Expedition Member Comments on Abercrombie & Kent Extreme Adventure

By: Destination Club News
Date: May 21, 2009

Two months removed from the start of a once in a lifetime trip, expedition member L. Craig Smith recalled his time on the Abercrombie & Kent Extreme Adventures trip, Norway: On the Trail of the Polar Bear. On March 21, Smith and nine others embarked on a nine day excursion to track the largest carnivore found on land, the polar bear. Added to the Endangered Species Act as a threatened species just over one year ago, the largest remaining population of wild polar bear can be found in Spitsbergen, an area where A&K has the exclusive rights to camp and track.

One of National Geographic Traveler's 50 Tours of a Lifetime, you can see why Smith called the expedition "the experience of a lifetime."

"Leaving Longyearbyen, we drove by snowmobile for more than eight hours to the eastern coast of Spitsbergen, surrounded only by snow, mountain peaks and wildlife such as Arctic reindeer and polar bears. The weather was harsh, with storms descending soon after we reached camp, bringing with them temperatures of -32° and 30-40 mile per hour winds. We quickly realized that nature dominated the schedule here in the Arctic, and that little had changed since the days of the explorers more than 100 years ago. For almost three days, the team and I waited for the driving snow and wind to abate, staying warm within the base camp tents, enjoying three-course dinners and each other's company and secure in the knowledge that the three guides accompanying us were monitoring the storm and the polar bears' locations. As morning broke on March 27, we emerged from the tents to dig out the buried snowmobiles and embarked on the polar bear search. Quickly expedition leader Mats Forsberg found the trail of a massive male and, within minutes, the male came into view. The sight was surreal, indescribable — truly the experience of a lifetime. After a day of tracking the male and venturing out onto the shelf ice, two members of the team lifted their skis on their pack to climb an Arctic peak, closing the expedition with a few backcountry turns at the top of the world."

"Upon returning to Longyearbyen, we toasted this overwhelming, simply indescribable experience. The greatest realization that I came away with was a newly discovered sense of self, what one is capable of being. I was simply honored to have participated on this adventure of a lifetime, to experience the human aspect of the trip and the overwhelming power of nature."

- L. Craig Smith

Members of the Abercrombie & Kent Residence Club can exchange a portion of their annual allotment of nights for tours, safaris, and expeditions with Abercrombie & Kent. According to Darin Gilson, Abercrombie & Kent Residence Club's Senior Vice President of Sales and Business Development, a growing number of members are starting to use this membership benefit and the club factors A&K usage into their destination club availability model.