Disko Bay, on Greenland’s west coast at 69° north, is where the inland ice meets the sea most dramatically. Behind the town of Ilulissat, the glacier Sermeq Kujalleq — one of the fastest-moving in the world — pushes a constant stream of icebergs down a 60 km fjord. The largest run aground on a shallow bank at the fjord mouth and pile up there, a few minutes’ walk from the last houses, before breaking free into Baffin Bay. The Ilulissat Icefjord has been a World Heritage Site since 2004.
Ilulissat itself has about 4,700 people, thousands of sled dogs and the best visitor facilities in Greenland. There are no roads between Greenlandic towns: you fly or sail everywhere, which makes trips here slower and costlier than in Iceland or Norway, and far more memorable. Most travellers now enter through the capital, Nuuk, 560 km to the south, whose international airport opened in late 2024.
Highlights
- Sailing among the icebergs at the mouth of the icefjord under the midnight sun
- The boardwalk to Sermermiut and the clifftop view over the ice
- A day at the calving front of the Eqi glacier
- Humpback whales feeding between the bergs in summer
- Driving a dog sled across the frozen backcountry in March and April
- The colonial harbour and national museum in Nuuk
West Greenland: planning your time
Allow four nights in Ilulissat: one day for the trails along the icefjord, one for an evening iceberg cruise, one for the long boat trip to Eqi glacier or to Disko Island, and one in reserve, because fog and ice delay flights and boats more often here than almost anywhere. Add a night or two in Nuuk on the way in or out. Build slack into your international connections — missed flights are the commonest problem on a Greenland trip.
