Boat captain
KarenLyberth
“You do not command the sea. You ask it nicely.”
- Based in
- Ilulissat, Greenland
- Guiding since
- 2014
- Languages
- Greenlandic, Danish, English
- Leads
- Disko Bay Icebergs
About Karen
Karen is a third-generation boat captain in Ilulissat. Her grandfather ran the first mail boat to Oqaatsut, and her mother ran the ferry. She took the wheel at nineteen.
She has spent fourteen summers in the Icefjord and learned, as she says, “the grammar of the ice”: which bergs are stable, which are about to roll and which are just pretending. She runs a strict one-berg-length rule that no guest has ever complained about.
In the winter she teaches navigation at the maritime college in Ilulissat, and plays bass in a band that is more popular than she lets on.
The berg rule
“Never closer than twice the height of the berg,” says Karen. “Some guests think that is far. In 14 summers I have not had to rescue a guest, and that is why.”
She keeps a laminated card with the rule on the dashboard, and has never needed to point to it.
Leads
Disko Bay Icebergs
10 days, Jun to Aug, from €5,600
