Bear Island is considered
to be Norway's own 'Devil's Island'. All Norwegians have heard about
the rough place where boys become men, where you always have to be
on your guard against polar bears, and the weather is extreme. There
are 90 days in winter when the sun never shows up. The whole summer
the island is generally engulfed in fog, and there are five clear
days in the whole year. Most of the winter, which starts in September,
there are gales and storms.
You carry a rifle just in case, when you go out, but you really don't
see much. In snow and darkness one man got punched on his back at
two different occasions. After that he was not able to fall asleep
and had to be evacuated back to civilisation in Norway. Another man
disappeared during a snowstorm, having got lost when walking between
two houses. He was recovered the following spring, deep-frozen and
well preserved, but dead.
Bear Island has the largest concentration of seabirds in the northern
hemisphere. Tourism is negligible, regulated by the Norwegian Meteorological
Institute. But toxins from industry arrive with currents from Europe
and are building up in foxes and bears. Seabirds are rumoured to be
declining in number. The pristine nature is under threat. If anything
happens to an Arctic environment the traces last for a long time.
