Monacobreen / Woodfjorden
Monacobreen or, Monaco glacier, named after the Prince of Monaco and his early 1900’s surveying expedition to this area, is truly a glaciological wonder. It was this frozen river that drew us deeper and deeper into the landscape today. Taking to kayaks and Zodiacs we cruised deep into Leifdefjord and the waterways that were recently occupied by this huge mass of ice before it retreated further into the very fjord it created. While the glacier’s face itself was a humbling sight, it was really the glacial offspring, or icebergs that lured us into the details of the area.
When a piece of ice breaks off the face of a glacier and falls into the water (if it happens to be a tidewater glacier such as Monacobreen) the term for this is called “calving”- just as a mother cow would give birth to a calf the glacier “calves” chunks of ice. These pieces, both big and small, mesmerized those of us who took the time to look into the crystal structures. From large, house-sized structures to tiny pieces of brash ice barely afloat above the water’s surface the details were uniformly intricate. Thousands of tiny air bubbles could be seen in every piece of ice, each of which was held in suspension in a nearly clear medium giving the impression one was looking into space. Hours went by photographing and marveling over the beauty.
With our fill of icescapes we cruised deep into Woodfjord, the main fjord system which Leifdefjord is an arm of. Nearly at the head of the waterway we headed to shore to explore a completely different environment, one full of life and color despite our extremely high latitude (80 degrees north by nights end!!). Hiking along true arctic tundra we stepped around and photographed an impressive variety of low growing flowers including: Svalbard poppy, Moss Campion, Whitlow grass, Scurvy grass, Tufted Saxifrage and innumerable crustose lichen.
Those who preferred to look up rather than down set off into the hills to take in the post-glacial landscape from a couple hundred feet about sea level. Peering out over Woodfjord and its many tributaries solidified the extreme scale and isolation of this area. Secure in the fact the ship would be a better place to spend the night, we scrambled back to sea level and our eventual push to 80 degrees north latitude – our northern record for the trip!
