A frontier town among glaciers and polar bears
Longyearbyen, founded as a coal-mining town, is one of the northernmost settlements in the world, and outside it the Svalbard archipelago is wilderness of glaciers, fjords and mountains. Polar bears roam free, so no one leaves town without a guide. Summer brings months of midnight sun, boat trips to glacier fronts and the abandoned Soviet mining town of Pyramiden; winter brings the long polar night, northern lights and snowmobile and dog-sled expeditions. The Svalbard Museum explains the islands' whaling and mining history.