Few places on Earth remain as remote, untouched, and defiantly wild as East Greenland. Imagine icebergs as tall as 100-metre skyscrapers, glaciers still considered youthful at 50,000 years, and landscapes sculpted over 2.5 billion years. This is not a land of contrasts—it’s a realm suspended in geological time.
Getting here feels wonderfully improbable. A small fixed-wing plane from Reykjavik lands on Kulusuk’s gravel runway beside a village of just 250 people. From there, a 3-km walk leads to the harbour, where an expedition vessel take you deeper into the Arctic wilderness.
Sailing through the Sermilik Fjord offers one of the planet’s most surreal spectacles. Norway, Alaska, Chile, and New Zealand may have claimed the fjord narrative, but Sermilik rewrites it. Its Greenlandic name means “place with glaciers,” yet that undersells the scale. Fed by a chain of colossal glaciers—including Helheim, among Greenland’s most dramatic ice producers—Sermilik becomes a crowded highway of drifting ice architecture: blue cathedrals, fortress walls, sculptural towers and arches forged over decades by wind and water.
Winter seals the fjords beneath slabs of ice, turning them into highways for sled dogs—the paw-powered monarchs of the land. In summer, boats replace these paws with propellers as melting ice reopens watery boulevards linking settlements to supplies, doctors, and hunters. With no roads and limited air access, remoteness has become the East Greenland’s greatest form of preservation—and its magnetic pull for travellers who crave adventure over itineraries.
A 10-day expedition doesn’t mean just sitting on deck. Zodiac landings deliver you to mossy tundra, glaciers laced with crevasses, ice caves glowing blue from within, and abandoned WW II outposts like Bluie East Two—its rusting fuel drums and collapsing barracks haunting reminders of Greenland’s strategic moment in global history.
With only 3,500 residents scattered across East Greenland, wildlife truly thrives here. Humpback, minke, and Greenland whales slice through icy waters; seals lounge on floes, glancing warily for polar bears; muskoxen graze the tundra; Arctic foxes and hares dart across the landscape; and seabirds—some of the region’s 128 species—trace the endless sky.
Against this wild backdrop, settlements appear like colourful brushstrokes. Tiny hunter communities such as Tiniteqilaaq and Sermiligaaq, and Tasiilaq—the cultural heart of East Greenland—offer insight into Inuit life shaped by resilience, resourcefulness, and kinship with nature. Museums chronicle history; drum dancers perform stories of hunting, survival, and myth; throat singers summon an older Arctic, one that predates borders and politics.
In summer, the midnight sun bathes the Arctic in 24 hours of gold. From September-April, the Northern Lights unfurl across the sky in electric ribbons of green and violet. There are no roads, no cell towers, and no human-made rhythm—only a cinematic wilderness.
The scene is breathtaking, yet it hides an uncomfortable truth. Climate change is beginning to re-script these delicate dynamics. Expedition leader Ida Olsson explains, “Greenland glaciers are retreating at an alarming rate. Apusiaajik Glacier has lost 30 per cent of its area since the 1990s. We see the ice disappearing before our eyes.” Greenland may feel far away, but it sits at the centre of the world’s climate story.
In an age of constant connection, East Greenland offers a rare luxury, solitude, if your are ready to surrender to the silence.