Ashore in Cambridge Bay
26 August 2010 | Cambridge Bay
Liz for Dermot
The first job this morning was to take apart and fix the heater stove. Given that Sibeal's position was that "Man make fire. Dermot no make fire. Dermot no man". Fixing the fire to dispel any questions as to my masculinity!
We came alongside today to fill up with diesel. This morning an ice-strengthened cruise liner, the M/S Bremen, came into harbour at 8am. It disgorged a succession of its 140+ passengers. They were in town for exactly 4 hours and 4 minutes. When the time was up they started streaming back to the beach area in their black and orange jackets- a bit like the Spanish school kids in London in the summer. One of their crewmembers rather disparagingly referred to them as a line of "ants"! They had come trough the North West Passage and now were going to head back all the way to Greenland with no further stops. There was a queue of 3-4 boats worth of passengers and one renegade lovely couple came along the quay to have a chat with us. He was saying how he hates this queuing part of the process. As he said this one of the senior crew-members also came along and we thought "how nice, he wants a chat". Instead he instructed with a totally straight face our Swiss friends that they must get back in the queue. I could never conform to this sort of behaviour.
We have done he stocking up in the Northern Store that was needed. One doesn't tend to go mad with the spontaneous shopping when at arctic prices. A 2 litre cartoon of fresh milk is $7!! We filled up with diesel and crucially Andrew managed to get to two thirds of a tank of propane for cooking which should see us to at least Tuk, if not even to Alaska.
We have all had showers in the excellent visitor centre. For some reason, only Sibeal was charged $5 for the privilege. I'll not speculate as to why. There was also a lovely cultural centre within the library of a new high school building with some interesting displays giving the historical context of the local community. We were able to get some internet access here in amongst the kids surfing FaceBook and MSN messenger. The staff showed a really nice human touch in ensuring that everyone got their fair use of the computers and also in having a low tolerance for minor misbehaviour that was rapidly nipped in the bud. Very impressed.
Vicky from the visitors' centre came by this evening with some musk ox meat for us. In addition she had a request. There was a second cruise ship coming into Cambridge Bay this evening. They had a problem and were looking for a diver. Andrew said that we did have some diving equipment on board and that if there was no other diver available locally we might be able to help, though our original plan was to have set sail for Tuk first thing in the morning.
We had heard of some yachts having problems with local kids chucking stones on deck. So far we have had lots of kids coming up for chats and chocolate but no stone throwing problems.
On Peter Semotiuk's radio schedule tonight we heard of Mathieu Bonnier's good progress rowing with Tico, his dog. Out of Franklin Straight. There are a pair of British marines rowing the other way who are having a tougher time as the wind is against them. The Finnish boat Sarema is also battling head wind and it is still clear if they will be able to get through Bellot Sound. This is a very narrow stretch of water with a fast current that is best done West to East. In its southern shore is the most northerly part of continental North America. There is also an abandoned Hudson Bay Company post called Fort Ross that would be nice to visit. Apparently was perfectly situated to link the trading communities in the East and West Arctic but for the fact that it was totally unreliable from a resupply point of view. It was abandoned after a succession of summers where the boats could not reach it. David Scott-Cowper (RCC) spent two winters here. There are apparently several very well preserved and functional buildings for the occasional visitor.