The NW passage is something of an enigma, one minute I have experienced warm (well +14 deg), sunny weather, and literally within an hour or two it has been below freezing, foggy and snowing.
The enjoyment of Fort Ross, quickly tired. The 48 hour stop over has turned to days. Whilst one day the weather was good; the ice in Prince Regent was not, and the days the ice was good, the weather was not. Bob clearly does not like going to windward in Dodo's Delight. To be fair, a heavily laden cruiser such as she probably isn't the best craft to be slicing into near freezing waters. The situation has been that a 100+ mile long stretch of ice has curled round the top of Somerset Island and been pushed south into Price Regent Inlet. At times blocking our exit to the north and east, at times indicating that a split may open and allow us to break through to the East.
Saturday, as with the coming few days were mundane… waiting for the window to leave. With two actors laid, our position for once was stable and whilst the wind rose and then abated, they did their job. News from Peter and Pelle aboard Anna said they had made it t the north of Prince Regent inlet, and were holed up waiting to get east once their own gale and ice situation had improved. We heard that the Michaela Rose, and an American yacht had required Canadian Coastguard icebreaker assistance on their trip to Resolute out of Prince Regent Inlet.
Monday 09 September
Throughout Sunday night the seas were mirror like. Hardly a zephyr of wind was felt and I slept with the niggling thought that we should be underway. Early Monday morning Bob put it to us… should we at least make some Easterly ground before the ice closes such any further? The unanimous 'yes' was heard across the saloon. By 9 am we were motoring past a quiet polar Bound, David and Jane clearly still in their bunks. After some discussion between Bob and I we set a course due East. Our theoretical exit route is NNE but the ice running south from Lancaster sound meant we needed to get East first. The forecast also showed some strong NW winds. During my watch, I sailed a with a little north in my course, based on the assumption that when we meet the ice, we could run south along it down wind rather than trying to beat into the breeze to find the gap which the ice charts showed.
By early afternoon the ice had appeared on the horizon: A long, continuous band, clipping the horizon from the north to the south as far as the eye could see… both at deck level and 40' up the mast. The ice chart does indicate latitude and longitude lines, spaced at large intervals. From these i spent some time guesstimating where the neck of the ice midway down it was thin at 2/10th. The rest was 6/10th or worse. Karen was on watch as we approached the thick pack and on scaling the mast I could see what appeared to be a narrow, navigable break approximately 2 miles to our south. We ran off and started the chicane through the ice. It lasted for a couple of hours; at times we doubled back on ourselves, or headed south, north but not in the desired easterly direction until after about ten miles we sailed into clear water once more to the east of it.
Tuesday 10 - Wednesday 11 September
As daylight came in Tuesday morning we motored into Fitzgerald Bay, located on the western shore of the Brodeur Peninsula (which is in turn at the western extremity of Baffin Island). This bay has a complex entrance. The depth drops from 40+ metres to few, and at one stage we found the seabed rock! The bay itself to the north is shallow, and as we were expecting northerly winds we anchored in 6 m depth, but 3/4 mile from the beach. The limitations of anchoring in the 2 x 2m bay was also hampered by underwater Pingu's creating obstructions. As the wind built the inevitable dragging of the anchor took place. However switching to the heavier CQR (which incidentally stands for "Chatham Quick Release" ;-), and re-anchoring close to the sole island in the bay and we were snug again. Close to the east end of the small island, in the sunlight, the pingu below the sea surface caught sunlight and reflected an azure sea; you could, just by looking at that small headland and sea think it was in tropical waters as it almost resembled a coral reef, that is except for the cold temperatures of both the sea and the air above! It was here that ominous looking footprints in the snow down to the water were very clearly visible… Polar Bear tracks. For 48 hours we read, cooked, ate, slept and did anchor watches. More Arctic monotony but this little anchorage was rather a reassuring pace for me, I took a great likeness to it, so like Sophie Louise Bay in the Tasmania Islands, this one is now called "HEMN Island" after I named it after a not so little girl I know.
Thursday 12 - Friday 13 September
The weather window was upon us and by mid morning we had hauled in the anchors and were cautiously negotiating our way out of the bay. There was a leg of 100 nm northwards to the end of Prince Regent Inlet. From there we would turn east once more. Days are becoming rapidly shorter, with darkness falling by 9pm local (we are still operating on Tuk time which is -7 hrs from BST). Thursday was fairly uneventful but we were seeing a fairly high number of growlers and small bergs flowing on the wind southwards and towards us, albeit they move very slowly. After my watch ended at 2300 hrs we hove to, so that the others could keep a drifting watch, as I was just falling asleep there was an almighty scrapping sound close to my ear… on the outside of the hull. Despite being hove to, we had drifted down onto a berg and run into it. There followed a series of mechanical noises as the engine was started, rammed into reverse, then accelerated into reverse and then flung into full ahead, at the same time as the boat veered to port and then starboard… it later transpired that the engine throttle had been used a little too enthusiastically, and then had been jammed into reverse so far that it locked into the steering wheel!
Quickly redressed I was on deck with Steph and Bob. Whilst they doused sails, I turned the radar on to see that we had drifted into a fairly large group of bergs. We slowly motored SW to clear water, and then lay-a-hull for the remaining darkness.
During Friday we steadily progressed out of Prince Regent Inlet. This took us on a course of North, gradually slowly turning East at the head of the peninsula. We are close to magnetic north pole as whilst steering a GPS true course of 035 degrees, the main compass is reading a course of 200 degrees! This also means that the auto helm compass has decided it's not playing… so no autohelm, no sitting under the cuddy keeping warm and no popping below to make a cuppa (whilst holding both hands round the kettle to extract any redundant heat into two layers of gloves).
Many years ago, when my father, having finished building the most recent family yacht had omitted to install an engine, and we therefore learnt to sail the proper way, without any gizmos and always sailing onto and off her moorings I quickly, like my siblings, became quite good at it. it then got to a stage that after a weekend away on the Clyde, I would send everyone below so I could do this single handedly. Then once that was mastered I got the clever idea that I could do all the manoeuvres from her foredeck and started rigging rope lines, (or "reigns) from the tiller, around a block (pulley) along each side deck and all the way to the bow from where like a chariot driver in reverse I could helm her onto her mooring. Needless to say, using the same trick, I rigged up lines in a similar manner from the top of Dodo's Delight steering wheel and forward to the companionway hatch. Thereby enabling steering in more comfort! The occasional use of the plastic fish slice from the galley is required to clear the ice from the buddy windows.
The temperature dropped, sea temperature being below freezing at -1.5 to -2.4 deg and much of the spray landing on deck and turning immediately into ice. The land we were following is rugged, high, steep rock faces, snow lying where it can or falling steeply down to where it can cling. In the same way as the land rises so steeply, so too are the depths. At just over a mile offshore the depths are over 400 m deep.
Saturday 14 September
We had agreed to make a call as we reached Lancaster Sound and turned East as to where we should stop. If for no other reason than a run ashore. Aside Fort Ross, where the only other civilisation was aboard other boars or in the cold refuge hut, we have not set foot ashore in a settlement since Cambridge Bay. We agreed that Arctic Bay, in Admiralty Inlet was a good place to go, partly as the main alternative is Pond Inlet which has an exposed anchorage.
The NW Passage over the years has been viewed as the area between either Point Barrow (Alaska's NW corner) or the Bering Sea to either Lancaster Sound or Baffin Island. Others will have their own views or definition. As far as Bob was concerned, Lancaster Sound is the easterly end and some would therefore say that as we entered Lancaster sound on Saturday morning we had completed the passage, albeit we still have some way to go before the trip is over.
We rounded the tip of the peninsula during day break… and right into 3/10th's ice. Whilst Dodo's Delight is not seriously hampered by this ice, it reverberates through the hull if you run into a piece, and constant battering won't do the waterline any good. More serious however is the potential for a piece to be driven by the propellor into the hull and damage either part, or the 'P' bracket (which holds the propellor shaft to the boats hull) or bearings. We gouged our way through it and gradually eased our way offshore to clear round it to the north. Soon thereafter David encountered 'pancake' ice - newly formed light pieces that form what looks like residual fat mixed with water in a saucepan. Again we drove on, and by the time I took over from him I started to move offshore again to circle around it.
By late afternoon we had motored south down Admiralty Inlet into Arctic Bay. The approach, for the last few miles is impressive. A near vertical, reddish rock face of 300' in height and about four miles in length welcomes you to the bay. For anyone who has seen or been to Suez or the Corinth Canal's - this looks like one side of it, almost cut by mankind it is so straight. We motored into the bay, a gentle circular one with a steep gradient rising away from the shore to the hill behind. The hamlet or town set in a semi circular fashion around the beach with the usual array of houses, sheds, two supermarkets, small generating station and government buildings nestling within it. The beach littered with abandoned skidoo's, long wooden sledges, aluminium motor boats and abandoned broken outboards.
Sunday 15 September
During the day we all went ashore. We bought what should be our last food provisions, mainly fresh (bread, milk, a little veg) as we aim to run stores down by the end of the trip. I walked through the hamlet, which as with most paces we have been to doesn't take long and stumbled upon the "Inn". A double story prefabricated metal clad building, with small regularly place windows. As I walked up the steps Steph came out, beckoned me in and introduced me to Jacques (Quebec Canadian). He runs the local hotel, which also has a restaurant. He kindly offered, for a small fee, for us to use a room for showers during our visit and use of the internet. He also, it later transpired the person to arrange fuel and water through. Despite speaking fairly good English it also allowed me to practise my french - albeit we both agreed that my English French and his Canadian French were incompatible we actually had a fairly long discussion.
The intention (at the time of writing) is to take on a small amount of fuel tomorrow, as diesel is subsidised in Greenland by the Danish so we will run tanks down between here and there and some more water.
I spent an hour or two on the hotels internet whilst watching CNN news - the first update on the outside world though most was US sports news on the lobby TV and skyping Sophie then walked back to make phone calls using the supermarket public phone. Bob had taken the dingy back to the boat and by the time the remainder of the crew had assembled on the beach and shouted across it was clear he was enjoying an afternoon siesta! The local chidden, always very inquisitive in these parts assembled around us, and before long Steph had been coerced into spending her dollars on an assortment of animal remains (local artefacts ;-)).
After 40 minutes Bob finally appeared on deck and started to row ashore to collect us. Fortunately the weather was almost balmy. I sat on the beach enjoying the sun. Steph decided she would swim out to the boat and was half way there when Bob started to row inshore. Despite some concerning minutes whilst Steph tried to get out of the water, she eventually managed to get her feet around the unhinged boarding ladder (in it's 'up' position) on the stern and clamber aboard. The remainder of the crew followed in the dingy; dry.
So what next? The wind is expected to turn to 20-30 kts of Easterly, dissipating by late Monday to Tuesday. We intend then to head north around Baffin Island to then turn southeast to Greenland. Once there we will be finding a safe place to lay-up Dodo's Delight for the closing winter and the NW passage trip will be completed. If it all goes according to plan (it never will!) we should be looking at flight schedules and availability in two weeks time.
In the meantime I still have a few personal boxes to tick in respect to Arctic experiences, and I hope to be able to write about these next time, or to tell you what they are and how I will fulfil them at another time, place and probably on another boat.
Richard
©. Richard Nicolson 2013