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Greenland · North America · northern hemisphere
Ilulissat is at its best for northern lights in February to March and September to October. Good but not prime in January and November. Crowds peak in August and bottom out in April.
| J | F | M | A | M | J | J | A | S | O | N | D | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Northern Lights | 67 | 94 | 92 | 20 | 9 | 10 | 17 | 18 | 86 | 94 | 67 | 42 |
| Lakes & Coastline | 7 | 11 | 25 | 23 | 42 | 64 | 93 | 87 | 70 | 7 | 5 | 4 |
| Hiking | 11 | 13 | 20 | 19 | 9 | 66 | 91 | 89 | 68 | 16 | 12 | 10 |
| Crowds |
Swipe the table sideways for the rest of the year.
The icefjord calves more ice than anywhere outside Antarctica, and you can walk to it from town. Two distinct trips: aurora over frozen sea from January to April, or the midnight sun on icebergs from early June to mid-July — and dog sledding only works while the sea ice holds
Short marked routes from town to the icefjord. No guide needed on the boardwalk.
Mid-April to mid-June. The sledding ends around 15 April when the sea ice goes, the summer boat operators do not start until mid-June, and it is the one genuinely awkward stretch.
June through September for the icebergs and the cruise calls
Everything is weather-dependent and flights cancel routinely — build slack in. The icefjord boardwalk is easy; almost everything else involves boats or dogs.
Hotels are few and fill well ahead for July. Going in March costs far less, adds the aurora and the dog sledding, and the icebergs are still there — frozen into the fjord rather than drifting.
Polar night and sea ice. Flights cancel for weather often enough to need slack in the plan.Jan · Feb · Mar · Nov · Dec
Break-up season makes boat access to the icefjord unreliable.Apr · May · Jun
Kept out of the score on purpose. Averaging a rare catastrophe into a monthly number would tell you something false; the warning is the honest form.
The marked routes are short and extraordinary. There is no road network beyond town, so walking is what there is when the boats are not running.
0 is this destination’s own quietest month and 100 its busiest. The scale never compares one destination to another. Source: Wikipedia — Ilulissat