Qaqortoq, Greenland, August 9, 2017

Qaqortoq, Greenland, August 9, 2017

Greenland!

Qaqortoq is in a nice harbor but the pier isn't large enough for the Rotterdam so we're anchored just a bit off shore and will tender to and from the ship. The town rambles up the hillsides. Maybe 3,000 people or so. From appearances you can definitely see Inuit features and coloring. The children are zooming around on bikes shyly looking at this phalanx of interlopers who've arrived for a few hours. The adults seem supremely uninterested in us, quite the opposite of the Canadians in the previous ports who really threw themselves into meeting and greeting. English and Danish are spoken as well as Greenlandic. That language is pretty indecipherable. The alphabet has a some oddities thrown in and the words are long, lots of root words with prefixes and suffixes tacked on. They also have their own currency but accepted dollars and Euros, credit and debit cards. I found the Banken after I'd used my debit card so no Greenlandic Krona to bring home. There is a small gift shop/tourist information office, a museum, a dress shop, outdoor wear shop, a church, hotel, police station, grocery store and what looked like a good sized bar/nightclub called Rockhouse.

There are some fishing boats of various sizes here and there plus a large, permanent loading dock with an assortment of small shipping containers. We've seen a couple of taxis and a vintage bus and assortment of cars, vans and small SUVs flying by us on the two lane road that winds along the waterfront. There are 30 KM signs posted that are totally ignored.  I'm not sure what I expected to find here, but somehow automobiles were not on the list. I didn't see a gas station so have no idea how much it costs. We did visit the grocery store. It was small but well-stocked with a variety of packaged goods from all over. The stuff wasn't cheap but since everything is imported I didn't think the prices were outrageous. Usually in a foreign grocery store you can find some odd things like salt cod flavored potato chips but they just had the usual assortment. Big display of bottles of Roses Lime Juice. I should have asked the clerk what they used it for. If everyone in town had a couple of vodka gimlets every evening they wouldn't make a dent in that supply.

All the buildings are brightly colored (red, blue, green, yellow) with steep roofs. The lady sitting next to me on the tender said one hillside of houses looked like a jigsaw puzzle. It being early August the vegetation was lush and green. Some buttercups and lupine but mostly weeds. There really isn't any soil good enough or deep enough to garden. No hanging baskets or window boxes of flowers that were everywhere in the Canadian ports. If it weren't for the colors of the buildings this would really be a grim place. Greenland doesn't have much natural color. It's all brown and grey cliffs and rocks. Lots of big boulders here and there, sometimes in retaining walls, along the roads or just wherever they were found. Various artists have carved into them so it's like walking through a sculpture garden.

An informal group of craft tables were manned by the makers. Lots of knick knacks carved from bones and stones. No trees to provide wood. The native women continue to do intricate beading of collars, cuffs and jewelry and also make clothing and accessories from seal skins. The people hunt seals and one whale per year for food not sport. There is a large tannery on one side of the harbor. I'm not sure if it's even legal to bring seal skin items into the US but I wasn't tempted at all.

The ship hadn't arranged any excursions at all. It seemed that most of us just wanted to walk around to say we'd been there. I did buy one of those tote bags you see everywhere with the name of the city or country emblazoned all over it. GREENLAND! Greenland! Greenland! Subtle it ain't but who goes to Greenland and doesn't go home and casually throw into a conversation, "When I was in Greenland..." Be forewarned everyone.