GREENLAND: ICEBERGS ARE BECOMING A BIG TOURIST ATTRACTION
English/Nat They're big, they're white and they're only water, but for the world's northernmost country they're turning out to be a big tourist attraction. Everyone knows that Greenland isn't green -- it's the home of icebergs. And with the popularity of the book and film, Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow, more and more tourists are finding their way to Greenland. One can't help but be awed by the power of nature. When an iceberg breaks up, the beauty of nature turns into a terrifying force. One fisherman died when this iceberg broke in half and sent huge waves into the harbour of Ilulissat, Greenland's iceberg capital. But despite their danger, Elke Meissner recognized the tourist potential of icebergs when she moved from Germany to Greenland 20 years ago. Today she runs her own tour bureau in this town, 300 kilometres north of the Arctic Circle. She says that these mountains of ice are the star attraction. SOUNDBITE: (English) "The main attraction of course is the big ice fjord, the icebergs, this huge glacier which we've got here only fifty kilometres from here and I think it's the only place in the world you can see that." SUPER CAPTION: Elke Meissner, Greenland Tours Ilulissat is the Arctic which people come to see -- icebergs and the midnight sun that never setting beneath the cold mirror-like sea. It's so typical it's where film producers chose to film the Greenland scenes of Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow, based on the popular book by Danish author Peter Hoeg. But to see the best of the ice requires a trip by boat, or better still by helicopter. The Ilulissat kangerlua, or ice fjord, holds the largest iceberg-forming glacier in the northern hemisphere. Here, ice that is some 25-thousand years old flows into the fjord at a rate of only 25 metres per day. But that's nearly 20 (m) million tonnes of iceberg daily, enough to supply New York City with water for a whole year. The fjord here is so choked with ice that no water is visible, even though it's up to 1000 metres deep. Meissner thinks people want the adventure of a new frontier. SOUNDBITE: (English) "The arctic is a little more popular than it has been before. Maybe because of the movie Miss Smilla's Sense for Snow and that people are a little bit tired of sun and only going to the beach." SUPER CAPTION: Elke Meissner, Greenland Tours And after a long day of berg-watching, you can retire to a seaside aluminium igloo for 150 U-S dollars a night. Or you can enjoy a whiskey on the 25-thousand year old rocks. And those who do make the long and expensive trip to Greenland know what they've come to see. SOUNDBITE: (English) "Just for the icebergs and for the nature." SUPER CAPTION: Swedish tourist SOUNDBITE: (English) "Nature. But this specific area has the icebergs and the ice fjord." SUPER CAPTION: Danish tourist SOUNDBITE: (English) "To see the light and especially to see the midnight sun and to see the beautiful colours in the sea and the icebergs." SUPER CAPTION: Danish tourist Greenland's stark beauty and unique landscape, as yet untrampled by mass tourism, is what draws people to this unusual destination. It's ironic that the very conditions that have kept Greenland off the main tourist arteries of the world - the cold and the ice - is exactly what now brings people here. For in Greenland it's the power of nature that awes the outsiders and commands the respect of the locals, even when the tourists have gone, winter draws in and the sun never rises above the horizon. KEYWORDS: UNUSUAL You can license this story through AP Archive: www.aparchive.com/metadata/youtube/8f18de08434d63788862aee6a58ef786 Find out more about AP Archive: www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork
