Top Of The World The Polaris Is Home To Out-Of-Their-Element Humans On A Trip Through The High Arctic

Ice hammered on the hull of the Polaris as the adventure ship roamed the high Arctic north of Norway.

The banging ice chunks sounded like bass notes on a steel drum. Ice swarms ahead filled the radar screen.

Destination: Svalbard, the top-ofthe-world Norwegian archipelago that includes the glacier-decked islands of Spitsbergen and Nordaustlandet.

“Let’s see how far we can get,” said Capt. Kenth Grankvist.

Polaris was approaching 80 degrees north latitude in the Arctic Ocean - only 600 miles from the North Pole - on a journey across the top of the world.

Grankvist would be on the bridge 19 hours this day to guide Polaris safely through the polar ice (admiring crew members call the captain, a 30-year veteran of Arctic navigation, the “Ice Master”).

“This is what we are here for,” the skipper said. “Here in the ice is where we will find the polar bears and the other animals.”

They call this “expedition cruising.” The objective is to position the 80 passengers aboard Polaris in wild places, then take them close-up to wildlife in Zodiac landing craft.

The crew includes a staff of naturalists who pilot the Zodiacs and lecture on flora and fauna wherever Polaris travels.

They can tell you all about sea birds, how mother and father murres share the duty while incubating the eggs of their young; how far tiny Arctic terns fly to nest here in summer (all the way from the Antarctic, about 11,000 miles), how much a polar bear cub weighs at birth (a little more than one pound).

New York-based Special Expeditions, the cruise operator, does this sort of wilderness cruising all over the world, from Alaska to the Amazon.

The clientele is as adventurous as the itineraries.

Most are seniors - curious, active professionals who have been many places, done many things. They are retired business executives, engineers, scientists, educators, physicians and attorneys.

Some would go swimming in 38-degree water to celebrate crossing the Arctic circle. And some would brave icy winds and climb mountains to view spooky rock formations.

“They have a love of life - they certainly don’t act their ages,” says Gunnel Cullborg, Polaris’s chief purser.

Grace Schaible, an attorney from Fairbanks, Alaska, was on her fifth cruise to Svalbard.

Why would an Alaskan travel here to see more ice and snow?

“To see polar bears,” she said. “You can’t do this on a ship back home.” (There’s no cruising on Alaska’s side of the Arctic Ocean because Alaska lacks the Gulf Stream/North Atlantic currents that “warm” the waters around Norway.)

But there is much more to Svalbard than ice and snow, said Mary Jane Mann, a businesswoman from Lancaster, Pa.

“It’s the beauty - it has me gasping,” she said as the midnight sun flicked golden streaks across the Arctic sky.

Polaris’s voyage into the land of the midnight sun builds like a symphony.

From Bergen, the busy seaport on Norway’s southwestern coast, Polaris travels north to pretty fiords and fishing villages.

But once past Tromso, a frontier city of 52,000 in Norway’s far north, Polaris ventures alone into polar ice and the mysterious islands of Svalbard.

The date is July 9. Spitsbergen is in view.

High mountains seem pasted against the sky. Massive glaciers wind down from the mountains like spilled meringue.

Show time!

A humpback whale leaps from the sea, then dives with a salute of its tail flukes.

Playful harp seals twirl like porpoises ahead of the ship.

Then the first polar bear sighting - the bear is strolling across a slab of polar-pack ice about 300 yards from the ship. A loner, an Arctic monarch.

Then, a spectacular sight - dozens of harp seals basking on drifting ice cakes, with a backdrop of glaciers shining like blue diamonds.

“Not dozens, hundreds of them,” corrects Stefan Lundgren, a Polaris naturalist from Sweden.

It is time to go ashore in Hornsund Bay, near the southern tip of Spitsbergen. Passengers already had been briefed on using the “Zodiac grip” when boarding the inflatable craft for shore tours. The Zodiac “drivers” (as the naturalists call themselves) are first aboard the rafts. They reach out for a passenger’s wrist - as the passenger reaches for and grasps the naturalist’s wrist. It’s a safety lock.

But one woman is a bit timid about stepping onto the rim of a bouncing Zodiac.

“Just fall into my arms,” invites Larry Prussin, a guide from Yosemite, Calif. And she does.

Ashore, the passengers are greeted by a chorus from thousands of kittwakes, murres and other birds nesting in the crevices of a 1,500-foot-high cliff. Their cries are so noisy that the visitors have to shout to be heard.

An anxious Arctic tern swoops to attack Robert Hager, a retired Boeing executive from Washington state. He is walking too near an unseen nest on the tundra. Terns are rather careless about where they build their nests.

Hager ducks, laughs and gives the bird the right-of-way.

Arctic wild flowers, purple saxifrage and moss campion - “little miracles,” one passenger calls them - carpet the tundra. The blossoms seem to be hugging the ground for warmth.

Gretchen Pederson, a naturalist from Bend, Ore., drops to a prone position for a closer look at the tiny flowers. Several passengers join her.

“This is belly botany,” she says.

The day was a thriller. But the best was yet to come.

July 12. Polaris is anchored off the southern coast of Nordaustlandet.

A glacier the size of Connecticut sweeps down to the sea from the island’s frozen heart.

The five-story-high face of the ice cap curves beyond the horizon for more than 100 miles. Waterfalls (the water is melted from the top of the glacier by summer’s sun) pour from the ice wall.

“You are back in the Ice Age,” says Ralph Lee Hopkins, the expedition leader.

Kittiwakes and fulmars perch atop the ice cliffs. A rare ivory gull is sighted.

Pederson dips a plankton net to find out what the birds are eating. Their diet: mostly shrimp-like krill, also a favorite entree with Svalbard’s whales.

The rafts move closer. Curtains of water roar down the glacier face, polishing the ice like marble in a sculptor’s studio.

“Awesome, just awesome,” says Walter D’Ardenne, a nuclear-safety consultant from San Jose, Calif.

July 13. Polaris is in Hinlopen Strait, the passage between Spitsbergen and Nordaustlandet.

The weather is bright. Sea and sky are so blue they seem to merge.

Stefan Lundgren eases his Zodiac through patches of ice … prodding, nudging, to find clear water. He has spotted two walruses loafing on a saucer of ice about a quarter-mile away.

The larger walrus, a male weighing perhaps 3,000 pounds, lifts its whiskered head as the Zodiac nears. Lundgren stops the outboard motor and lets the raft drift the rest of the way.

Passengers are so close they can see the wary walrus’s tusks reflected in the sea.

But then the walrus flops down and resumes its nap. A low rumbling sound, like a growl, rattles the ice.

“He’s snoring!” Lundberg says. “What do you know - he’s snoring!”

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: If you go GENERAL: Special Expedition will repeat the Arctic Norway cruise aboard Polaris in July 1997. Meanwhile, the company’s fleet will be cruising next year in the Sea of Cortez, Egypt, Alaska and other areas. THE SHIP: Polaris - 238 feet long, 2,214 gross tons - has accommodations for 80 passengers, all in outside cabins. There is one sitting (with open seating) for each meal. Facilities include a well-stocked library of nature books, a cozy lounge, a sauna, a small gift shop and a beauty parlor.There always is a physician aboard. ITINERARY: Northbound Polaris cruises through the Svalbard region of the Norwegian Arctic begin in Bergen and end in the town of Longyearbyen on the Svalbard island of Spitsbergen. From Longyearbyen, passengers travel to Oslo aboard a chartered jet. Southbound-cruise passengers fly from Oslo to Longyearbyen, there to board Polaris and cruise through the Arctic islands on the way to Bergen. FARES: Price for the 16-day packages begin at $6,470 a person. This includes the cruise with all meals aboard, all shore excursions and sightseeing, one night at a first-class hotel in Oslo, and the charter flight between Longyearbyen and Oslo. Not included is air transportation between the United States and Norway. PACKING: The style aboard Polaris is informal. Special Expeditions recommends that passengers dress “in layers” to stay warm on deck and during shore tours. Summer temperatures in the Arctic at times are in the mid-30s and 40s. The packing list should include a warm parka, a heavy sweater, rain jacket and pants, wool gloves, wool hat, wool socks, lightweight long underwear, walking shoes with rubber soles, and rubber boots at least 12 inches high, the latter for “wet” shore landings from Polaris’ Zodiac rafts. DETAILS: Special Expeditions, 720 Fifth Ave., New York, NY 10019. Phone: (212) 765-7740.