location Beerenberg, Jan Mayen — **location** Beerenberg, Jan Mayen

Sailing above the Arctic Circle to climb and ski the world's northernmost active volcano.

Two weeks before anchoring off the shore of Jan Mayen, I had no idea the island, or its massive volcano, existed.

Alyssa Larson and I boarded our boat, the 60-foot Aurora Arktika, in Isafjordur, Iceland on a Monday and arrived, terribly seasick and shaken, to the arctic Norwegian island of Jan Mayen on Friday. My berth for the 84-hour journey was top bunk, in the bow, without fresh air. That--combined with my weakness for motion sickness--means that I was the most miserable I've ever been. But once on the uninhabited (aside from 18 temporarily-stationed Norwegian military personnel) island of Jan Mayen, we successfully climbed and skied Beerenberg, the world's northernmost active volcano, in a 36-hour push, on the summer solstice, from our sandy beach base camp at which we spent five days. Then we crawled back into the boat and sickly floated back to Iceland, 350 miles away.