Day 11: Ittoqqortoormitt, Greenland
Yes, I know you’ve all heard of this place but struggled with how to spell it properly! Right?
But before we reached this little town, the ship had to navigate a fjord filled with icebergs. There were so many icebergs that one could almost leap from iceberg to iceberg (if you were willing to freeze your butt off and were very good at long jump). So throughout the night, you could hear and feel the ship bump into many icebergs.
Arrived at Ittoqqortoormitt early in the morning with the sun shining on the colourful houses.
This is the most isolated settlement in Greenland, with less than 500 people living in these colourful houses.
In the past when people were unable to read, the colours had meaning:
- Red was for churches and stores, including the houses where the priest or store owner lived
- Yellow was for hospitals, including the house where the doctor or nurses lived
- Green was for telecommunications buildings
- Black was for the police and
- Blue was for factories and fish plants
These days, they can choose the colour to paint their houses
Here’s some of the sights of Ittoqqortoormitt….the church, the Danish National Evangelical Lutheran Church.
The football field, with a visiting Arctic hare…
The view from the helicopter pad, and the airport building …
The supermarket, and one of the waterfront properties….
The dogs (all used for dog sledding) many puppies, and apparently the dogs only get fed once a week
The muskox skeletons which sit on some of the roofs, and an example of the polar bear pants worn by the ladies
The afternoon was spent doing a zodiac cruise around the town’s coastline. Lots of wonderfully shaped ice bergs and a small waterfall.
Comments
12 responses to “Hello from the Northern Hemisphere”
Looks great I like the idea of the significance of the different coloured buildings
Also I want polar bear pants but I have to work out where I could use them
How picturesque. Trust you to find the pups Sara. Very interesting place indeed. Keep more coming please.
I’m not happy about the dogs only being fed once a week!
That sounds very unkind even cruel 😢
Yeah, I have also always struggled with how to pronounce Ittoqqortoomitt. Love the photos!
We could all make use of polar bear pants in Sydney today.
How’s life on Scenic Eclipse? Just like before?
Where’s the coffee shot?
Wow! goes close to describing it. Sensational pictures, great stories, informative and wonderful.
Glad to see it’s all going well. And probably only a tad colder than Sydney at the moment!
What a gorgeous town. Beautiful shots. Terry re pants depends on how drunk you are. Seen any other animals Sar?… xxxooo
Very pretty town but don’t think I’d like to live there . Poor puppies ! Bet there aren’t any fat ones there !
What do the 500 residents do for a living?!
Beautiful place 🙂
❤️🙏👏🏻 did they feed you? Is that once a week as well? Maybe photo of some of your food!
this is a repeat Sar – or have you gone back to check on a few facts??
Has the link gone to the wrong day? We have already had this interesting news. xx