My first step in Greenland was to a town called Qaqortoq, the fourth largest town in the country. It was a fairly small town. Our ship had to moor further out in the sea and all passengers had to take a tender - a smaller ship to take us on shore. As I got off the tender some people were already going back to the ship. Unlike us, where our day starts at 10am 😅 some were perhaps early risers and had already done the tour of the town. And many others were people working on the ship, taking advantage of the few hours they had off from work in the morning
Famous landmarks
There are two main museums in the town, the Qaqortoq Museum located in a blacksmith built in 1804, the oldest building in the town. It was fairly small and very busy with many cruisers visiting all at the same time, and I didn't manage to get any good photos. The other museum is the Norse Museum, just across the road. This yellow building is a little newer than the Qaqortoq Museum, it dates back to 1874. Both museums were quite interesting, especially if you like Norse history.
Another famous landmark in town is the Mindebrønden memorial fountain. It was built in 1932 and is the oldest fountain in Greenland. There are three whales at the top and water is supposed to sprout from the blowholes at the top. It looked very sad as there was no water in the fountain. I read online that they close the water off during the winter months. September isn't exactly winter yet, it would have been nice if they kept it on, or at least turned it on for the day. Around 30 cruise ships stop by each year, and now you have 3000 people from one cruise ship who go away disappointed and tell their friends and family about this sad fountain that has no water. It's not exactly very good to promote tourism.
The Stone and Man sculpture is an open air art project. Back in the 90s, a local artist with the help of other nordic artists, carved a lot of sculptures around town. Most are of fishes and whales, reflecting local life, as well as traditional designs. Qaqortoq isn't big, and it's fun to try find them as you walk around town.
Hiking at Qaqortoq
I read there was a nice viewpoint in town that involved climbing up 200 stairs. That was manageable and easy I thought. Somehow I must have took the wrong turning and went the opposite the direction. I didn't realise it because the scenery was very pretty. We went past a cemetery (more on that in another post)
We went past a satellite on the way up, it was enclosed, I reckon it might be out of use now. I found that very interesting as I used to work in telecoms and rarely got to see a satellite so up close and personal.
After a bit more uphill climbing, we reached a flat plateau with a gorgeous view of the town below us.
We continued to climb and got to the top of the view point. From here, the town was even further away, and I could see our ship moored out from the port. There was another satellite next to the old one I went past earlier on. That's probably the town's main connection to the outside world. It was quite a view up here, and I'm glad I took the wrong turning and ended at the Qaqortoq Viewpoint. Sometimes mistakes can be good.
After coming down from the Qarqortoq Veiwpoint, I found the 212 steps Panaromic stairs that I had originally planned to go. It was much harder work than going up to the viewpoint, and frankly speaking a disappointment as there was not much to see at the top, and nothing compared to the earlier view.
The other side of town
We did a lot of walking around town, the town wasn't that big and there wasn't much else to do to be honest. We went to the other side of the time, that's opposite to the Qarqortoq Viewpoint. It looked more residential here.
In the old days Greenland houses were coloured coded making it easier for people to know where to go.
Red buildings signified churches, schools, teachers’ or ministers’ houses. Yellow colours were assigned to hospitals, doctors, and health care personnel. Green was at first the symbol for radio communication and later became the colour of telecommunications. The colour blue was often reserved for fish factories. Police stations were black.
Source
This system isn't used anymore and people can paint their houses whatever colour they like. All this adds to the charm of the town.
We continued walking gradually uphill and saw the viewpoint that we were at earlier on in the day on the other side of town. Can you see the satellite?
Our walk started to go downhill towards the port, and took us to a big building called the Great Greenland. I had no idea what it was and was intrigued enough to do a spot of exploring. It turns out this is Greenland's main seal tannery, using seal skins to make products such as jackets and bags etc. The sealskin jackets inside the shop were beautiful, ultra soft, warm and totally wearable. It also came with a price tag of at least Euro2000!!!
The factory and tannery was off limits to visitors,, but there was a showroom with some interesting artefacts and a rack full of colourful and very soft sealskin. They had two armholes at the top and most of them were a little on the small side which I thought was rather odd because I normally wear small sizes.
I ended up modelling the largest one. However, I found out afterwards, these are decorative pieces and not garments!!!! Woops! I wonder how many other visitors made a faux pas like me 😂
I hope you like this little quick tour of Qaqortoq in Greenland. Let me know what you think of it.