Scoresby Sund GreenlandCruise Port Guide

The Scoresby Sund fjord system (in Greenlandic: Kangertittivaq) on the eastern coast of Greenland is the world's largest fjord system, a complex of interlocking fjords and side branches covering an area of approximately 38,000 square kilometers — larger than Belgium. The main fjord stretches 350 km inland from the coast, with walls rising 1,000–2,000 meters from the water surface, creating scenery of staggering scale and grandeur.

The fjord system was named after the Scottish whaler William Scoresby Jr., who charted the area in 1822. The only permanent settlement in the entire fjord complex is Ittoqqortoormiit (population ~350), formerly known by the Danish name Scoresbysund, founded in 1925 on a peninsula at the fjord entrance. The community is one of the most isolated towns in the world — the nearest other settlement is hundreds of kilometers away.

Cruising through the Scoresby Sund in summer offers an extraordinary Arctic spectacle: floating icebergs calved from the inland ice sheet, drift ice from the polar pack, and the dark fjord walls reflected in still water. Polar bears roam the fjord shores and ice; the area has one of the highest polar bear densities in the Eastern Arctic. Musk oxen graze on the tundra above the fjord walls, and narwhal (the unicorn whale, with their characteristic spiral tusk) use the fjord as a summer feeding ground.

The rock of the Scoresby Sund walls is among the oldest exposed on the Earth's surface, including Precambrian gneisses over 3 billion years old — older than the Greenlandic ice sheet above them. The landscape is geologically as well as visually overwhelming.

The midnight sun illuminates the fjord from late May to late July, creating an otherworldly light that transforms the ice, water, and rock into a photographic paradise.