A pack of dogs kick up the snow with their strides forward. There are only 35 more metres to go, but the hounds’ muscles are clearly strained. With their tongues lolling in the crisp, fresh air, they labour to pull a sled, a driver and its passenger, me, towards the top of the hill. A few more metres of pulling, and then finally, the panting dogs arrive. A crimson hut beckons, our lodgings for the night.

The well-trained Greenland dogs sit and rest, knowing instinctively that they have reached their destination for the day. After departing in the morning from the town of Ilulissat, it took us three hours to cross over snow and the frozen sea to arrive in Kangersuneq Bay. The dogs and musher sweated to get this far, but as my only task was to savour the dramatic landscape (and to try not to fall off the sled), I’m glad the opportunity for warmth is near. Icicles were beginning to form on my hair.

Historically, dog sledding once had but a single purpose: survival in winter. It allowed Inuit to be mobile, often enabling them to scour the ice for the next seal breathing hole where they would hopefully find their next meal. Greenland dogs are smart, com-pact and incredibly strong animals, and they are happiest when working. They each have their individual personalities: some are born leaders, some are lazy; some are friendly, yet others prefer to keep to themselves. But when they begin to run they be-come one seething energy machine.

The terrain in the famous Disko Bay region in West Greenland is pure ice-sculpture in winter, and only accessible overland via snowmobiles and dog sleds. We are two visitors and two Greenlandic dog mushers. But for the presence of our wooden lodgings and the trails left by sleds, we might be forgiven for thinking that we are the first visitors to this remote land of ice. It’s a daunting thought. And for a first-time dog sledder like myself, one fact takes a moment to sink – those hills beyond the flat, snow-covered field are, in truth, vast icebergs marooned in the frozen sea.

We are, however, just following the everyday path of the locals. My Greenlandic driver, Niels, a fisherman and dog musher by trade, tells me that the locals travel dog-sled style to reach fishing spots that are only accessible in this way. But also, they make social calls to the nearest settlement by crossing the ice, go out hunting with a dog pack, and, of course, they just have fun with them.