All aspects of sport and recreation on Svalbard feel the impact of a warming climate, from dogsledding to snowmobiling to skiing, fishing, hunting and glacier climbing. Snow melts two or three weeks earlier than it did 30 years ago
LONGYEARBYEN, Norway — It was early April, and while the midnight sun had not yet arrived on the remote archipelago of Svalbard, darkness had begun its annual four-month retreat from the world’s northernmost town. On a cold, pristine morning, sled dogs with their thick coats and powerful legs began a howling chorus as they set off into a snowy valley of reindeer, grouse and distressed grandeur.
Svalbard, between mainland Norway and the North Pole, offers one of the world’s most isolated and arresting wildernesses. The northern lights dance to an electromagnetic rave party. Mountains dive into fjords as if to go swimming, their bases shaped like the wide paws of polar bears. Arctic foxes skitter with the herky-jerky motion of silent movies.
Lately, she said, she had been thinking of her father, now deceased, who lived on Greenland and mused that it might be possible one day to grow oranges in the Arctic.
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