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Greenland may be at nighttime depths of winter proper now, however President Donald Trump has as soon as once more pulled the Arctic island of 56,000 largely Inuit individuals — midway between New York and Moscow — out of its frozen anonymity, reviving discuss of American management.
“We need Greenland. … It’s so strategic right now,” Trump advised reporters aboard Air Force One on Sunday, a day after launching a US assault on Venezuela and seizing its president, Nicolas Maduro.
He added: “We need Greenland from the standpoint of national security, and Denmark is not going to be able to do it.”
The remarks have been met with alarm from officers in Greenland, who’ve reiterated their proper to independence, and Denmark, which governs Greenland as an autonomous crown dependency. European allies together with France, the UK, Germany and Italy additionally expressed opposition to US expansionist ambitions within the resource-rich Arctic territory.
Before Trump and geopolitics thrust it into the worldwide highlight, Greenland was already rising as a journey vacation spot and people making the journey are discovering the island behind the headlines — a ruggedly pristine wilderness steeped in wealthy Indigenous tradition.
An inhospitable icecap a number of miles deep covers 80% of Greenland, forcing the Inuit to dwell alongside the shorelines in brightly painted communities. Here, they spend brutally chilly winters looking seals on ice below the northern lights in close to perpetual darkness. Although lately, they will additionally depend on group shops.
The drawback for vacationers through the years has been getting to Greenland through time-consuming oblique flights. That’s altering. Late in 2024, the capital Nuuk opened a long-delayed worldwide airport. In June 2025, United Airlines launched a twice-weekly direct service from Newark to Nuuk. The island had already seen a tourism boost after Trump turned his consideration to it.
Two additional worldwide airports are due to open this 12 months: firstly at Qaqortoq in South Greenland in April; then, extra considerably in Ilulissat, the island’s solely actual tourism hotspot, in October.
Located on the west coast, Ilulissat is a fairly halibut- and prawn-fishing port on a darkish rock bay the place guests can sit in pubs sipping craft beers chill-filtered by 100,000-year-old glacial ice.
It’s a spot to be awed by the UNESCO World Heritage Icefjord the place Manhattan skyscraper-sized icebergs disgorge from Greenland’s icecap to float like ghostly ships within the surrounding Disko Bay.
Small boats take guests out to sail carefully among the many bay’s magnificent iceberg flotilla. But not too shut.
“I was on my boat once and saw one of these icebergs split in two. The pieces fell backwards into the sea and created a giant wave,” stated David Karlsen, skipper of the pleasure-boat, Katak. “…I didn’t hang around.”
Disko Bay’s different giants are whales. From June to September breaching humpback whales be part of the likes of fin and minke whales feasting on plankton. Whale-watching is glorious throughout Greenland’s craggy shoreline.
Whales are eaten right here. Visitors shouldn’t be shocked to encounter the standard Greenlandic delicacy of mattak — whale-skin and blubber that when tasted is akin to chewing on rubber. Inuit communities have quotas to not solely hunt the likes of narwhals but in addition polar bears, musk-ox and caribou — which might additionally seem on menus.
Ilulissat is additionally a hub for coastal sea cruises. Driving Greenland’s document 141,000 guests in 2024 (as of January 2026, the 2025 figures haven’t been launched) was a surge in cruise tourism.
The west coast is particularly standard with voyages, usually emanating from North America or Iceland. And whereas Greenland cruising began as an adventurous area of interest, it’s now mainstream. For 2026, Virgin Voyages will visit Greenland on an Iceland-New York transatlantic, whereas Celebrity Cruises has been crusing its waters for the reason that Covid pandemic.
The 2026 photo voltaic eclipse will even enhance numbers. Eyos Expeditions, for instance, is placing on an unique cruise round Greenland to put visitors within the path of totality.
From Ilulissat, cruise ships hug the shoreline heading south, calling at fairly little communities of inexperienced, blue, yellow and purple painted homes, and Qeqertarsuaq (Disko) Island, the place flat-topped mountains are capped by glaciers.
They additionally discover the putting blue waters of Eternity Fjord close to Maniitsoq and South Greenland’s historic hut websites of pre-Inuit paleo cultures and the stays of Viking longhouses courting again to their Tenth-century arrival.
Remote and rugged
A extra natural means to see this coast is by the multi-day coastal ferry, the long-running Sarfaq Ittuk, of the Arctic Umiaq Line. It’s much less company than the fashionable cruise ships and vacationers get to meet Inuit commuters. Greenland is dear. Lettuce in a local people retailer may cost a little $10, however this coastal voyage gained’t break the financial institution.
The sizzling ticket at the moment for exploring Greenland’s wilder aspect is to head to the east coast going through Europe. It’s uncooked and sees far fewer vacationers, with a harshly dramatic shoreline of fjords the place icebergs drift south. There are not any roads and the scattered inhabitants of simply over 3,500 individuals inhabit a shoreline roughly the gap from New York to Denver.
A rising variety of small expedition vessels probe this distant coast for its frosted surroundings and wildlife. Increasingly standard is the world’s largest fjord system of Scoresby Sound with its sharp-fanged mountains and hanging valleys choked by glaciers. Sailing north is the prosaically named North East Greenland National Park, fabulous for recognizing wildlife on the tundra.
Travelers come to see polar bears which, in the course of the northern hemisphere’s summer time, transfer nearer to land because the sea-ice melts. There are additionally musk oxen, nice flocks of migrating geese, Arctic foxes and walrus.
Some of those animals are truthful sport for the native communities. Perhaps Greenland’s most fascinating cultural visit is to a village that can take longer to learn the way to pronounce than truly stroll round — Ittoqqortoormiit. Five hundred miles north of its neighboring settlement, the 345 locals are frozen in for 9 months of the 12 months. Ships sail in to meet them in the course of the transient summer time soften between June and August.
Locked in by ice, they’ve retained conventional habits.
“My parents hunt nearly all their food,” stated Mette Barselajsen, who owns Ittoqqortoormiit’s solely guesthouse. “They prefer the old ways, burying it in the ground to ferment and preserve it. Just one muskox can bring 440 pounds of meat.”
For getting round throughout winter, the Inuit right here these days favor snowmobiles, though they nonetheless hold their sled canines. During winter they’ll provide dog-sledding jaunts to intrepid guests, wrapped up heat towards the deep-freeze temperatures. These can final both an hour or be a part of expeditions over a number of days, generally with the added expertise of studying how to construct an igloo. Sisimiut on the west coast and Tasilaq within the southeast are lively winter facilities for canine sledding.
Winter’s most stellar attraction, although, is northern lights watching. With little city mild air pollution, Greenland is a darkish canvas for spectacular shows, and aurora borealis-watching holidays are gaining popularity.
Staying outdoor, Greenland is growing a status amongst journey fanatics: from long-distance snowboarding expeditions and heliskiing on the icecap to mountaineering the 100-mile-long Arctic Circle Trail from Kangerslussuaq, the place firearms want to be carried for warning pictures in case of polar bear encounters.
Life is positively altering right here. The local weather disaster is consuming away at its icecap and Greenland could nicely find yourself as a pawn in a sport of geopolitical chess. But for now, the brilliant glare of worldwide consideration ought to shine a positive mild on one of many wildest journey locations on Earth.
Travel author Mark Stratton is an Arctic specialist who has traveled to Greenland six instances and counting. He’s marveled on the aurora borealis, sailed to Disko Island, dog-sledded with the Inuit, and as soon as received caught in an icefloe.
● This article was initially revealed in January 2025. It was up to date and republished in January 2026.