Greenland - Kangerlussuaq, August 20-25, 2021

The flight from Copenhagen to Kangerlussuaq lasts almost 5 hours. Kangerlussuaq is not the main settlement of Greenland, but large planes arriving from afar can land only there, unlike the capital city of Nuuk. Where it is impossible to build a sufficiently long and flat runway. Therefore, our acquaintance with Greenland began with the village of Kangerlussuaq (I can't call it a city in any way, there are only about 500 people live here). All people go to the coastal settlements from there.They use small planes for that purpose. In my opinion, there are only 2 seasons in Greenland, the season of snow and ice and the season without snow and ice. I was met at the airport by Karsten Lings and his son. Mr. Karsten has long been the outfitter of the traditional hunting for tourists in this region. His family moved to Greenland from Copenhagen when Karsten was very young, he fell in love with this harsh country and does not intend to leave it. His son, in whose veins, thanks to his mother, the blood of the Inuit natives of Greenland also flows, received an excellent education in other countries, but he returned home with a firm conviction that he wanted to work as a guide with his father and help him with the organization of hunting. Already on the day of arrival, we met Karsten's family then had lunch and left the village. We drove to the place where we could test our carbines, and made a control shooting from hunting weapons. Late in the evening we boarded two boats and set off. The centuries-old ice and snow on the slopes of the Greenland mountains thaws a little in July, August and September. Thousands of new rivers are rushing from the mountains towards the ocean at this period of time. Our boats moved along one of these rivers for a couple of hours, the width of the river reached 500 meters. Rivers become full-flowing in the valleys between the mountains and it is difficult to swim along them, because in June of each year the channels can change, so last year's routes often turn out to be useless. A camp with impressive tents had been already settled for us, everything was thought out to the smallest detail, and everything was in its place. A kitchen was set up in a separate large tent. The locals like when everything is on their place. There is the serious competition there, whoever provides optimal service will get the best feedback and attract more new customers. We met the first Muskox males in an hour after left Kangerlussuaq. We could also observe them with binoculars directly from the camp. The next morning, we left the camp and sailed inland. We were moving in the direction and along the coast where we could most likely meet a worthy Caribou male. After an hour and a half, we moored to the shore and continued on foot. Soon we spotted the first Caribou males, but decided to move on and find a more noble samples, since I was not tired of walking at all. The landscape was quite relief, every 200 meters new species opened up in front of us and there were new chances to notice animals. We saw a couple of nice animals at a distance of about 400 meters, but they noticed our approach and moved further away. We were about to go around the mountain to approach them from the opposite side, but one of them suddenly appeared just 100 meters away from us, and Karsten offered to shoot. One shot was enough – the trophy became a 6-year-old male Caribou with the most luxurious horns Its horns were still covered with fur, but the skin had already completely peeled off, so we easily managed to clean them. In general, Caribou males wear clean horns for a very short time there, they start to shed them already in October. Caribous rarely live longer than 8 years in local conditions. We had come across sad evidence of the difficult living conditions of animals in Greenland – the mummified remains of Muskox individuals who did not survive last winter. The main enemy of the local fauna is just the harsh winter weather. Wolves and polar bears wander there in winter, but they usually prefer to be in more northern latitudes. We butchered our trophy on the spot, took it to the boat and returned to the tent camp. The next morning we repeated yesterday's journey, but sailed a little further, and moored to the shore where the permafrost and ice began. The source of that newest river was nearby. We saw a lot of hares and foxes during the voyage. Strangely, but the local hares are even larger than their Central European relatives. But foxes in Greenland are smaller. That time we landed on the opposite shore. Since It was a rut season for the Muskoxen large males were in herds and were measuring forces with other males. We walked about a half-hour when noticed several Muskox males and chose the most imposing one. I fired from a distance of 150 meters, the animal swayed and fell dead. Karsten determined the age of the male - 12 years. It was much harder to carry to the boat the butchered Muskox carcass than the Caribou. That one weighed almost 400 kg. The weather that day was especially sunny, and the nature was picturesque. It was very pleasant to be in such a unique place, on the border between the green-covered land and the beginning of the glacier. Our boat repeatedly got stuck in shallow water on the way back to the camp, Karsten and his son in rubber overalls jumped into the icy water and pushed the boat to a deep place. That's how my hunting trip to Greenland ended. In the morning we moved downstream towards Kangerlussuaq, and in the evening I managed to exchange my ticket and get on a more convenient flight home. Greenland has a special, unique nature. Mr. Karsten has advised me to visit his country in winter, when a hunter sees completely different landscapes and gets a special experience. I am very grateful to Mr. Karsten for the professional organization of the hunt and the wonderful service. I would like to mention his excellent culinary skills separately.