iceberg

We managed to pass through a slick of small ice pieces called bergy bits. As it traveled through the half- congealed sea, the ship sounded like a swizzle stick stirring a vodka martini.

Landing on Devon Island, the largest uninhabited island in the world, we encountered our first sight of a polar bear and cub, walrus lounging on bergy bits, and the bloodied ice where a ringed seal had been recently killed.

Icebergs and bergy bits - fragments usually not more than 15 feet high and 30 feet across -- drifted past ominously in the gloom.

The threat is not from the large bergs, which are easily detected on radar, but from the smaller pieces known as bergy bits, particularly at night.

The mini icebergs - which international monitors officially call "Bergy Bits" - were spotted just before Christmas.