Northeast Greenland National Park

Most of the park is under a giant sheet of ice.

Near the coast there are mountains, deep fjords and icebergs. The ground stays frozen deep down all year.

About 80 percent of the park is permanently covered by the Greenland Ice Sheet, says Visit Greenland. Along the coast it describes huge tundra areas, mountains and deep fjords filled with icebergs.

At Zackenberg, in the park, Aarhus University says the ground is permanently frozen. Only a top layer 20 to 100 centimeters thick thaws each summer. The valley there was freed from glacier ice about 8,000 years ago.

Roughly 80% of the park is permanently covered by the Greenland Ice Sheet; outside it lie tundra, mountains and deep, iceberg-filled fjords (Visit Greenland).

Aarhus University describes the Zackenberg study area as lying in the zone of continuous permafrost, with an active layer 20-100 cm thick. A major geological flexure and thrust zone crosses Zackenbergdalen, separating Caledonian gneiss bedrock to the west from Cretaceous sandstones and Tertiary basalts to the east. The core study area was deglaciated about 8,000 years ago, and the ice sheet margin lies about 60 km to the west.

Muskoxen with long, shaggy coats live here. So do polar bears, walruses and narwhals.

Little lemmings are food for owls, stoats and wolves.

Visit Greenland says the muskox, Greenland's largest land mammal, is found throughout the park. Polar bears have one of their strongholds here, and walruses rest on sandy beaches in summer. In summer, narwhals swim into the fjords to look for food.

The northern collared lemming is a key animal: it is the base of the food chain on land. Snowy owls and long-tailed skuas breed in the park because of lemmings. Only two birds, the raven and the ptarmigan, stay all year.

Visit Greenland lists the muskox (Greenland's largest land mammal, found throughout the park), the polar bear (one of its strongholds), the walrus (summer haul-outs on sandy beaches, today found in Greenland only inside the park), the narwhal and the Arctic wolf, whose population there probably does not exceed 100.

The northern collared lemming forms the base of the land food chain: predators such as the stoat, and the snowy owl and long-tailed skua, can likely only live or breed here because of it. Only the raven and the ptarmigan stay all year; pink-footed and barnacle geese come to molt their flight feathers, because predator numbers are low here.

Long ago, people lived and hunted here. You can still find their old tent rings.

Today scientists come to study the Arctic.

Visit Greenland says Paleo-Inuit and later Neo-Inuit (Thule) cultures lived in Northeast Greenland, and their tent rings, tools and turf houses are still well preserved in the cold. From the early 1900s to the 1960s, trappers lived in small huts here; more than 350 huts are left.

Today very few people live in the park. Aarhus University's Zackenberg Research Station, set up in 1995, studies how High Arctic ecosystems work and change.

Paleo-Inuit cultures (Independence I and Dorset, 2,400 to 200 BC) and Neo-Inuit cultures (Thule, AD 1300 to 1850) lived in Northeast Greenland; tent rings and tools lie exposed on the soil, and turf houses remain (Visit Greenland). Trappers, mostly from Denmark and Norway, lived in more than 350 surviving huts from the early 1900s to the 1960s.

Zackenberg Research Station (est. 1995, owned by the Government of Greenland and operated by Aarhus University) supports long-term High Arctic ecosystem monitoring as part of the Greenland Ecosystem Monitoring programme.

You need special permission to visit this park.

The best time is July and August, when the fjords are free of ice.

There are no roads, hotels or public airports in the park, and visitors need a permit from the Government of Greenland. Most people come on expedition ships in summer. Visit Greenland says July and August are best, when the fjords are free of ice.

Visitors may not hunt, fish or take anything away, and campers must stay away from places where birds and mammals breed, feed or rest.

The park has no roads, harbors, commercial airports or accommodation; a permit from the Government of Greenland must be sought at least 12 weeks ahead (cruise operators arrange it for passengers). July and August are recommended: the fjords are ice-free and breeding birds are still present (Visit Greenland).

Visitors may not hunt, fish or remove objects, no motorized vehicles may be used on land, and tents may not be pitched near breeding, foraging, molting or resting sites of mammals and birds.