DEW Line station
30 August 2010 | Coronation Gulf
Liz for Dermot
This morning we rounded Belcher and Lady Franklin Points and were rewarded with another spectacular sunrise. There was another abandoned DEW Line station on Belcher.
We are now entering the rather nicely named Dolphin and Union Strait we decided to deviate slightly from the direct route for an anchorage called Bernard Harbour part of which is formed by Teddy Bear Island. One can only wonder what led to it getting this name- perhaps a crew of explorers we bothered by some particularly cuddly ice-bears.
I got an email telling me that the Russian cruise liner Clipper Adventurer that we met in Gjoa Haven had indeed gone aground on its way to Kugluktuk (Coppermine). The passengers had been evacuated. They were due to finish there anyway but the next group have had their cruise cancelled. Apparently they were sailing along a track route of soundings and hit a rock where there should have been 68m of water. One has to feel for the navigators on the bridge. The level of detail in the charts all around here is a tiny fraction of most of the world's waters. In most areas a modern hyrographic survey vessel will have tracked back and forth taking a wideband of soundings to get a complete picture. Round here you can see on the chart a line if individual spot soundings. These could easily have missed a rock by a matter of metres and this indeed what has happened. Once they have got the boat off one can just imagine the risk assessments that will have to be done before any commercial cruise liner can get insurance up here! And I thought I had got away from talk of risk assessments!
Today is I gather the August bank holiday at home. In recognition of this the skipper has offered us triple our usual pay.
When we got to Bernard Harbour we hit a bank of very thick fog and were going to press on as there wasn't any point if we could not see anything. Fortunately it cleared at just the right moment, which was just as well as we have had a fabulous afternoon wandering ashore. There is an abandoned Royal Canadian Mounted Police hut- can't have been a prime posting and I doubt it was a crime hotspot. There is also yet another DEW line station- the fourth since Cambridge Bay. They must have cost an absolute fortune to build and run. I suppose at the height of the Cold War the potential threat to national security made it justified. I would love to know a bit more about these stations, how they were run etc. something to Google when I get back. Sure Wikipedia has pages on them
We started ashore with a team photo, which is the one I have included. There are so many wonderful other photos I would love to share to give a proper impression of our day ashore.
It has to be said that the Americans have not cleared up after themselves very well. This stuff is never going to decay away up here. Still makes for an interesting stroll. There was a landing/beaching area in the harbour with a track and pipeline leading up to 4 buildings. Several miles away were several golf ball type aerial complexes that we did not get to.
There was the remains of an enormous radio mast that had come down in a pile of twisted metal and cable. All of it balanced on a single round bearing.
In amongst all this were all sorts of wildlife. I saw a ground squirrel run across my path. There were also caribou and musk ox reasonably close. Lots of snow buntings and red-breasted divers. Lots of wild flowers, seed pods and fungi. When we got back to the shore there were obvious polar bear foot-prints in the sand at the level of the high water mark so they cannot have been that old. Better look out of the port-holes tonight!
When we got back on board there was a pretty fresh westerly wind that we could have slogged into all night and made little progress. Perhaps too easily we talked ourselves into stopping for the night before an early start in what we hope are the predicted light winds.
Maire set about baking and make a glorious "Irish stew" using the musk ox meat- possibly a first. Definitely a triumph. We also had the first of our really very very good German wines courtesy of thee Hanseatic.
Going to have to press on from tomorrow. Been a great day though.