Northwest Passage Cruises

First built in 1924 as a Canadian outpost on the southeast coast of Devon Island, with concern about sovereignty of this Arctic Archipelago. It was settled several times but finally abandoned with a ‘ghost town’ feel. Tundra is good to explore and to ship cruise the nearby inlet.

Situated on the SE coast of Victoria Island (the 8th largest in the World), and the largest community on the Island. As well as the community focus there is the history of the area

The first Europeans to reach Cambridge Bay were overland explorers led by Thomas Simpson in 1839; searching for the Northwest Passage and crossing the sea ice to Cambridge Bay by foot. Another overland expedition was led by John Rae who reached Cambridge Bay in 1851. The first ship to reach the bay was HMS Enterprise under Richard Collinson who wintered there in 1852/53. Both Rae and Collinson were searching for Franklin's lost expedition.

Key historical site where Franklin spent his first winter before the Erebus and Terror vanished to the outside World.

Made very sombre with the graves of three of Franklin’s men, and others, plus later memorials. Situated on the very southwest corner of Devon Island, separated by Barrow Strait, it is at a key ‘crossroad’ in the northwest Passage and was the main base in the search for Franklin.

This remote location is a key destination for everyone that visits the NW passage, with the main focus on the location, rather than wildlife, but offshore can be good for Beluga.

This island is in a key location in Lancaster Sound at the junction of Prince Regent Inlet and Barrow Strait, off the northwest coast of Somerset Island. It has some really impressive and steep seabird cliffs that is one of the most important sites in the Canadian Arctic and a bird sanctuary.

Also good area to look for marine mammals and other Arctic wildlife.

Narrow strait separating Somerset Island to the north from Murchison Promontory of Boothia Peninsula to the south, the northernmost part of mainland America.

The 2km (1.2 mi) wide and 25 km (16 mi) strait connects the Gulf of Boothia, Prince Regent Inlet, and Brentford Bay to the east with Peel Sound and Franklin Strait to the west. It became a strait on ‘one’ of the NW passage routes. On a map of the Canadian Arctic, unless you look in detail, it is easy to assume the Boothia Peninsula and Somerset Island is one peninsula. In many ways, with Bellot Strait locked in ice much of the year, it is like the peninsula. Since it is so narrow, it can be a place to look for Narwhal, and, along the shore, Polar Bear, or even wolf.

Situated on the SE side of King William Island it is the location where the Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen and his crew spent some time on his route through the Northwest Passage.

In October 1903 he put Gjøa into a natural harbour on the southeast coast of King William Island. He stayed there for nearly two years, learning from the local Netsilik Inuit, and the skills to live off the land and travel efficiently in the Arctic environment. This knowledge proved to be vital for Amundsen's later successful exploration to the South Pole. He also explored the Boothia Peninsula, searching for the exact location of the North Magnetic Pole. Today there is a community at Gjoa Haven and a popular landing for cruise ships. Permanent European-style settlement started in 1927, as a Hudson's Bay Company trading outpost. The settlement attracted the traditionally nomadic Inuit people as they adapted a more settled lifestyle. By 2016 the population was 1,324.

Situated close to the southwest corner of Devon Island with Viscount Melville Sound nearby.

Great ship cruising in a location close to where Lancaster Sound splits into a myriad of channels that made the exploration of the northwest passage so challenging.

This long sound separates Somerset Island on the east from Prince of Wales Island on the west. To the north it opens onto Parry Channel. To the south, at the mouth the Bellot Strait, it merges with Franklin Strait.

Sir John Franklin passed through the strait in 1846, an unseasonably warm summer, since typically Peel Sound is frozen. The east side of Peel Sound was traced by James Clark Ross in 1849, searching for Franklin, and in 1858 Francis Leopold McClintock tried to penetrate it and was blocked by ice. Even today cruise ships attempting the NW passage prefer the Bellot Strait route compared to Peel Sound.

The island (the 61st-largest island in the world and Canada's 15th-largest island) and the surrounding area was the region where the Erebus and Terror ended up.

It is now known the two ships became stranded in 1846 when frozen in the sea ice northwest of the island. After abandoning the two ships, most of the crew died from exposure and starvation as they attempted to walk south near the western coastline. Two of Franklin's men were buried at Hall Point on the island's south coast. It wasn't until June 29, 1981, that researchers finally had luck. A team led by Canadian archaeologist Owen Beattie, found 31 pieces of human bone fragments on the southern tip of the island, called Booth Point. On September 9, 2014 the Victoria Strait Expedition located the wreck of HMS Erebus. The HMS Terror, was found in 2016 in Terror Bay, off the south-west coast of King William Island.

The area also played an important for the Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen on the expedition through the Northwest Passage, spending nearly two years with his ship on the SE coast at what is now known as Gjoa Haven. The island is separated from the Boothia Peninsula by the James Ross Strait to the northeast, and the Rae Strait to the east. To the west is the Victoria Strait and beyond it Victoria Island. Within the Simpson Strait, to the south of the island, then the Adelaide Peninsula, part of mainland Canada. Queen Maud Gulf lies to the southwest.

Fort Ross is an abandoned former trading post on Somerset Island. First established in 1937 by the Hudson's Bay Company, it was only operational to 1948, as severe ice conditions in the surrounding waters made the site hard to reach and economically unviable.

It is interesting to visit a Hudson’s Bay Company hut and to contemplate the location. It is situated at the eastern end of Bellot Strait on a south-eastern peninsula of Somerset Island, a key location in the northwest Passage. Also good for a rage of high arctic species.

Between Ellesmere Island and Devon Island at the entrance to Jones Sound.

It is part of the Nirjutiqavvik National Wildlife Area and Cambridge Point, with spectacular cliffs that are an important location for breeding seabirds including black guillemot, black-legged kittiwake, glaucous gull, northern fulmar, and thick-billed murre. Offshore waters are also good for marine mammals.

A large island (96th in the world, 21st in Canada) at key location with Devon Island to the east, Bathurst Island to the west, and Somerset Island further to the South, across the main passage, with various smaller islands nearby.

Cornwallis Island is the location of Resolute, one of the most northerly settlements in Canada, certainly the most northern ‘town’. The airport is used as a hub to join cruise ships, though still a challenge, with a beach landing and a Zodiac cruise to get to and from the ship, with luggage!

On Ellesmere Island (10th largest in the World) and the most northerly community in Canada. In Inuktitut it is called Aujuittuq—”the place that never thaws”.

It is the only ‘public’ community on Ellesmere Island, created in 1953 by the Canadian Government with a relocation of Inuit families from Inukjuak, Quebec. It is also one of the coldest inhabited places in the world, with an average yearly temperature of −16.5 °C (2.3 °F). There is an airport, but even today it can be a challenging place to land, or even get ashore by Zodiac from a ship.

One of the deeper inlets into Devon Island, on the southeast side, but further west from Dundas Harbour. Great ship cruising with icebergs and the flat-topped mountain geology of this part of Devon Island.

The Location of the HMS Terror, (discovered in 2016) off the south-west coast of King William Island.

Curiously the name is coincidental, but it is a sheltered location suggesting the ship was sailed into the location, rather than drifting here. It is located in the south-western side of King William Island, the entrance to the bay marked by Fitzjames Island to the west and Queen Maud Gulf to the west, and Irving Islands to the east. Queen Maud Gulf is between the northern coast of the mainland and the south-eastern corner of Victoria Island.

The location on King William Island, where some of the men of the Franklin expedition created a summer camp in the summer of 1847 for magnetic observations.

By late December 1847/January 1848, the officers and men left the camp in a hurry and headed back to the ships. The site as ‘discovered’ in 1859 by the McClintock expedition searching for evidence of Franklin’s Expedition, finding artifacts.

Also known as Kiluhiqtuq, a deep inlet on the Canadian mainland at the east end of Coronation Gulf, into which the Burnside and Western rivers empty.

The name, or its native equivalent Kingoak (Qingaut, nose mountain), is also used to identify the community of Bathurst Inlet located on the shore. Melville Sound opens into the eastern side of the inlet at Cape Croker, west of the Hurd Islands.

Since it is on the mainland a wider range of animals and birds might be encountered.

Located at the mouth of the Coppermine River in the Kitikmeot Region of Nunavut, Canada, on the southwest side of Coronation Gulf, southwest of Victoria Island.

It is the westernmost community in Nunavut, near the border with the Northwest Territories. There is an airport and Kugulutuk is a location where small expedition ships may drop and pick up passengers before or after a trip through the northwest Passage (rather than a longer trip right through the Bering Strait).

Good place to see a range of 'high' Arctic birds typical of this remote part of Canada.

Separates south-eastern Victoria Island from the mainland in Nunavut, Canada.

At its western end lies Cambridge Bay, leading to Dease Strait; to the east lies Simpson Strait; and to the north, Victoria Strait. It is home to the Queen Maud Gulf Migratory Bird Sanctuary with a range of shorebirds and wildfowl that can be encountered, and other Arctic animals.

The gulf is between Victoria Island and mainland Nunavut with the chance to see a more diverse range of Canadian Arctic birds compared to the areas of NW Passage further north. To the northwest it connects with Dolphin and Union Strait, thence the Beaufort Sea and Arctic Ocean; to the northeast it connects with Dease Strait and thence Queen Maud Gulf.

The northwest point is Cape Krusenstern (not the Cape Krusenstern in Alaska). South of that is Richardson Bay and the mouths (from west to east) of the Rae River, Richardson River and the large Coppermine River, Napaaktoktok River, and the Asiak River. At the southeast end is the large Bathurst Inlet. At the northeast end is Cape Flinders on the Kent Peninsula. In the center of the gulf lies the Duke of York Archipelago.