NUUK, GREENLAND

NUUK, GREENLAND

Nuuk is the capital of Greenland and its largest community of 17,000 people and had the traditional brightly painted buildings of Sisimiut. They are painted once a year to maintain that vibrancy unlike the buildings in the Canadian northern communities.
One of the main things to see here are the Qilakitsog mummies that date to 1475 AD. We didn't have time to visit them as we had five-and-a-half-hour hike on the Little Malene Hiking Trail, the Lille Malane Loop, scheduled. It wasn't departing until 10:15 so had time for a leisurely breakfast. Five taxis were waiting on the pier to pick up the nineteen of us on this shore excursion. We drove part way up a mountain and were dropped off where we met our guide. He pointed out the route we were to take to the top of the mountain then around the mountain and down the other side. It wasn't until we came to the first of many boulder fields that we wondered what we had gotten ourselves into. We really wished we had our hiking boots with us. (We had left them at home because of luggage weight issues.) Our poles were a godsend. Wouldn't have made it without them. Our Greenland guide and the Crystal guide were also essential as they hauled us up and over the boulders, showing us where to place our feet. When we weren't coping with boulders, we had to deal with the soft peat moss tundra which was very wet in places and very uneven. Luckily we came through with no sprained ankles but it was hard on these old knees. The weather was perfect for hiking - sunny (at last) with a northerly breeze and temperature just above freezing. We enjoyed our picnic lunch in the fresh air.
We were late getting back to the ship which had to delay its departure until our return. We ordered a bottle of champagne for the room, had a glass, and fell into bed for a most deserved nap. Went down, as usual, to the Saloon for our pre-dinner drink and to hear Perry play to find the place packed after his cabaret show the night before. "Mr. Two Martini Man" was sitting in "our" leather sofa. We dubbed him that as he always had one martini before his wife joined him when he ordered another. She came in later and JIm joined us too. It turns out that Kathy and Richard cruise Regent most often and only joined Crystal because of this itinerary. They too are having lots of fun squeezing past each other in these tiny rooms. Had a quick check outside after dinner for the Northern Lights but no luck. Apparently they were visible the night before but no announcement was made so we missed them. Good thing we've seen them before.