WHEN I DECIDE TO TRY and get on a Norwegian whaleboat, I had no illusions about solving the whaling issue. I just wanted to understand it better, by meeting the whalers and getting a clear look at what they do and how they justify it.

To the whalers, I was nothing but a burden: They have no need to open up to foreign journalists. But I speak Swedish, which Norwegians easily understand, and after a long process of discussing my motives and ironing out the logistics, they finally agreed to let me ride along, telling me where I had to be, and when, to catch up with Sofie.

From Stockholm, where I was living at the time, it takes two flights to get to Tromsø, a bustling city on Norway's northwestern coast. I arrive on April 29. Spring has made it to southern Sweden but not here: Snow still covers the hills, and the scrawny vegetation is naked and brown.

Most whaling boats heading north pass through Tromsø, including Sofie. Using my

Sofie's crew is unsentimental about whales, but they're a strange mix of blue-collar and genteel. They can reduce an 8,000-pound mammal to a pile of steaks in an hour. They'll spend just as long fussing over a cake they're making for dessert.

cell phone to coordinate with Captain Karlsen, I meet him in a pizza place by the town's quaint harbor. Norwegians are guarded at first, and Karlsen is no exception. He's friendly enough, but sees little need for small talk. "OK, grab your stuff," he says after a quick handshake. "We'll join the others."

Around the corner we find two more crew members, John Sommerseth, a massively potbellied and redheaded 39-year-old, and Kjell Edvardsen. Hellos all around. Silence.

Odd Olsen, 37, the boat's pudgy, jovial cook, joins us a few minutes later, along with Sofie's co-owner and harpooner, Tor Raymond Skarheim, 39. Skarheim's left eye was jabbed in a childhood archery accident, leaving it locked in a perpetual squint. Though Skarheim turns out to be a willing conversationalist, the effect is a look of guarded suspicion.

The men head toward the docks, shuffling along in their clogs as I lug my bags a few steps behind. We shove off the instant my gear hits the deck. The crew has been motoring north nonstop for the past 20 hours from their home port in the Lofotens—a mountainous island group about 170 miles to the southwest that's surrounded by some of the world's richest cod waters—but time is precious, so they have to keep moving. Karlsen pokes his head out the window, throttles the engines, and slips Sofie into a long blue-water channel, pointing north.

Sofie was built in Hardanger, Norway, in 1940 and has been in constant use ever since. She carries 898 gallons of diesel and a six-cylinder, 550-horsepower Volvo Penta engine that burns about six gallons an hour, giving her a range of 1,150 miles. Five different captains have piloted Sofie to go after cod, herring, haddock, coalfish, and, since 1996, minke whales. Tall in the bow, low in the stern, and wide at the beam, she's a classic Scandinavian fishing vessel, ideal for absorbing rough seas.

A steel-reinforced second deck level was added in '96. Essentially a platform that raises and extends the bow—with a narrow walkway connecting to the bridge—this upper deck serves as a mount for the whalers' harpoon cannon. Inside, the electronic equipment (sonar, GPS, autopilot) is state-of-the-art. For entertainment, there's a television and a DVD player in the forward cabin, along with a kitchen stereo that warbles a steady rotation of Shania Twain, Delbert McClinton, and A-ha.

The vessel is worth around $240,000, but co-owners Karlsen and Skarheim could get $500,000 just by selling their commercial fishing licenses. Whale-hunting licenses, although granted at no cost by the Norwegian government, are nontransferable. To keep them, Karlsen and Skarheim must undergo yearly tests of their harpoon-cannon marksmanship, while Sofie has to pass annual inspections. The crew are all year-round fishermen, and to a man they're unsentimental about minke whales.

"There's no difference between a whale and a moose," Skarheim tells me one afternoon. He knows all about the widespread disdain for his vocation and isn't fazed. "We're fishermen—that's what we do," he says. "Besides, what's a better use of fossil fuels: car racing or providing food for people?''

Shortly after launch, I take in the view on the second level. Our course to sea follows a stunning waterway that winds between the Norwegian mainland and its coastal islands. Glaciers, steep chutes, and wide bowls drop to the ocean all around us. It's like floating through a flooded ski resort.

Before long, Skarheim joins me. He's carrying a soot-blackened broom handle and stops to ask if I get seasick.

"Not really," I respond.

"Hmmm. Do you have seasick pills?" he asks, sizing me up with his one good eye.

"Yes."

"Good. Take them."

Then he wraps the broom handle with a filthy rag and shoves the makeshift Q-tip into the cannon barrel to clean it. Next, he front-loads the barrel with an explosive charge, which he gently tamps down. From an ammo box at his feet, he grabs a grenade and screws it onto an odd-looking shaft made of two parallel bars and two folding barbs. The assembled harpoon weighs 40 pounds; Skarheim uses both arms to lift the four-foot projectile and slide it into the cannon. The shaft's parallel bars allow for a stout rope to slide up and down the harpoon's length and rest neatly outside the cannon's mouth. The coiled rope is gathered in a basket in front of the cannon, then extends back to a heavy winch.

Skarheim finishes loading in two minutes. Sofie is now armed and ready to hunt.