Getting to Greenland by leaving it

About ninety percent of the tiny population of fifty-six thousand Greenlanders lives in west Greenland. East Greenland, by comparison, has fewer than three thousand residents scattered over only five settlements and two towns. Noone lives in the northeast or the far north, a coastline of almost 2,500 km of pure wilderness.

If you could fly directly from Nuuk to Kulusuk, the main airport in east Greenland, it would take about two hours. But even though east and west Greenland are part of the same ‘local’ council region, you can’t fly direct from west to east. It used to be possible but, in 2017, Air Greenland lost the Government of Greenland tender for flights to east Greenland. Instead, the tender was won by NorlandAir, based in Iceland. So now if you want to reach east Greenland from the west coast, you must first fly to Iceland and then return back to the east coast. Instead of a two hour flight, it is now a three and a half hour flight to Reykjavik, an overnight stay, and then a return flight to east Greenland of one and a half hours – a total of almost thirty hours including an international stopover, and assuming no delays.

I pondered the idea of a two hour direct flight as I stepped on the Dash-8 from Reykjavik to east Greenland, having left Nuuk two days earlier. It certainly felt odd leaving Greenland in order to fly back into it. But stepping off that flight at Constable Point in east Greenland, the process felt almost fitting. Compared with west Greenland, east Greenland feels like another country, a colder, snowier, and more spectacular one.