25.06.2011 – 25.06.2011  1 °C

We received our early morning wake up call to find ourselves moving slowly towards a very large amount of pack ice. During the previous evening we had rounded the southern tip of Spitsbergen and made our way up the east coast between the main island, Spitsbergen and Edgeoya (another of the Svalbard islands on the RHS of Spitsbergen).

The ice was rated as 9:10 ice to water ratio, which means it was impassable for our ship—our ship is only rated for 4:10 ice to water so we had to turn our boat back and start back up the LHS of Spitsbergen (which we had just passed). The day was therefore spent with us sitting around listening to lectures and stories about Spitsbergen! I have to admit that I spent the majority of the time snoozing!!

Watching ice flow passed the boat is pretty surreal. Iceberg after berg floated passed our boat, and you can pick when we hit a big one because you can really feel the shudder and jarring go right through the boat!

Another great dinner and then Conductor and I spent the evening at the back deck bar; chatting and playing darts.

Great way to end a fairly slow day. Tomorrow we are back in the zodiacs wandering part of the tundra and checking out a specky glacier!