Haakon Godtlibsen has been shipping the sea around Spitsbergen throughout the summer months on his deep sea trawler “Havella” for the past 30 years. He knows the area like the back of his hands. In August 1965 he is accompanied by the writer Alfred Andersch and the director Martin Bosboom, as opposed to the huntsmen or scientists that are often on board. Their essayistic TV feature explores the history and present of the Arctic archipelago. The film uses fictive dialogues with the skipper and wonderful, atmospheric black and white images to introduce landscapes and (often abandoned) settlements on Spitsbergen. It shows flora and fauna, road builders and oil prospectors, introduces a biologist and a poet trapper and casts a critical glance at the whalers and the Arctic explorers of the past - and ultimately reaches the pack ice border.