"Northern lights and extreme beauty." Kangerlussuaq by Gwyndra

"if you only see Kangerlussuaq!" This message was promtly served to me by the girl in front of me in the queue to boarding the plane bound for Greenland... But even if it´s true I still had an amazing trip! Kangerlussuaq is situated on the weat coast of Greenland and is the arrivial point of every plane to Greenland. From here you can go to many domestic terminals.... that is if you have the money. It´s very expensive. Kangerlussuaq is an old american air base and has been a key point in the radar-surveillance etc. for many years but is now a normal town with the main airport in Greenland and the only thing under surveillance is the weateher by the meteorologists from Denmarks Meteorological Office. I went with a group of young people from the association FNU which wants to promote the connections of young people between the Nordic countries by seeing the similarities and differences by travelling and other co-nordic arrangements.

View over the Ice Cap

Eventhough the city is so small there is actually something to see everyday. We went out on dog sledge as you can see on the above picture, a sightseeing in the town (not extremly exiting, but a good way to get the story of the town), some took a trip on snowmobiles (you must be a daredevil is my impression ;), a muskox "safari" and a trip to the Ice Cap. Kangerlussuaq is actually the only place in Greenland where you don´t have to go by helicopter to the Ice Cap. Some years ago Volkswagen decided to make a testing area on the Ice Cap and constructed a gravel road to the edge. In the end it didn´t turn out to bee a very good idea so VW handed the rights to the road to the city and now the tourists are using it. It´s not far from the city about 25 km but the ride still takes 2 hours each way and you go by 8wh :) The ride is a experience in it self and I can only recommend it. Both the scenery and the bumpy ride. It´s only in the winter it´s actually possible to go up on the Ice Cap beacuse in the summer the melting makes is vey dangerous. But you will get an experience og extreme beauty whenever you go!
The ice is known to talk... you can´t hear it on the cap but bring back a piece and you will hear it when you return to the town! It´s actually just the temperature differrence that makes the is melt... and as itis compressed snow there is many many tiny bubbles of air and when they burst it´s makes little delicate clicks.

Northern lights taken by fellow traveler

This was the most fantasctic and beautiful experience I´ve had in a very long time! The green wawes rolling over the clear night sky. There is really no satisfactory way to describe it... The locals told us that it was a very good period that we were there. On a scale from 1-10 it was a 10 and it didn´t happen very often. I can only recommend that to go... equipped with warm warm clothes and a fellow traveler to massage your sore neck... Belive me, it hurts the day after when you have tilted your head backwards for hours and hours in the freezing cold ;)

• Pros:The snow, the ice, the lights!
• Cons:Nothing but the smell of the diesel driven vehicles
• In a nutshell:A pretty good introducion to Greeenland!