radio chat of the RIB drivers kept us entertained until, after a frigid swim, they upped their anchor to steam off at 20 knots to catch their flights from Kangerlussaq the next morning. We were left alone to enjoy the rain, the mist and the isolation of a Tillman anchorage.