Getting to Svalbard for a seasons work was a long-time dream come true, and one of the many perks of living and working there is getting locals rates for various activities which is how and why I went on a 5 day cruise with Hurtigruten, from Longyearbyen, up to the 80th parallel and back again.
I shared a cabin with a fellow staff member, aboard the historic ship MS Nordstjernen, which was doing its last summer of commercial cruises. The ship itself was built in 1956 by Blohm & Voss in Hamburg and later used many summers for Svalbard cruising. Nordstjernen was one of the last of the old-style vessels in Hurtigruten’s fleet and carries a nostalgic feel of earlier polar travel.
One of our standout moments came at Moffen Island, a sandbank island just above 80° N famous for its walrus haul-outs. We could clearly see the walrus grouped there, lying on the sandbank that is Moffen Island, giving the sense that we really were at one of the world’s far-north marine places - it was wild to think the actualy north pole was another 1100km further north though.
Another significant stop was at Ny‑Ålesund (78°55′N) one day out from returning back to Longyearbyen. Ny-Ålesund began life as a coal-mining settlement and later transformed into one of the northernmost year-round research outposts in the world. It’s historically notable as the airship base for Roald Amundsen’s 1926 Norge airship expedition, where the airship was tethered before the Arctic flight - the mast he used to secure it to still stands, just outside one edge of the settlement. Research stations from many countries operate there — the UK, Norway, Japan, Germany, France, South Korea, India, China, the Netherlands and Italy, to name a few, each with their own building. The place felt remote but serious: modern labs and miners’ huts side by side, a museum, a small shop, a gym, a dog yard of huskies, a busy port area and staff living there year-round. (Yes, Id love to do a season there!)
Beyond the stops, the broader history of the Svalbard archipelago anchors the trip: in earlier centuries, Dutch and English whalers and sealers established shore-bases such as Smeerenburg and others on the northwest coast of Spitsbergen. These whaling stations processed whales for blubber and oil, leaving try-works, iron caldrons and grave sites on the gravel beaches. That hard human enterprise defined much of the early European Arctic presence. On our landings we saw the ruins of cabins used by fox hunters and whaling men, remains of the fire places and even large pots in some places, where whale blubber was processed, a graveyard or two etc So amazing!
On board the Nordstjernen wooden panelling, brass fittings, a panorama lounge, a café and open deck-areas built into the ship’s architecture all still reflect its heritage. Although mid-summer meant calmer waters and less ice cluttering the sea, the Arctic still felt immense and open. We spent time on deck simply watching bird life — seabird cliffs, kittiwakes, guillemots, fulmars and my favourite, puffins — and scanning shorelines for wildlife signs - most of all polar bears! (Though we didnt see any on that voyage, I still saw 14 during my season of work at the hotel) Landings were modest: hikes from shoreline, visits to old cabins and ruins, all with a constant awareness of the polar environment.
Crossing above the 80th parallel felt significant. There was no dramatic marker other than the GPS readout and the certificate signed by the expedition team,
If I were to summarise: this trip was about wilderness, history and latitude. The vintage ship, the 80°N milestone, the whaling-station history and the research-settlement of Ny-Ålesund combined to make it something unique. From the deck of the Nordstjernen, surrounded by sea, light and Arctic calm, I saw a side of Svalbard few get to experience and its something I will never forget.
