The Icefjord Gets a Runway
Ilulissat's new airport opens on 29 October. The ice it puts within reach moves 19 metres a day, and sounds like nothing else.
The first thing that hits you at the Ilulissat Icefjord is the scale. Standing on the rocky shoreline, with nothing but white stretching to the edge of the horizon, you’re struck by the immensity of it all, and by how something so big can be quiet and thunderous at the same time.
You sit in silence and stare. Then a clap sounds in the distance and ripples across the frozen water. When the glacier calves, it can push up waves several metres high.
A glacier in a hurry
The ice in the fjord comes from Sermeq Kujalleq. It is one of the fastest and most active glaciers in the world, moving about 19 metres a day and calving more than 35 cubic kilometres of ice a year, roughly a tenth of all of Greenland’s calf ice, according to the Danish Agency for Culture and Palaces. UNESCO inscribed the fjord as a World Heritage site in 2004. The protected area covers 40,240 hectares.
The icebergs choke the fjord mouth, grounding on a shallow sill before they break free into Disko Bay.
The walk out
The walk to the Icefjord is manageable for most people. You head up through town, past a row of homes where the howls of sled dogs echo off the rock. Then comes the moment: you round a bend at the Icefjord Centre, and the glacier comes into view.
Read next · NewsIlulissat Gets a Direct Line to Copenhagen1 min →From the centre, a boardwalk runs out to the edge of the fjord. It is slightly hilly and takes more than 10 minutes, so give slower walkers time.
Why now
On 29 October, Greenland Airports opens Ilulissat’s new airport, and Air Greenland flies the first direct service from Copenhagen. Until now, every visitor arrived via Kangerlussuaq or Nuuk. From November, a traveller can leave Copenhagen on a Wednesday morning and stand at the edge of the Icefjord that afternoon.
More visitors make the basics matter more. This is a UNESCO World Heritage site: be kind, and stay on the marked trails.
In town
Shop early. Depending on the day, some shops close early or don’t open at all, so don’t leave souvenirs to the end of the visit.
Try a muskox burger at Hotel Icefiord. Then look for a local carver at Sanaluttarfik, the big red artist’s workshop towards the landing site.
Disclosure: Andrew Lovesey travelled to Ilulissat as a guide with Adventure Canada on its Into the Northwest Passage expedition.
Sources
- Danish Agency for Culture and Palaces, Ilulissat Icefjord World Heritage site
- Air Greenland, New winter flight schedule 2026 for Ilulissat, 24 Feb 2026
- UNESCO World Heritage Centre, Ilulissat Icefjord
Where to stay near Ilulissat
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Andrew Lovesey is Editor-in-Chief of Not An Atlas, and always on the hunt for the next big thing: where to go, where to stay and what's worth the photo. His first trip was to the family cottage in Prince Edward Island, all rolling hills, red sand cliffs and jellyfish drifting in the North Atlantic. He'll sit anywhere but the middle seat (no armrest wars), never flies without the adapter that lets his AirPods play the in-flight movie, and has eaten at a McDonald's in every country he's visited. Iceland gets a pass because it doesn't have one. He once learned to bead earrings from Aleqa Hammond, Greenland's first female premier, on a ship in the Northwest Passage, and will tell anyone who'll listen that Cincinnati is wildly underrated. Friends say charming, driven and loyal. His mum says persuasive. Next stop: Greece.
