Overview
Peter's cairn from town This is a nice easy hike if you ever find yourself spending a day in Qaqortoq, Greenland. The city has a population of about 3,500 and the buildings are all gaily painted. The official website for Qaqortoq has a hiking trails map, but it does not have any details on how one should approach this small summit. The key is to hike up to the town soccer field which can be reached as described below. From the NE corner of the field, you can find a faint trace of a trail heading up a gully in a NE direction.
soccer field
Qaqortoq is an Inuit word meaning “the white place”. That description probably is true much of the year, but on July 6, 2010, they had one of their unusual sunny days and we made the most of it.
Getting There
Qaqortoq is a fishing village and most visitors arrive by water. There is a heliport that provides transport from Narsarsuaq Airport the only international airport in Greenland. There is also a ferry (Arctic Umiaq Line A/S or Arctic Umiaq (AUL) ) that operates on a route from Ilulissat-Narsaq.
Red Tape
There does not appear to be any problem with hiking across the hillsides in Qaqortoq.
Route description
To reach the summit, starting from the town pier, take the following streets…go to the visitor center (N of the pier); turn right (E) and follow Vatikanbakken street E and NE; take a right on Sanatorievej street; take the first left onto Ringvej street and continue to the soccer field.
start of route
From the NE corner of the soccer field, go NE up the drainage
gully to ridgetop to the ridge top and turn right heading ESE gradually climbing (class 2) up the ridge to the summit cairn.
final ridge to summit
Since this is a relatively short hike, you may want to extend it to include
Saqqaarsik (the Front) which is north of Peter’s cairn. It is a pleasant cross country hike of about 1 mile which drops about 400’ in elevation before regaining it to the false summit at 1,080’. From there another 15 minutes will get you to the true summit which is about 1,260’
Saqqaarsik Hiking trails map
Qaqortoq hiking trails