‘Pyramiden has captured a part of my heart – so many secrets, stories, such beauty… Diolch yn fawr!’ Samantha Saville, Aberystwyth, Wales, UK. The guest book at The Tulip Hotel, Pyramiden, in which I attempted to sum up the impossible, has entries from 1987 up to 2000 (I guess some tourists found it… Read More
We log in via the visitors book, pass the security guy, don hard hats with the Statsbygg logo (the state construction arm of the Norwegian government) and file into the dank corridor (which must be the bit outside the mountain) and through the second metal door that has been unlocked for us. We descend as… Read More
Bit of an extended post today since I have skipped a couple…. Staying here in Longyearbyen for any length of time, people start to become concerned that you manage to find your way out of town and experience some of ‘the nature’ here. Though Longyearbyen has just about everything one needs, after a few weeks,… Read More
It’s been all go this week with interviews, so much so, there wasn’t even time for a blog post yesterday. I think that’s a good excuse for a double photographic bill today. This week art, photography and relationship to the landscape and species of Svalbard has featured quite strongly in discussions so far. Today the… Read More
I’ve had a day focussed on tourism today, one way or another. It’s actually ‘low season’ at the moment, between the busy snow-scooter, skiing – filled March and April and the summer season proper, although there are still visitors about here and there. So, like the tourist operators and service providers, I have been gearing… Read More
(For anyone not of the right age and taste in music to get the Skunk Anansie reference, this blog title needs screaming loudly and with passion!) As mentioned last week, Environmental Protection is a big talking point in Svalbard, as is the future of coal mining here. The ‘paradox’ between the two, is perhaps no… Read More
Takes one to know one, so they say. In that spirit we booked ourselves on a guided walk up a glacier and into an ice cave as an exploration into tourist mode and a bit of a day off. Of course it wasn’t, but it was heaps of fun in the sun! Along the way… Read More
Quite a bit of the week’s discussions have been around cultural heritage, how that is defined, protected and managed in Svalbard. Time with my trusty field assistant is running out, so we went on an excursion to go and experience some local cultural heritage…or did we? Gruve (mine) 5 was built from 1957 and extracted… Read More
Today I have been comtemplating this question quite a lot and had some very interesting discussions around it. I can say with some certainty and without causing too much uproar, that it can mean very different things to different institutions and individuals. From a surface glance, the tensions (or not) between the three ‘legs’ of… Read More
It is only a matter of time before Svalbard moves into full summer mode and the snow cover receeds. The ‘big melt’ is coming, in fact it might have started today with temperatures edging over the zero degree mark, (though I am holding out for more snow and re-freeze next week :)). Today we saw… Read More
samsaville.org 