Erez Marom had organized a photo workshop based in Ilulissat, Greenland to photograph during midnight sun the majestic icebergs that float in the bay. My trip started by taking the plane from Geneva to Copenhagen, then to stay overnight, and continue the other day via Kangerlussaq to Ilulissat, Greenland. When I tried to check-in in C'hagen, the receptionist told me that the hotel was fully booked and that my room had been cancelled by eDreams. What in hell and why? Sometimes, indeed, eDreams bugs seriously. So I had to take a taxi again to return to the airport and finally got a room in the airport hotel Clarion. Perfect, very convenient hotel.
In Kangerlussuaq, at the east coast of Greenland, we had to wait about 4 hours for the fog to clear up in the destination airport of Ilulissat. The aircraft we finally got was about good for 17 passengers and of course not equipped for instrument flight. When we flew over Greenland I could see the hughe areas no more covered with ice resp glacier...
To get the unique midnight sun light we photographed mainly during night.
We left around 10 pm and came back to the hotel around 3 am. The hotel Arctic, were we stayed in, was fully booked. It has an adequate infrastructure, but it had some difficulties to cope with the needs of so many clients. Ilulissat profits from the clima change, which means that an important number of tourists come to document the floating icebergs. I was happy that we had a small boat to sail out in the bay. So we could venture out to find nice icebergs "only for us"..
It was very impressive, at least for me, to see and to "feel" these multi-thousand-year-old ice bergs floating in the sea, and hear their cracking like thunder. Finally - in months or years from now - the icebergs that we have photographed - will be gone, disappeared in the sea. And by this millions of tons of sweat water is getting lost. Concerning wild life the highlight I had were the humpback whales that I could photograph during my last hours in Ilulissat.
The whales were hunting cod fish in the glacier bay, sometimes almost in a distance that I could touch them..I have to organize this again for myself.
Erez is a good guide, enthusiastic and demanding. The 6-person group that we have been, enjoyed the opportunities that mother nature offered, as well as the tutorials that Erez gave us. We came as individual photographers from various corners of the globe to join our common interests but we have left as friends.