Nanortalik, our final port of call, is situated on an island at the mouth of the Tasermiut Fjord.
Our sail-in this morning passed small islands interspersed with icebergs with a backdrop of the rugged mountain peaks. The whole scene is like something from some fantasy movie such as Lord of the Rings.
The town itself is rather small having a population of only around 1000 and therefore once again it was a tender operation to get ashore. There is very little commercialisation of the place although we were entertained by a local as we walked into town.
Many of the houses appear to be very small and they are all painted in bright colours. Traditionally the colours represented the occupations of the owners with Red meaning church or schools and yellow indicating hospital workers such as doctors and nurses. Nowadays house owners do not need to stick to this but most hospitals are still painted yellow.
Other larger blocks of what appeared to be flats were decorated with murals of birds and wildlife.
Nanortalik is home to a large open-air museum featuring many different buildings reflecting different aspects of Greenland life. This included such things as examples of clothing….
…some of the boats used for hunting seals and bears,…..
…and items used to extract oil from the blubber of seals.
The exhibits ranged in age from this ancient “Hobbit” hut…..
…right through to more modern devices such as these record players.
One of the houses had an exhibition of the last known ship to have been sunk by hitting an iceberg, the wreckage of which has never been found. The Danish ship MS Hans Hedtoft sank on her maiden voyage on 30th January 1959, with the only piece of wreckage found being one lifebelt. This happened off the Southern coast of Greenland not far from Nanortalik, a very interesting tale.
The main occupation historically in this area has been hunting and fishing and the old harbour was a focal point of the museum.
Altogether the museum was well worth the £5 entrance fee as it showed how the Greenlanders managed to survive in this sparse environment.
Nanortalik translates from the Greenlandish language as “Home of the Polar Bears” but the only one I saw all day was this one.
We now have four days at sea before arriving home at Southampton.