In Greenland, Taking It All In With Snowy Jogs and Sled Dogs

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The wind was howling around me, trying to slip through every crack and crevice of my outfit; at the cuffs of my jacket, the hems of my snowpants, the tiny gaps in my helmet.

It was mid-January, and I was zooming toward an ice fjord in Greenland, clocking at least 30 miles per hour on a snowmobile. It was, maybe, five degrees out. Everything around me was frozen, and even though it was close to 11 a.m. the sky was black, like night. This is how it goes in the Arctic Circle during the winter.

I was tagging along with a Greenlandic family, on their way to their favorite fishing spot. The journey was part of a nearly two-week reporting trip to Greenland, an island that conjures up images of icebergs and polar bears and has been thrust recently into the news by President Trump. He covets Greenland for its size, its location and its minerals and has threatened a U.S. takeover.

So off I went to Greenland.

I started in Nuuk, the capital, interviewing members of the political class and everyday people, asking them what they thought of Mr. Trump’s talk. Short answer: They didn’t like it.

After one long day of reporting, I went for a jog. It was snowing, and Nuuk’s streets were covered in ice. A mile or so in, a pack of runners plodded past me, headed in the other direction. I pulled a subtle U-turn and thought I had stealthily folded myself into the group until a Danish guy turned around and asked: “Who are you?”