Kulusuk is a tiny village of 250 inhabitants and the main access point to Eastern Greenland, thanks to its tiny airport with a direct view of the ice.
Grey skies, low clouds, a fine drizzle that seems to come from every direction: it’s not the most comfortable first sight over tundra!
Taiga, steppe, tundra: when I was at school, geography was my favourite.
It was the right time to dream on the green and brown pages of the world atlas, on the strange and fascinating words of the textbook that reminded me of the adventures that one day I would live.
Tundra, steppe, taiga: the sound of these words repeated in my mind gave me almost a physical sensation, the harbinger of a smell that I imagined was typical of those places.
Anyway, the tundra doesn’t smell. And it is also very quiet: no trees, no leaves, no obstacle to the wind. Our feet trample on the soft and slippery moss. With a little attention, you could hear your own heartbeat.
The scenery is fascinating: streams and lakes, a few patches of snow in a weird silence.
Arctic summer in Eastern Greenland
We are almost at the end of the short Arctic summer. The thaw has created new, temporary rivers. Water flows down from the rocky ridges, floods the plain and eventually goes to the sea. The trail is often interrupted by these fatuous streams, which can lengthen the time of the walk because you have to find a suitable place to ford.
Here in Greenland, they say, you can drink from any stream. It’s all pure water from millennia-old melting glaciers.
We were ready for the first refreshing sip. But here it is, the surreal sight of a soccer ball. It floats incongruously in the middle of the tundra, miles away from any human presence except for the two of us.
Who knows what the journey of that ball was before floating in this silent nothingness?
Or – more simply – who knows where the guys who have lost it while playing are now and how much they miss it. A leather ball in good condition must not be a very common object in Kulusuk.
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Sounds like a great time 🙂