Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ

Day 10 and overnight we had steamed around Sorkapp which is the southern tip of Spitsbergen and north up the west side on our way back to Longyearbyen.

The conditions were calm, cold (3 degrees celsius) and foggy and we had time to make just one more landing - at Kapp Toscana on the south side of Bellsund.

Coming ashore here we were presented with the astonishing spectacle of piles of beluga whale bones, cast-offs from the harvest of these animals in the 1930s. Frankly, it was a shocking sight but, as the expedition leader Troels rather generously pointed out, the whalers of the time 'didn't know any better'.

Periodically, the fog lifted a little to reveal the spectacular mountain scenery of Wedel Jarlsberg Land and what would prove to be the last three reindeer of the trip.

Further along the beach was the head and part of the spine of a sperm whale, all that was left of one that had washed-up there two years previously. In the cold conditions things take a long time to decompose and there was still enough of the whale worth eating to keep two glaucous gulls and an ivory gull interested.

On the way back to our ship the Aleksey Maryshev, a lone puffin flew around our Zodiac inflatable boat, giving us the best view we had had of one on the whole trip.

Thinking global

As we steamed back to Longyearbyen to begin our journey home, my partner Louise and I could reflect on a spectacular and surprising trip, filled with experiences that we will never forget, seeing awe-inspiring wildlife in some of the most wonderful scenery imaginable.

Puffin [photo: Terry Cavner]

Svalbard is a beautiful, if harsh, place and I hope that it will remain so, but there is no getting away from the fact that the Arctic sea ice is melting, even if there is more in the waters around Svalbard than at any time in the last three summers, and glaciers are retreating.

Global warming is a complex subject but, as I understand it, measurements of temperature, taken over many years, show that the world is warming. Over geological time the world has warmed and cooled periodically but what is equally clear is that there is a correlation between the recent increase in temperature and the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere (historic levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere having been established by study of the composition of gasses in ice cores, thousands of years old, taken in the polar regions).

It follows, therefore, that if something can be done to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, for example by reducing our reliance on fossil fuels, it may help to arrest global warming.

Increasing global temperatures will bring about a rise in sea level, which matters if you, like millions of others throughout the world, live in a low-lying area.ΜύIn Suffolk, rising sea levels will create serious challenges for communities along the coast and river valleys, exacerbated by the fact that the East of England is slowly sinking anyway.Μύ

If we're going to get our feet wet, let's at least give ourselves some breathing space.

There are small things that we can all do, which will save us all money as well as reducing the amount of carbon dioxide that our activities generate, such as turning electrical appliances off stand-by, turning our heating down and car sharing.ΜύOn this expedition cruise for example the Aleksey Maryshev ran only one of its two engines.

Before I went on this trip I was dismayed how many people seemed to think that the complete loss of the polar ice caps is a foregone conclusion, almost as though it is already too late to do anything about it.

I don't know whether they will be proved right but, having been there, I came home with a strong sense that the Arctic deserves our protection.