South Africa

South Africa, Maverick Life

Chasing adventure in Kalaallit Nunaat, the planet’s last untamed wilderness

Exploring the East Greenlandic coast aboard the OCEANWIDE EXPEDITIONS sailing schooner, Rembrandt van Rijn, while undertaking a range of eco-adventure hikes and trailrunning recces within the polar circle, near Ittoqqortoormiit, Greenland, Europe. (Photo: Jacques Marais)

By Jacques Marais

5 Jan 2025

There is something extraterrestrial about Greenland’s desolate eastern coastline. But a scouting expedition will open this frontier to intrepid runners with a taste for adventure.

The jitters.

They always gnaw away at your subconscious, pre-trip. Dogs waiting, sensing, watching while you pack. Family life unfolding in the background, cooking in the kitchen, smirking at the nth rerun of Big Bang Theory.

Smelling the comfortable smell of your other half in deep REM sleep while said sleep eludes you. Busy mind: planning shot angles, pre-thinking set-ups, overthinking potential travel issues. All while the low-level hum of exhilaration builds like a nuclear reactor at the waking edge of your consciousness.

Travel is that: a Jekyll and Hyde wolf sniffing at the doors of perception. Scratching, nudging it open, allowing both fear and exhilaration to flood your prefrontal cortex. It scares me, because I both hate it and love it. Mostly because it forces me to step into all those uncomfortable zones I don’t have to confront when I’m cocooned within the safe space of home.

Here’s the rub: I love chasing adventure (it borders on an addiction), but those endorphins come at a price.

The cost is that you must often leave those you love the most, swapping that warm cocoon of family — and familiarity — as you venture in search of the weird and strange. In doing so, you must shed your skin, sharpen your blade, grow a pair, embrace the unknown.

Truth? I take a couple of days to slot into this “game on” persona, to trust the process. But I do know it will all be good once I’ve passed through Amsterdam and Reykjavik.

Photographer Jacques Marais with his son, Robert, in Greenland. (Photo: Jacques Marais)

Iceland is where I’ll find my flip-switch. It is also where I’m meeting up with Robert, my middle child. He’s been on a gap year — couch surfing in Cornwall — and we’ve not connected for seven months. The tousle-haired youngster whom I said goodbye to in Cape Town is no longer a boy, so sharing this adventure with him will break new ground for both of us.

At dawn, we will board a charter flight from Keflavik to bomb across the Barents Sea to the icy Constable Pynt in northeast Greenland. I went to the desolate village of Ittoqqortoormiit on an expedition with Inuit hunters in 2005 and know the climatic extremes awaiting us there.

Hemmed in by a glacier and icebergs and strafed by Arctic storms, the settlement is cut off from civilisation for months at a time. One could say it is an acquired taste, and one would be right. This time I won’t need my dog-sledding licence (yup, I have one, for up to 12 dogs), instead boarding the Rembrandt van Rijn, a three-masted schooner dating back to 1924. This historic ship (part of Oceanwide Expeditions’ polar fleet) cruises the wild Greenland seas and offers daily treks on to terra firma to allow us to experience the unique geology and wildlife that shape this exhilarating wilderness area.

Ten thrilling days of dodging icebergs and trekking in this ice desert awaits…

Sol Breen (Sun Glacier)

Less than 48 hours ago, we boarded the Rembrandt van Rijn and set sail into Scoresby Sund, by far the most extensive fjord system on planet Earth. We pitched and rolled for most of the night, waking up intermittently as the schooner crunched through the frozen slush on the water’s surface.

Just before dawn, we anchored in the lee of Sol Breen, or the Sun Glacier ice fall. A cobalt gloom filtered through the porthole, and we suited up in our sub-zero gear before venturing on to the deck. The view that greeted me was mental, with one word coming to mind: bonkers!

This wild, visceral whiteout world was like a bucket of ice water to the face, breathtaking. As was the outside temperature at -9°C, making it painful to breathe or hold your camera after a few minutes, leaving you feeling as if your fingernails are being pulled out with a pair of pliers.

The icy waters of the polar circle. (Photo: Jacques Marais)

Weaving among floating ice in the subzero world. (Photo: Jacques Marais)

Temperatures dropped to below -10°C. (Photo: Jacques Marais)

Aboard the Oceanwide Expeditions sailing schooner. (Photo: Jacques Marais)

A scene from the east Greenlandic coast. (Photo: Jacques Marais)

We anchored in this extraterrestrial ocean world for the first night, drifting into fitful sleep while the low growl of the glacier resounded amid the coal-black granite outcrops. Dawn did eventually sneak in under a gunmetal grey gloaming, with just enough visibility for the captain to set sail for Vikingebugt, our next anchorage.

Low-level clouds veiled down to water level, and soon snowflakes cotton-wooled across the deck, fat and fluffy, covering every surface in a layer of crystalline powder. The underlying geology shapeshifted as we drifted, morphing from ancient and brittle scree slopes into hexagonal basalt columns.

And all the while the unbroken land mass of Kalaallit Nunaat hunkered down like a gargantuan hibernating beast.

Glowering at our tiny ship, it showed nary a sign of life, except for the flutter of an occasional glaucous gull against the washed-out parabola of the Arctic sky.

Bjørne Øer (The Bear Islands)

Just to be clear: this was a legit work trip, not some crazy vacay.

Part of my Arctic voyage was to scout and capture potential trail running options in Greenland for future Oceanwide Expeditions trips. It is certainly no easy task to run here: the terrain is harsh — forbidding in places — with serrated ridgelines and dagger-like spires stabbing into gruel-grey cloud banks.

Today would be our first chance to scout the shoreline along Scoresby Sund. This fjord system is named for an infamous Scottish whaler who operated here during the 19th century; the bay of Jittehavn, where we anchored, was once one of his haunts.

Early October sees Greenland teetering on the cusp of hard winter lockdown, but right now, the underlying Devonian sandstone is still visible in places. Brick-red ridges ruck up amid giant glaciers and snow fields, bristling with sparse tundra scrub and little else.

Jacques Marais on the east Greenlandic coast. (Photo: Jacques Marais)

Temperatures have dipped to below -10°C as we board the Zodiac inflatables and head for shore. We weave through chunks of floating ice and land on a narrow sand spit, with our senses set to hyperaware.

This is, after all, where the largest land predator in the world lurks. Yup, polar bears rule this subzero world and, all in all, it makes for daunting terrain in which to go feral. But then there is the timeless geological drama and natural splendour that makes it impossible to say no to the lure of running in Earth’s final remaining wilderness.

Robert and I headed out under the watchful eyes of our guides, Jan Belger and Georg Hirn, both armed with .30-06 calibre rifles. After half an hour of hiking, we split up, with Belger and the rest of the group heading across a gentle snow ridgeline.

This was a perfect place for us to test and film a few potential loops. Robert donned his running shoes and sped off to where the magnificent spire of Grundtvig’s Kirke spiked against the sky while I followed him, grabbing photos and video.

Trailrunning within the polar circle, near Ittoqqortoormiit, Greenland. (Photo: Jacques Marais)

At times, he completely disappeared within this jaw-dropping landscape, all while dodging ice ponds and deep snow drifts.

Over the following two weeks, our plan was to recce a range of areas like this promontory overlooking Jittehavn. It will be key to have easy Zodiac landing spots and high vantage points from which to scout for bears. But if this all comes together, runners who join these adventure expeditions to Greenland will be guaranteed trails unlike anywhere else in the world.

Rode Fjord (Red Fjord)

Let’s talk aurora borealis.

I could bore you with the details, but will instead do my best to keep it simple. During a solar flare, the sun (an incredible 150 million kilometres from Earth) emits charged particles that collide with our planet’s magnetosphere before connecting to the Polar regions.

Aurora borealis. (Photo: Jacques Marais)

Exploring the East Greenlandic coast aboard the Oceanwide Expeditions sailing schooner. (Photo: Jacques Marais)

Once they enter our atmosphere, these particles collide with atoms and molecules at high speed; as part of this interaction, gases are emitted to form the multicoloured veils we see.

Most of the time, the colours of the northern lights are not that visible to the human eye. We tend to process greens better, and will see those tones before pinks and reds. Long exposures on any good camera, however, make it easy to create a pleasantly artistic image.

So far, the weather gods had been kind to us, with multiple aurora sightings. Tonight though, the KP Index (a forecast system used to predict solar weather and visibility) was high. Where previous evenings had topped out at three or four on a scale of 10, we were now expecting a solid six, with a drove of photographers on deck.

Most shooters were aiming towards the distant horizon, but my plan was to shoot through the rigging of the ship. My reasoning was two-fold: I wanted images that stood out from those of the crowd, and if I focused on the mast, this structure would remain sharp despite the rolling of the ship on the ocean swell.

As usual, the aurora started with a faint shimmer on the horizon, but soon magnified in effect. A column of light sheared skywards from the west, and quickly further shafts of luminescence beamed into the night skies. Within minutes, this celestial show began to arc across the ship, stretching from horizon to horizon.

I lay on my back with the ultra-wide 14mm lens on my camera aimed at the sway and whistle of the rigging, and watched as the neon epicentres flared like fantastical fireworks against the velveteen of the polar sky. Two hours had flashed past in a Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds moment, and I was gone, way up there, cartwheeling through space. DM

Jacques Marais is an internationally respected outdoor photographer and author. Follow @jacqmaraisphoto on Instagram or visit his website www.jacquesmarais.co.za

This story first appeared in our weekly Daily Maverick 168 newspaper, which is available countrywide for R35.

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South Africa

Sol Breen (Sun Glacier)

Bjørne Øer (The Bear Islands)

Rode Fjord (Red Fjord)