Oh, my! My apologies to L. Frank Baum, but lions and tigers and bears wasn’t close enough. Yesterday we journeyed from the port of Narvic, Norway to Bardu, about 8 miles from the Swedish border to visit the Polar Park, the northernmost wildlife park in the world. It’s 2.5 mile walkway over hilly terrain boasts the world’s biggest area-per-animal enclosure ratio and is home to lynx, musk ox, Arctic fox, wolves, reindeer, bear, moose and wolverine. February is an interesting time at the park, and the temperatures were unusually high, 28 degrees Fahrenheit. Annie, our guide, said the day’s weather was like a bad day in summer there. It was warm enough that some animals could just hunker down and not have to move around to stay warm, so we might not see all of them. We were not disappointed; the only ones that didn’t appear on our tour were the bears and the wolverine. 

Norway has no animal sanctuaries; it’s illegal to take an animal from the wild even if injured. All of these animals were bred in captivity. They keep a tight rein over the numbers in the park; they use chemical castration to keep animals from breeding, which is reversible when they do need to increase populations. If they want an animal they don’t have, if for instance their last wolverine is aging and they need a replacement, they put the park on an international list and wait for one. They also provide animals to other parks internationally.

There was a family of magpies in the park. Annie said they were the “cleaners” and kept the enclosures free of any food the animals didn’t eat (or didn’t see). My slideshow has a great photo of Gladys, the mama magpie.

Lynx are like housecats the way they pounce. The wolves sang for us. The foxes scampered. The moose let us kiss their noses. It was a wonderful day. 

Deborah