Being tied to a dock is a trade-off. It is uncomfortable being in the public eye, but that is compensated by making it easier to meet locals. They are interested in you and your boat, and it provides chance to learn about your host country, and make some good friends. Occasionally unsettling facts come to light.

If you grew up reading Jack London, as we did, you have a certain image of a lead sled dog, White Fang for example. Skard (“hard ice” in Norwegian) above, is a working lead dog. From his master and friend, Ronni, we learned the reality of how a lead dog does his job.

To begin with, being the toughest dog on the team is not part of the job description. Rather, you need to be a loner, and intelligent. The right lead dog is like a cow with a bell. The rest of the pack follows.

Skard was sired by Iditerod Race champions and came from Susan Butcher’s kennel.

He has a sweet disposition, and there is an obvious love affair between these two.

Ronni races with Skard in the lead using a 12-dog team. He also takes folks on winter sled camping trips in Norway and soon in Svalbard. In the fall they start training with four wheel carts, building endurance. They switch to sleds when the snow comes.

Ronni has been doing this for 20 years and is still learning. He says it is the old timers, the mushers with 35 or 40 years of experience, who really know the dogs. Like many locals he has connections to Svalbard (aside from visiting). His grandfather was a trapper there for many years.

Can you guess what this is? If you have sailed offshore in adverse conditions you will be used to dropping your foul weather pants over your boots at the foot of your bunk. This makes it easy to quickly get into foulies and on deck.

But this is firemen’s gear.

We met Eric (second from the left) the day before. His Grandfather was the first to bring coal from Svalbard to Tromso, at the beginning of the 20th century. He brought his crew by to have a look at Wind Horse. They are small boat sailors, and a fireboat is part of their equipment, so it was fascinating talking about boats and fires with them.

Along with fighting land fires and running the fireboat, they also handle accidents, and do underwater recovery.

We’ve now visited with three of the Norwegian Ferry service captains. Our talks have been short, they usually have just an hour at each stop, but interesting. Can you imagine running a passenger ferry with 600+ passengers, a huge crew, and multiple stops every day? Even with bow and stern thrusters, and 21st century electronics you have to be very much on your toes.