I saw the Northern Lights in Svalbard. It’s a wonderful place where you can see many of them. The landscape there is stunning and being over 78°N, you live the experience of the polar night which is perpetual darkness - where else to watch Northern Lights?

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Sailing a yacht round the coast of Svalbard (Spitsbergen), just 500 miles from the north pole.

An absolutely amazing experience – it feels like being part of the Arctic summer - exhilarating and relaxing at the same time.

You’ll see the midnight sun, polar bears, walrus, whales and thousands of birds. There’s time to explore on land too – you can walk on glaciers, climb hills and just soak up the atmosphere .

You don't need to be super fit or to have sailing experience, the friendly skipper (who has sailed through the northwest passage and is great company) teaches you as you go along.

Tel: 029 20 704 987; www.thepolarpeople.co.uk; email: holidays@thepolarpeople.co.uk

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If you're heading to Svalbard, it's a fair bet you aren't looking for a typical hotel package and Basecamp would never fall into that. I've stayed in every hotel in Longyearbyen (the main town in Svalbard) and Basecamp is head and shoulders above the rest.

Run by the fantastically-named Oddbjorn, Basecamp is a little eccentric. The comfortable rooms are furnished as hunters' cabins with home-made furniture made from driftwood and Russian wetwood, and the emphasis is on getting out and seeing Svalbard as much as possible.

One thing that sets Basecamp apart is the opportunity not to sleep in the hotel. Visitors usually spend at least one night on an ice-bound ship at the mouth of a majestic glacier, and there is nothing like joining a husky camp and waking to the chorus of 30 huskies demanding breakfast. You'll know you are in the Arctic.

www.basecampexplorer.com/svalbard/en

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