For The Love of Travel

Pond Inlet, Nunavut is a hamlet of about 1,500 Inuit at the top of Baffin Island. The town’s economy is largely service based with government being the largest employer.

After being cleared by Customs to land in Canada, we took zodiacs to the shore to visit the Tununiq-miut theatre group for a performance of throat singing and demonstration of Inuit games.

Gorgeous 10 degrees, with sunshine and fabulous cloud formations!!

Tonight, passenger Elaine Bernstein ( accompanied by Naomi Lehman) performed ” Songs at Sea”, a classical vocal recital. Gabriel Faure, Ambroise Thomas and F. Paolo Tosti were my faves in the program.

We were woken this morning with an announcement from the bridge….bowhead whales at 11 o’clock (Isabella Bay)….. Throwing clothes on, we rushed on deck to be treated to the sight of 4 hugh 50 ton whales cavorting in front of the ship. Bowheads are surface feeders and oxygenate by breathing through their nostrils on the top of their heads….so we saw lots of plume being blown. Lovely!

We managed to eat some breakfast before another announcement, walrus and some more polar bears (Nanuqs in Inuit) ahead……they were in the distance needing serious binocular power ( Eagle eye, Leica or Swarovski models) to see them in detail. I saw what looked like a rock with my bino set. Am investing in new ones on return home!

The National Geographic photo team is calling for 1 photo selected by each person on board and the experts will critique these (anonymously) in a session after dinner tonight. It is great to have such talent, in both staff and passengers…have learnt a lot.

Took 2 lovely photos from Petermann Ice Island. It arrived in its current location in Baffin Bay in 2012 and was created as a result of a calving from the Petermann ice shelf way up in the north. Magnificent !