I ́ve been to Iceland twice before and I fell in love with this country the second my feet touched Icelandic ground for the first time. In the past months there was an inner change of myself. I wanted to travel, but I also wanted to give something back to the country I was travelling to. When I came across Ocean Missions, I knew I wanted to participate one day. I ́ve always been interested in whales, marine life and conservation of nature. So this seemed to me like the perfect opportunity to get in touch with like minded people, to learn new things and to live out my passion for photography – documenting this whole trip with my camera while experiencing Icelandic nature and wildlife.
So I joined Ocean Missions for the Hope Expedition.
Little did I know how impactful this week would be to myself and that my expectations of this trip would be exceeded by far.
There is this famous Icelandic saying: Þetta reddast. It means that everything is going to work out in the end. That you don’t need to worry, because everything is going to be okay.
One week before my flight to Iceland there was a snowstorm in Northern Iceland. A freaking snowstorm. In June. As we were told later, if the storm would’ve hit Iceland during the expedition week, we wouldn’t have been able to sail at all. There were a lot of challenges in this expedition – not only for us participants but also for the crew. For example the restoration of our ship Hildur took a little longer than expected. So instead of living one whole week on Hildur, the crew had to arrange us a place to stay for 3 nights. Not how the expedition was supposed to start, but they found this beautiful cottage for us.
Þetta reddast.
I packed my camera gear, my clothes and flew to Iceland. My body was flooded with excitement and all my doubts like if we all would come along with each other or if I would get seasick disappeared. My first ever sailing trip together in a group of 13 people, completely strangers, for a whole week on a small boat awaited me. Iceland welcomed me with cold wind and sun. I couldn’t wait for the adventure to begin.
The days before sailing.
On the first evening in Húsavík we, the Ocean Missions crew and us participants, had a dinner all together. Everyone was excited about the upcoming days and you could feel a huge amount of positive energy.
As I mentioned earlier, Hildur was still in restoration. So we moved into a lovely cottage a little outside of Húsavík. The crew of Ocean Missions had planned the upcoming days in every detail. On the first day after breakfast, we got to learn everything about Ocean Missions. About their research and data collection, their activities to raise awareness about marine pollution and their cleanup activities. Beside all the information we got, I felt the passion everyone of Ocean Missions has for this project.
Right after the presentations about Ocean Missions Raíssa introduced herself to us. She would guide us every day through meditation, would talk about practising presence and observing the distractions of the mind. We would talk about our fears and so many more things. This was something I would have never expected on this expedition, but I am very grateful I could participate in this. This will reverberate for a long time, thank you Raíssa!
Next, we headed out to a beach close to Húsavík for a beach cleanup. And to be honest, I was a little shocked how much trash there was. It’s a beach Ocean Missions comes back to regularly, but right now after this snowstorm, it’s been in pretty bad conditions. After an hour of picking up trash, we ended up with 7 huge sacks of trash. A lot of plastic, a lot of fishing gear which got lost and a lot of small particles of all kinds of materials. We could’ve spend days on this beach and we still would be picking up trash. We started to get a feeling, how much trash (esp. plastics) is out there and how important the work of Ocean Missions is. It is essential to get as many people as possible attached.
We need to make sure that everyone understands they can make a difference. That we all need to care about the environment around us.
Back at the OM headquarter, some of us started to sort the trash and documented, what kind of particles and trash we collected. Documentation is essential because science and in long term politics need valuable data to hopefully change the course for a better, more nature protecting future. Furthermore, we did some tests to identify microplastics collected by Ocean Missions with their manta and of course documenting it. Our first impressive day ended in a very Icelandic way – in a hot tub.
The next day we started getting to learn about life in Húsavík back in the days, visiting the local museum. It’s hard to believe how hard the life several years ago must have been in those harsh conditions. For the afternoon we would participate on a whale watching tour with North Sailing. As for myself, I always wanted to see Humpback Whales so I was super excited as Humpback Whales are pretty common in Skjálfandi Bay at this time of the year. The conditions have been a little tricky, as there were low hanging clouds and fog as well. From time to time, we and the other ships out there stopped and everything fell into silence, you could feel that there was a special tension, everyone staring at the sea. Our patience was rewarded in a way I think nobody had expected. Our trip was slowly coming to an end, when a humpback appeared close to us. And what a show the humpback put on! We could observe flippering, which means the whale rolls under water close to the surface and slaps its long pectoral fins against the water which can be a way to communicate or just a play. But there was more to come. The whale started breaching several times right in front of us. Leaping out of the water and then crashing back down, creating large splashes. This behaviour might be used for communication, to dislodge parasites, or simply for play. For whatever reason this humpback whale did this, everybody was filled up with pure happiness.
Everybody was mesmerised by this scenery, and tried to get some videos or pictures of this moment, which everybody I think will remember forever. For myself, a dream came true watching and photographing a breaching humpback whale.
Freezing but full of gratitude, we returned to Húsavík. Back there, we continued our tasks sorting trash and identifying microplastics at OM headquarter. We closed the day with a dinner and of course at the local geothermal bath. I got the feeling that we would get a lot less sleep as I am used to. Our last day on land started with breakfast, some meditation with Raíssa and Charla talking about her work especially concerning whales and how to identify them. We visited the mast builder for the Opal which was super interesting to see how many countless hours of work had to be done to build a completely new mast. Back at the OM, we finally got to know Heimir, who would be our captain on our expedition. He showed us around, explained to us a lot about the characteristics of wooden sailing ships and also about the history of the ships which are used at OM, the Opal and the Hildur, both beautiful wooden sailing ships. Both ships had to be restored and while the Opal wasn’t finished on time, we would be doing our sailing trip with the beautiful, freshly restored Hildur. Later that day, we could watch the Hildur being brought back on the water, which was a pretty impressive moment to take part of.
Of course there was plenty to do that day, so we continued our program. Visiting the the Northeast Iceland Nature Centre to hear a presentation from Alli (Aðalsteinn Örn Snæþórsson) about microplastics and his research about it using Fulmars. They are seabirds spending their whole life on sea – which means every microplastic found in dead Fulmars must be microplastic from the ocean.
As we didn’t learn enough this day, after this we visited the local whale museum and got a very interesting guided tour. Our minds full of information, some of us would create some art out of collected trash at the OM, some others would buy some last needed items (more warm layers) and we finally had our last dinner at the cottage, packed our stuff and finally moved on to the Hildur. Our adventure was about to begin.
Day 1 sailing
Today we would start our journey on Hildur! Some last preparations had to be done and we did a quick visit at the riggers. They are specialists who are responsible for the installation, maintenance, and repair of the rigging on a sailing vessel. This rigging includes the system of ropes, cables, and chains that support a ship’s masts and control the sails. Once again it made us realise how many people and how much work is behind a wooden sailing ship.
The weather got better and better the last couple of days and we left Húsavík on a sunny day. We’d be spending the expedition in the so called Hope spot. A Hope Spot is a special place that is scientifically identified as critical to the health of the ocean. The best news of the day was that the conditions would be good enough to sail to Grimsey, a small island in the area of the Hope Spot, around 6 hours of sailing straight north. The sun was shining, everyone was in the best mood.
Some of us participants already got introduced into steering Hildur, while the others were looking for marine wildlife – especially whales. And we were lucky again!
After some time, we could encounter some humpback whales. The ocean, the sun, and humpback whales with no-one else around us. So peaceful! But we still had some hours to go, so we continued our journey towards Grimsey.
We arrived at Grimsey some hours later in the evening. We would stay the night in the small harbour. Grimsey is a small Icelandic island located about 40 kilometres off the northern coast of Iceland, just south of the Arctic Circle. It is a special place to visit. One of the most notable features of Grimsey is that the Arctic Circle crosses through the island which I think is a pretty cool thing to do. Beside this, there is a huge amount of seabirds living on and around Grimsey which we would explore the next day. But first things first – we headed up to the (only) local bar to get some drinks and just chat and enjoy the evening together. It’s been an exciting first day on sea. Oh, the day ended in the local supermarket. There is a wall with a painting of Grimsey where every visitor could write down his name. Of course the Hildur Expedition had to add their names! It’s been quite a bit after midnight, when we got to bed. And for myself, I couldn’t wait for the next day to begin!
Day 2 Grimsey
Right after breakfast, we headed out for a small hike around Grimsey. We wanted to step across the Arctic Circle and also wanted to explore the wildlife (well birdlife mostly). Grimsey is renowned for its rich birdlife, particularly its large colonies of seabirds such as puffins, guillemots, and kittiwakes. As for myself, I hoped to get some pretty photos of Puffins. During our hike, the weather conditions were kind of special. Wind, from time to time sun – and a lot of fog. Sometimes you couldn’t even see the cliffs. As we stepped across the Arctic Circle, it felt like being in a magical mystery place. There were no sounds, no wind, just fog.
There’s a marker on the island to show where the line of the arctic circle exactly is. At this special place we came together, meditated with Raíssa and continued our journey with her talking about love and choosing love over fear. The music she played, the topic we talked about, this place and the weather conditions made it so special. At least for myself a lot of emotions came up.
Sadly, we had to go back to Hildur after some time, but not before taking a group picture to create a memory for all of us.
On our way back we came across a lot of puffins again and I can tell you, I was pretty happy with the pictures I got that day.
Back on Hildur, a delicious lunch awaited us. And while we ate and talked about our experiences on Grimsey, Heimir steered us towards the open sea again, as we had a lot more to do that day. As Ocean Missions does a lot of research about micro plastics in the ocean, we would sail close to Grimsey and collect samples using the manta. The manta is a floating device with a tight knit net. While slowly sailing around a certain area for half an hour to collect samples, Charla and some others prepared the next steps.
After half an hour of collecting samples, we got the manta out of the water, we removed the net and would pull it over a sieve, flush it with water to get the samples on the sieve. Then the sample collecting began, putting them into different containers so the samples could be analysed later on back at the OM headquarter. We had to document when, where and how long we took the samples and also did a first quick view of what we gathered. We did this process with the manta in total three times to get more meaningful data. While collecting samples, we could enjoy the view of Grimsey, as the fog had almost disappeared completely. Some Fulmars came across our ship, curious as they are. As I mentioned before, our schedule for the day has been pretty long. Having 24 hours of daylight this far north you can do so much in one day. We should learn later on, how much energy this costs. But it is so amazing having so much light, your mind and body wouldn’t really get tired and you (well I can just speak for myself) feel always like „okay, whats next? It’s still bright, let’s go exploring!“ A wild experience and something you have to learn – conserving some energy to not break down someday.
But for now, we finished collecting samples and set our course south again. Our destination for the day was Hjalteyri, a little village located at Eyjafjörður, a little north of Akureyri. It would take us some hours to get there, so we had plenty of time to do some fun stuff.
The day was still bright and sunny, we came across some humpback whales and some dolphins, the ocean was calm and looked kind of like liquid oil.
Besides the fact that we had so many amazing things done that day, I didn’t feel any tiredness and was excited where Heimir would take us. Little did we know that we would stay up until around 3am in the morning. As we got to Hjalteyri, the crew already told us that there’s a hot tub directly at the harbour. So we all got ready, jumped in the surprisingly not so hot tub, shared a sip of rum and enjoyed the stunning view on the fjord with the beautiful Hildur.
The day ended in one of the weirdest places I have ever been to. Kind of a secret bar run by some locals, a lot of alcohol and some really nice conversations. It’s hard to describe it in words, but its been a night to remember. And I am happy that I could share it with all these amazing people! Writing this down it still feels surreal that all of this happened in only one day honestly.
Day 3 Eyjafjörður
Waking up after this crazy day, the sun was still shining and we witnessed a beautiful and peaceful morning. Coming on deck, it’s been pretty warm, quiet and nobody was around us. I enjoyed my first cup of tea on deck, sitting in the sun like a gecko. Out of nowhere I heard one of my most favourite sounds – the sound when a whale comes to the surface and breathes out. Every time I hear it it gives me joy and a peaceful feeling. It happened that there were around 4 to 5 humpback whales in the bay, I guess they were looking for some breakfast. So it’s been kind of logical that we had breakfast on deck, watching and hearing the whales around us. We sailed a bit to the middle of the bay, to get a little closer. It’s been perfect conditions, everyone was amazed by the scenery in front of us.
The sun was shining and I have never experienced such heat in Iceland before. Good for us, Heimir suggested we could take a swim in the bay. How could you say no to this? Taking a cold plunge from an old sailing ship in a bay in north Iceland, with some humpback whales swimming around you?
Come on, you gotta take this opportunity! It was a hell of fun!
Right now you won’t be surprised to read that we had a lot of stuff to do on this day. Sadly we had to say goodbye to this beautiful bay and the humpback whales. We would sail a short distance to Dalvík where we would do another beach cleanup. On this particular beach we have been to there wasn’t much waste like bottles or plastics luckily, but again a lot of fishing gear and old nets. We even had to get the zodiac to transport those nets, as we found a pretty huge and heavy one.
I think politics have to do something about the use of fishing gear, as a lot of marine wildlife suffer and die because of those abandoned nets in the oceans. This could make a huge difference in the future. Right after a successful beach cleanup we were sailing another short distance to Hrísey, a small island in Eyjafjörður with a lot of birds to watch.
So we did a little walk around the island to enjoy nature, the birds, creating some memories with our cameras and having good conversations.
Leaving Hrísey again, we wanted to get some more samples of the waste floating in the ocean, so we got the manta in the water and zig zagged north of Hrísey. Apparently a minke whale came across us and got interested in the manta. As Charla said, they’re usually shy and don’t come close to humans.
This one followed us for around 15 minutes, circling around our ship. He even got super close to the manta and you could see on several videos we recorded, that he even took a look at the ship and all of us.
I still can’t believe this has happened as Charla said „this just doesn’t happen“.As the whale disappeared we, full of joy about this encounter, remembered that we needed to finish collecting the samples.
Continuing our journey we came across a beautiful lighthouse with again loads of seabirds. Until today, we spent every night at a harbour, but not this time. We would stay the night in a small little bay named þorgeirsfjörður. We reached it around midnight, set our anchor and enjoyed the luxury of staying the night in a beautiful bay, with nobody around us. Just some Fulmars, the moon and the midnight sun, which on this night just barely touched the horizon before it started to rise again.
Of course there was no way we could go to sleep. So we stayed on deck, waited for the sun to reach its lowest point, listened to music, talked to each other and just enjoyed the moment. Another day (and night) for the books. It’s been the first time for me personally seeing the never setting sun and I will never forget this experience.
Day 4 the day of our return
After an again too short night our last day of the expedition was about to start. The first stop would be the small island Flatey in Skjálfandi Bay, which name basically means flat island. The highest point of Flatey is just 20 metres above sea level. There are some few people living on it, but it’s mostly known for the huge amount of seabirds living and breeding there, like again the puffins for example. We did a small walk around the island, enjoyed the moment, watched some puffins and came together one last time in a circle with Raíssa to conclude our little side journey with her. For myself, a moment full of gratitude, reflecting on our journey together, thinking of all these amazing moments but also thinking about what I learned on this journey. About life in Iceland, about the people I met and felt so close to after spending a week together, about what Raíssa taught us about love and fear.
Leaving Flatey, right below a huge group of puffins flying above us, massive clouds came in and after almost 24 hours of sun for 4 days, the more Icelandic weather showed up again. Which turned out to be good as well. Beside the fact that our skin got some rest of all this sunlight the wind picked up again. So much, that for the first time on our journey we could actually sail.
Þetta reddast.
Under the commands of Belén, we set sails and saw the Hildur for the first time in her complete beauty. As I mentioned in the beginning I am no sailor so there were a lot of firsts on this trip for me. I had to learn how much energy, power and how much of working together as a crew is essential for sailing. Some things you have to explore first to understand how much effort it takes.
There was one last thing I wanted to do before we would reach Húsavík again. Flying my drone around the Hildur while the sails were set. So Heimir, Belén and I coordinated everything so I could set up my drone. I must admit I was pretty nervous because I never started, flew and landed my drone while being on a moving vehicle. But, as I use to say, it’ll be a win-win anyway. If I lose my drone, I have a good story to tell, if everything turns out well I probably will have some amazing footage. While Heimir showed his sailing skills keeping the Hildur pretty stable while I ́ve been starting the drone, the moment it got in the air and flew safely around Hildur, it’s been the best flight I ever had, it was so much fun. We even managed to get kind of a group photo as we all got on deck, waving at the drone. While I flew and recorded the moment, the time came as the battery began to die so I had to land the drone. It should have been wise to listen to Charla’s advice, putting on a glove if the drone needs to be caught right in the air. I don’t know if you, the reader of this blog, is into drones, but they all have some avoidance sensors so that the drone won’t crash in subjects. It is also a pretty common move to grab the drone out of the air if the ground is not suitable for a proper landing. So the drone refused to come close enough to our ship – like there has been an invisible wall around us. The battery got lower and lower in energy and all I wanted was to save the footage.
Saving the drone was just the second priority for me now. Heimir helped me a lot by slowing Hildur down as much as possible. Of course there is a setting to deactivate those sensors and landing the drone would have been a piece of cake. But in the heat of action I didn’t really think of this and just forced the drone full speed above us, grabbed it without hesitating. I got the drone, I got the footage – and a lot of cuts in my finger of the drone. Should have listened to you Charla! I was full of adrenaline, relieved I got the footage. Charla came up with a big smile „told you!“ and she did an incredible job taking care of my wounds.
Thank you so much Charla, you’re awesome!
So this would be the end of the Hope Expedition 2024. With full sails we came back to Húsavík, appearing out of fog and clouds out of nowhere. I am glad we did some „real“ sailing to finish our journey. The ship seemed to behave way more natural. Not against the wind and the sea, more like it’s a part of the waves, the wind and the sea. At least for myself it felt pretty different compared to sailing using the engine. A feeling I really want to explore again.
We closed the day by unpacking Hildur, having a last dinner in Húsavík and some of us had some drinks at the local brewery. Like every day and night on this expedition, we didn’t go to bed early. To squeeze every minute we were together and enjoy this Expedition as long as possible.
Epilogue
So what did this Expedition with me, personally? Before I booked and joined Ocean Missions, I told everybody it’ll be a once in a lifetime thing. The whole Hope Expedition changed a lot for me. Lately I haven’t been satisfied with how my life looked like.
This expedition gave me so much inspiration for a new course in my life. It brought up a sense in myself, which I lost in the last couple of months or years. It’s been a very long time since I was a hundred percent sure that I am exactly in the right place at the right moment participating in something I truly believe in and which combines my passion for nature, wildlife, conservation of nature, the ocean – and photography. I think it is so important to engage and inspire more people for nature conservation. To strive for a change for the better because we humans are all in the same boat.
Because right now we all are destroying this beautiful place we call Earth. Home. Using the power of images I believe is a powerful way not only to get people into important topics. Photography is stopping the time, it has the possibility to bring us back to our most loved moments. An art to create memories. I want to thank the whole Ocean Missions crew for their work, their passion and their beliefs which make them keep on doing this. Even if the fight against plastic pollution sometimes seems to be a fight we, as humans, can’t win. Speaking now directly to all the beautiful people participating in the Hope Expedition and the amazing crew we had: I am more than grateful meeting you all. The best thing for me personally, beside all these „bucket list“ moments I encountered was being part of this.
Meeting you all and getting a small glimpse of who you are. Looking back, I couldn’t have asked for a better company for this expedition. Thank you Heimir for not only sharing your knowledge about wooden ships but also your presence alone made me feel that the whole journey will be a success, even if unknown bad things might happen. Thank you Belén, for sharing your passion for the ocean and sailing, teaching us a lot during the trip. Thank you Charla for sharing your knowledge about whales and marine wildlife. Thank you Taïme, also for sharing your knowledge about puffins in particular, for bringing so much positive energy and laughter. And of course thank you Raíssa, for showing me new perspectives on life, for everything you shared with us. Again, I can just speak for myself, but the talks we had, the moments we shared during the daily hour with you, all this got very deep into me and helped me to deal with some bad stuff I carried on my shoulders for a long time.
Lastly, in no particular order, Sanne, Andreia, Hilda, Ellen, Joaquim, Deb and Dominika. I am happy I got to know you all, I really enjoyed doing this expedition together with you. And especially, thanks to the Hot Tub Gang, you know who I mean. Had a blast with you!
It’s been one of the best experiences in my life. Love you all. Forever grateful.
„One of the greatest freedom in life is to be able to choose how we react to things in life“
Raíssa
