Polar Bear watching cruises, Spitsbergen

country:	Arctic Circle
location:	Spitsbergen
departures:	2008: 15 Jul, 16 Jul 2009: 15 Jul
price:	From £3350 (12 days) excluding flights

Arctic holidays

Wildlife cruises

the amazing things you'll be doing

Join us this summer on our 12-day wildlife expedition voyage around the Svalbard Archipelago, a group of frozen islands a mere 600 miles from the North Pole. Spitsbergen, the largest of these islands, is home to an exciting range of mammals – including Polar Bears, Walruses and Beluga Whales – as well as vast seabird colonies and stunningly beautiful scenery.

The island of Spitsbergen is a dramatic land of huge glaciers, snow-covered mountains and steep sided fjords, separated from the North Pole by a mere 600 miles of frozen ocean.

This is the true ‘High Arctic’, an extreme land gripped by ice for over eight months of the year and by darkness for over four. Winter begins to loosen its grasp in May and during the brief Arctic summer Spitsbergen is transformed into a land of perpetual daylight, covered by a flower-filled tundra that is grazed by herds of Reindeer.

Towering sea-cliffs crowded with millions of seabirds guard the land, while off-shore lies a crazy paving of packice upon which Polar Bears hunt and Walruses laze. This will be our sixth journey to the Svalbard Archipelago and is timed to coincide with the peak of seabird breeding activity. In late July the sun never sets and the pack-ice has usually melted sufficiently to allow our ship, the ice-strengthened Grigory Mikheev, to complete a circumnavigation of the island. Our tour begins with a night in Oslo, before we fly north over the ice-dotted Arctic Ocean to Longyearbyen, the capital of Spitsbergen. Here we will board our vessel and begin the 10-night voyage through an icy wilderness almost entirely devoid of human life. Birdlife on the other hand is abundant, and even in Longyearbyen itself Snow Buntings fly around the rooftops and Purple Sandpipers pick for insects along the melt-water streams.

day-by-day itinerary

Day 1:	Fly Oslo.
Day 2-11:	Spitsbergen voyage.
Day 12:	Fly London.

this holiday is operated by a wildlife specialist

Typically trips are expertly guided by a leading specialist with a good knowledge of the area to be visited. Inevitably, birds, plants and mammals are the main focus of attention however, the aim will be to incorporate all other aspects of the natural world in an attempt to be as broad-minded as possible. A local guide may often accompany trips.

how this holiday makes a difference

For this exciting voyage we have chosen a small ice-strengthened vessel carrying a maximum of 45 passengers, thus avoiding the larger vessels whose hundreds of tourists can dilute the very special 'wilderness experience' and, importantly, do more damage to the fragile Arctic environment. Indeed, on all our holidays, we make it a priority to minimise such disturbance and this is especially important on Spitsbergen where a stray footprint can remain on the tundra for decades and an uncovered egg can chill in minutes.

The operators of our expedition vessel are very aware of their responsibility towards the protection of the Arctic environment and, as tour operators, we do our best to inform our passengers beforehand as to how to behave. We also distribute the WWF's 'Code of Conduct for Arctic Tourists' to all of our Spitsbergen customers and our expert naturalist leader is always on hand to offer further advice if needed. It is perfectly possible to enjoy such beautiful areas without adversely impacting upon them, so please join us this summer and permit us to show you such sights as Polar Bears wandering over the pack-ice, a Walrus lazing on an ice-floe or two hundred thousand Brünnich's Guillemots crowded onto a vertical cliff-face… all lit by 24-hour daylight and backed by some of the world’s most beautiful scenery!

As a company we have achieved AITO’s top level, 3-star Responsible Tourism accreditation and we have always tried to operate our holidays in an environmentally responsible manner, striving to contribute to wildlife conservation and habitat preservation at all times.

Our policy includes:

To focus, particularly, on visiting areas which do not benefit from the rewards of mass market tourism.

To minimise environmental damage by exploring in small groups and, as much as possible, on foot.

To use, wherever possible, local guides.

To involve local communities and to ensure that they receive a fair share of the benefits of wildlife tourism.

To use, wherever possible, small, locally owned accommodations & specialist local agents/ground operators.

To purchase, where possible, local produce.

To develop and commit to long-term plans to visit rural areas and support the local communities.

To contribute financially to projects local to the areas that we visit (ie. schools, hospitals, etc.)

To educate the local people on the importance and long-term benefits of wildlife tourism.

To keep our clients well-informed on aspects of wildlife management and conservation.

To work with British and overseas conservation organisations to develop new wildlife tourism destinations.

To run our UK office in as energy-efficient a manner as possible.

We also encourage our clients to offset their carbon dioxide emissions.

Tourism can be good and bad for destinations & local people.

We carefully screen every holiday against our criteria for responsible travel.

'Look behind the brochure' to find how each holiday makes a difference (see left).

We don't claim to be perfect - there is no global accreditation - but we've led the way since 2001 and screened 1000's of holidays.

We invite every traveller to write a review about their experiences and responsible tourism.

This valuable feedback is sent to the people who run the holidays. We keep a very close eye on it and take off holidays that don't live up to our standards.