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Upernavik Greenland Travel Notes Gail Ferris |
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Once again, July 28th
2009, as in 2003 and other years earlier I launched from the Old Harbor off
the same old rock slabs that I and everyone has used for eons. The Now its rocks are not so
slippery with seal fat. It is a wonderful
quiet harbor just perfect for launching kayaks. On these rocks there is
plenty of room to walk around my kayak while loading it. Then I can just roll my loaded kayak on
foam rollers gently in to the water and leaving soundlessly. There is nothing as lovely
as this moment when I have launched and am once again on the water in my
kayak. |
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The time was about |
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#022 |
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The rudder pedals worked
fine and the lines to the pedals were just the right length. Wow! That was a
major relief. Once again I was on the
water in my kayak and all felt just that same old wonderful feeling of being
absolutely comfortable. Now I get to
go out and about exploring in my kayak seeing things I have not seen before
as I always find myself so looking forward to once again after my last
paddling trip here in Upernavik. There is nothing having
such not only a seaworthy but a versatile kayak such as this one, Long Haul
Mark I, that I know I can paddle for hours in a myriad of conditions just
traveling and exploring. In the picture below you
can see the one foot waves off my bow.
There are two islands, Griseøen a just a mile away and Lange Ø about
two miles away from Upv. Lange Ø is
the farther of them. You can see the
over to they layer of fog that is off Qaersorssuaq/Sandersons Hope at
Agpagdiit point and the ice that I encountered a few miles later. On the right side is an
island Nord Ø which is actually four to five miles away. On the left side are the
ends of both Griseøen and Lang ø and these even though they look like they
are side by side are actually a mile apart. From where I am the
Griseøen is about a mile from me. Looking at this photo you
can see how tricky it is to guess how far things are away and what the
distance is between them. |
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GPS point # 41 Starting out paddling in
this area with this golden yellow illumination from behind me in these early
hours seemed very strange. I have only
known this landscape when it was back later in the day with gray and brown
colors every where. I took this photo at You can see the water is
quiet, just some minor swells left over from the storm. |
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#023 |
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Approaching Lange Ø I took
some wonderful photos of the low light in the north reflected on the rocks. This reflected light is
what you see when the sun just above the horizon in very early spring |
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#024 |
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In the photo above is an
example of the unusual light in In the center you see some
icebergs. These are grounded on the
tip of Lange Ø there is no ice free area on the inside to paddle. My only other option which
I had decided not to do would have been to paddle way out and around. Ice circulating in gyres is
frightening. I felt thoroughly
threatened in the sense that I would be grabbed spun around and around in the
gyre helpless to escape from among the clutches of the ice chunks swirling
madly around. I paddled through the mass
of whirling shards being forced occasionally to collide with luckily a couple
sharp a basketball sized shards of ice. I realized that now I was committed
to getting in my delicate kayak through this madness undamaged. Now as I was paddling among
the ice in the gyre I discovered that once I was committed to paddling
through this gyre, there was no safe and stable way to just back out and
escape. The only solution was to
carefully just paddle. From my cockpit just
looking this ice spinning and roiling about on the water in front of me and
at my sides was sickening, so I made up my mind to just take short glances to
judge where and how strongly to paddle through but definitely not to stare at
this hypnotic motion of the water and ice.
I realized that here I am just a little kayak in the middle of nowhere
that this is no time to become dizzy so I forced myself to just concentrate
in delicately but resolutely paddling through. With resolution I measured
my paddling stroke testing to see that I would maintain my bow in the gyre. I
had to paddle patiently and resolutely maintaining maximum control to just
get myself through. If anything
happened to me, such as losing my balance and rolling over, nobody would ever
know. I really don’t want to
become apart of the food chain that soon! |
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#025 |
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In the photo above now I am
off Lange Ø on open water with some one foot swells coming at me from the
south. Just coming around the bend
are some icebergs that have originated in Upernavik Glacier fifteen miles to
the north that are making their way out to open water where I am. In years past only in 2008
did I see any parade icebergs in this area between Umiartorfik on Lange Ø and
Agpagdiit the northwest point on Sandersons Hope on these two tips. The depth where these icebergs are is great
but off the island to my right, Lange Ø, there are extensive shallows where
icebergs of this size would easily strand. It is weird watching
absolutely soundless icebergs move and not just stay put in one place
depending on the wind and the currents.
When icebergs make noise is
when they are breaking up then they sound like cannon going off or thunder,
they really get your attention, even make your hair stand on end. I thought it was
interesting to see a layer of fog over Sanderson’s Hope hanging about 200
feet above. In this picture above it
looks like there is no such 3,000 foot peak. I had never before experienced
in this area while paddling this fog is like this but I have seen it
elsewhere in Torssut in the early morning looking like this. Usually in this area there
is no fog and a slight wind. Below is a scanned topo map
showing my route to my campsite the first day. |
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Next is a photo showing the
ice making its way from the dense cluster along the top which is Upernavik
Icefjord toward the opening I passed between Sandersons and Lang Ø. The largest iceberg which
is a tabular type is starting to make its way around the island, Lang Ø, in
the foreground through the passage and will emerge next to Sandersons Hope. |
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#026 |
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This photo below shows a
large iceberg just in front of the peninsula on the low island in the center which
was where I encountered the gyre off Lange Ø.
I suspect that this iceberg
was stranded because it is shallow off this island and I came across its
remnants when I got on the water three days later. Upernavik is around to the
right side of the photo behind the elevation in the foreground. In the foreground is part
of the base of Sandersons Hope. I paddled along in front of
this base where you can see nearly vertical slabs of rock. Where you see a tiny
iceberg off the base is a place where gyres occur on a small scale. Along this coast line there
is no place to land for several miles heading south which is going to the
right in this photo. |
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#027 |
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Paddling worked out to be a
slow ordeal because the waves are swells three feet coming toward me
continually and I suspect that the tidal current was against me all the way
because it was a long slog past Sanderson’s, very arduous. I saw four motorboats
heading for Upernavik from the town Kangersuatsiaq/Prøven about ten miles to
the south. They had to have been storm
bound for the day before so now they were going to Upernavik for some
errands. I found that It is a good
idea to padding near some rocks otherwise I become very bored. I have discovered that just
looking while approaching a destination has no reward because in this
refractory atmosphere there is no depth perception. Everything farther away is just magnified
enough that they just stay the same size no matter how close you are to them
– what a drag! Below is a photo taken from
the airplane that shows just what I mean of detail viewing is much more
rewarding than paddling a mile off shore. Below is a photo from the
air of the southern edge of Sandersons. You can see a slab that is possible
to land on but you can’t get your kayak up over the rocks on the top of the slab. This slab is only a dire emergency landing
place. The waves just slam into this
coast line. After passing the main
portion of Sanderson’s I passed a familiar beach with boulders on it and an
outlet from the lake above. There really is almost no
place to land along this coast or any level ground for camping |
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#028 |
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I took another photo
farther south along this coast just before it breaks to run eastward in 1993
late in the afternoon. The rock strata colors are
startlingly beautiful in this illumination. When I passed by this time
it was back lit and looked very brown and gray all the contrast and
brilliance was gone. |
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#029 |
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I got to the corner and
passed the very colorful rock faces brown, purple, pink and white rocks I was
too tired to take a photo. I needed to
land. It seemed to take forever to get
to the landing place I remembered ought to have been just around the
corner. Actually it was another
couple miles. With the tide running
against me it took a long, long time to get there. I was now feeling tired and
I was looking forward to finding my old campsite I had used in 1993 where I
knew there was flat ground and flowing water from a lake above. |
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I forgot to take a photo of the expanse of yellow
brown slab rock where I landed. It was very tricky landing
on the shallow rock slabs because the swell from yesterday’s storm had remaining
swells to it which were continuing to wash up and then running back down
these long rock slabs. These short swells were a
major problem to me as it takes me too much time to get myself out of the
cockpit after having been so comfortably stuffed in it for so many hours. The cockpit in this kayak is
deeper than most kayaks and really cradles me. It is absolutely comfortable like a deep easy
chair in the living room easy to get into but hard to get out or again later. I figured that if I timed
it right a wave would drop me on this shallow slab I would land, flop over
sideways and get myself out of the cockpit on the dry rock. The worst problem for me is
that on dry land I would have to really fight to get out of the cockpit. I would have to execute a sublime balancing
act as I heisted myself up onto the stern deck and to get my leg over the
side and stand up on that foot. For me
this is very awkward and I just knew from experience that another wave would come
in and refloat my kayak taking me right back out again on its ebb. Meanwhile there I would be
stranded on top of my rear deck precariously balanced or helplessly tilted to
one side with one leg over the side in deep water being carried who knows
where? Next I would be in very deep
water having to get myself back into the cockpit to balance and paddle the
boat back to another attempted landing. I know I have tried this
trick a few times and the only thing I can say is how glad I am wearing a dry
suit in this situation. This area has only long
shallow slanted slab rock, there are no beaches. I looked for any sort of
very shallow flat spot just large enough for me to float in on the back of a
wave and stay while the wave ebbed just long enough so that I could just
light and hop out. What I was hoping
to find was a shallow depression in the slab parallel to the waves with a feed
from below I could paddle in through to the parallel pocket. I did not see anything the
slabs were continuous unbroken surfaces into the water. Then I looked around at my
possibilities and noticed some rocks in the shallows parallel to the beach
not far out. I remembered from having
tried this trick in Stony Creek that I should look for a spot that was among these
rocks where the water would stay corralled between the waves but shallow
enough that I would have to have time to step out on a slab. Next I was looking at these
inviting rocks in the shallows and I found some at just the right depth. All looked fine, so I thought. I set myself
up for a landing thinking I could just heist myself up and hop out between
the waves. So there I was sitting on
the back deck, my wasn’t that nice. Sure,
oops, now just as I was about to step down I noticed that it looked too
deep. Sure enough I was just about to
step into a hole. Next I repositioned and
just as I was about to step down I noticed it looked dark below where I was
about to step and again which could either be another nasty hole with square
sides or some slippery entangling seaweed. Then a wave came in while I
was trying to get my self up onto the stern deck and get my leg over the
side. Sure enough the wave pulled me
back out into deeper water. Indeed these little waves
just having a field day pulling me back out while I was sitting on top of my
paddle balancing myself on the stern deck. Of course the wave was just taking
me out and it was not going to bring me back to where I wanted to be. There I was looking absolutely silly, to
say the least, and it is a good thing nobody was around to see this display
of “did you see what that American did in her kayak? Whew! Now I have seen
everything!” So there I was playing hobby
horse on my kayak, not something I had planned on. I looked rather silly washing back out
sliding down in the cockpit paddling back in again. Then I thought about my
strategies as I remembered John Dowd explaining how to take advantage of
differences in heights of waves as they are occurring in sets. There is usually a numeric cadence to
sets. On the What you do is to count the
waves and see how many waves occur between the highest wave. Then you watch for the highest wave, paddle
in on the back of that wave and you will have time to make a landing at the
highest point the shallows before the next high wave arrives. I choose to look for a
parallel coral in among these same shallow rocks near shore rather than
attempt to jump out over a shallow spot again. What I figured was that I
needed a coral where a high wave would carry me over a coral of rocks on its
highest swell but leave a pool surrounded by shallow rocks exposed during the
rest of the waves in that set. My kayak would stay afloat
in these shallows while I would get myself out and stand up on a safe rock
surface. All I would have to do once
I was safely out of my cockpit and standing up was to tow my kayak out over
the rocks on the next high swell. I
could safely wade to shore. All went
fine and I was very glad that I had remembered this strategy of taking
advantage of the wave cadence and the distribution of the rocks. |
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I was only too happy to be
able to get out safely and just have to wade a short distance towing my kayak
behind me to the shallow slab. I
lifted bow and let the swells float my kayak up above the waters edge. I got out my trusty pool
noodle rollers, put them under the hull and pulled the kayak up the shallow
slab. I had to keep switching bow to
stern the rollers as they ran out under the hull. It was a very long way to actually
get my above the 6 foot high tide line.
I saw some sea weed
remaining where I thought it was absurdly high above the tide line but I
decided to take my chances. I wound up tying my kayak
off on a couple rocks. I was quite worried that
the tide might just get up here and take my kayak away in the quiet of the
night while I was snoozing in my tent. At I noticed here that there
was fog here and there drifting about. |
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All in all I did find this
time that paddling at about I am glad that I happened
to have brought my hood of windproof, soft black material to keep the sun off
my nose and lips. My lithium non-rechargeable
AA batteries in my GPS are still fine from last year. They were very expensive but were worth the
investment. |
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#030 |
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All was going fine I had a
long crossing in front of Sortehul and paddle down Torssukatak to make before
I could come in for a landing and set up camp. I was worried about cross
winds and head winds because I have seen them before here. |
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It seemed a little gray out
so I checked my compass to see how well it was working. I assumed when I left that this new compass
would work. Oh boy now I find that my
magnetic compass on my deck does not work. I thought that I had set
the bungie cord mount on the deck where the compass would be easy to look at
while paddling. I bet that the angle it is
resting on or maybe there is some steel item packed just below may be causing
it to hang up. It does not take much
to hang up a compass. The only ones
that don’t hang up so easily are spherical compasses. I have only my GPS to rely
upon. I just have to go on and
try to figure out some other time what is going on with this compass. |
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According to my GPS reading
I was at N 72°39’01.2”;
W 56°02’16.5”
In
this photo below taken just after I launched to show you a view of Sortehul
from the east side all was very innocuous, just a quiet summer morning around
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Below is what it looked
like when I launched quiet sunny conditions with low swells. Unfortunately I discovered that I could not
recognize islands by color difference because they looked all the same color
no matter how far apart they were. I was really disconcerted
as the last time I launched from here everything made sense. Now the only thing I could do was to just
start out heading for what I thought ought to be the opening of Torssukatak. I sort of took off just
heading across this is my view in the photo below. |
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#031 |
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I sort of took off in a
direction toward an island across the way which turned out to be U I did not
find the navigational aid on the nearby island Qorssorfik that I found in 93
indeed I never found the island because when I left the campsite I started
paddling more or less straight out rather than hugging the shore as I did in
1993. I found myself with that
same lack of visual distance perspective problem. I don’t know from where I was starting out
from everything just looked the same, a dark brown. Part of the problem was the
time of day being at a time in the morning when objects to the east were
backlit and it was slightly gray. The previous time the light
was brighter and things looked different.
In this photo below I could
not gauge distances it all looked like one solid mass of dark brown rock on
the other side. I just headed for the largest lump that also seemed as if it
was out of place on the other side. |
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As I progressed the lump
resolved into an island, Umanaq. I knew that there had to be
islands here and there in this bay and that the opening was along the upper
southwest side. From years of paddling
among the In complete darkness I used
my estimate of distance to thread myself through the islands I had
familiarized myself with under reduced light conditions. Even thought the next
island, Ikermio, worked out to look like a couple small lumps of rock far
away rather than just over there. Ikermio would not be too
particularly significant because it does not have much altitude but It is
considered as a possible emergency landing site on this crossing. As I paddled along I found
the first few miles of crossing from Qaersorssuaq island to Nutarmiut all
seemed very quiet and I thought to myself well isn’t this nice. |
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#032 |
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Then as I neared Umanaq
island 2/3rds of the way across wow it all changed which was just what
happened in 1993. As I neared an island where
there was a summer house the wind cooked up and I was on the receiving end of
some 1 to 2 foot waves broadside things really livened up. The wind came through from
out of Sortehulle pushing the water broadside with the tide. I really wonder how anyone
can land at this summer house because it is just bombarded with waves coming
out of Sortehulle. |
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After battling all the
broadside waves off Umanaq island I paddled past some other shallow
interesting island landmarks I had not seen before. These shores had lots of sea weeds in their
shallows and an interesting coastline of small boulders. I think ducks especially like this area. Then I arrived at Torssukatak
passage under nice calm conditions. Below is a photo taken from
the Iput in 1995 as we were at the beginning of Torssukatak passage, just
rounding the point Qasingortoq on Nutarmiut Island, heading due east down
Torssukatak passage. You can see that there is
no place to land unless you are completely desperate, just a little detail
for those of us who paddle kayaks! |
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#033 |
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Torssukatak passage had
four active waterfalls in 1993 on the north side. Surprising or not surprising this time when
I passed by this time, in 2009. all those waterfalls
were not even damp. All the
accumulated ice and snow up on the top is now gone. Below is a photo taken in
1995 when I was on a boat, Iput, at the first of these waterfalls.
#034 |
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I crossed to the south side
which was a better paddle the current and wind was in my favor. In the photo below conditions looked like
this, bright sun very little wind and I paddled in the shadow of the island. I have for years really
been curious as to whether there are actually no possible landing sites long
this coast. I sailed on the Iput down
this coast in 1995 and saw no landing sites. This time I thought that in
my kayak I have a better opportunity to very closely inspect the coast for
landing sites. I had a lovely paddle very
close to the coast all along Angnertussoq and Singarnaq islands. Once again I did not see
any feasible landing site. The entire
way was packed with solid trap rock chunks with no level place other than to
stand on top of a boulder, no place to set up a tent anywhere except in dire
circumstances there was an emergency beach flanked with endless boulders. Below is a photo from the
Iput showing the cliffs we were passing by on Angnertussoq and Singarnaq
islands and all along this coast line the edge was like what you see in the
picture just rock chunks that have tumbled right down to the waterline. In the photo above just
near the rock you see which was a couple miles from my campsite I think that
the current had turned against me. Previously I was probably
riding the shore eddies down the passage but here the passage turned and
those eddies resolved into contrary current.
Paddling became arduous I was not getting anywhere too fast and I felt
some discomfort in my arms while paddling. Below is a photo of the
next corner I was approaching looking back. |
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#035 |
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I took this photo in 1993
on a quiet summer day. |
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#036 |
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As a cure to the slowing
progress and developing discomfort I resorted to using a rocking style yawing
the boat from side to side to dip the blade in deeper. This change in paddling
technique came from my experience of canoe paddling with a single
paddle. I can never forget my first
experience paddling a canoe in a slalom whitewater race where I watched and
learned that the best forward thrust comes from digging in with a vertical
paddle stroke. The idea in a
whitewater race is to get the canoe back upstream through the gates without
touching the gates. Any other canoe
and kayak stroke simply reduces the thrust of the stroke. With a kayak to obtain full
power via this vertical trusting stroke in a kayak the hull has to be rolled
from side to side to allow the paddle to become as vertical in the water as
possible any other will simply resolve the straight forward propulsion into
yawing or forcing the hull into an arc on each side opposite side from where
the paddle blade is used with each stroke to gain this sort of vertical
stroke power is thrust. I used this technique where
I could really control my kayak and see the results in the calm shadows
approaching my campsite. My campsite was on
Angnertussoq across from the razorbill colony on Nutarmiut island. Finally at long last I
arrived at what I decided to use as a campsite. I had never camped here before. I had passed by my 1993
campsite in the photo above but decided to go to a new place to see what was
there. Ah ha for my new campsite I
came upon a wonderful shallow keyhole beach in bright sun filled endless blue
mussels and seaweeds – couldn’t be better! From this beach I had a
lovely view of the entrance to Laksefjorden just over Nutarmiut. It was a lovely sunny flat
spot for camping with plenty of grass up on top and a pond. From the remnants washed up the beach I
think it is a highly used campsite. |
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#037 |
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Finally not too soon I arrived
at my campsite this was a place I had not been before. I went wading gathering
mussels but - oh no how disappointing! I found that I had forgotten my
cooking pot. I resorted to looking all
over the place hoping that some abandoned cookie tin or large tin can had
washed up that I could use to boil these mussels in. At last after hunting and
hunting I found nothing even remotely usable so I resorted to eating them
raw. I did not want to regret not
eating some mussels at all. Up on top in the grass was
a pond, well sort of! Not so good, it
was largely bog rather than pond. Then I realized as I looked
at the edge of the pond that it was littered with tidal debris, ropes, chunks
of whatever and sea weed. Oops I told
myself this pond has to have some salt water in it. Oh that can’t be I said to
myself. I bet the tide just got up to
the edge but didn’t flood into the pond.
Wow there is a lot of
plants in this pond that looks like sea weed, oh that can’t be it has to be some sort of plant that looks like seaweed, it
can’t really be seaweed, it has to be freshwater. I will just take a taste –
Oh very bad, it has salt in it. Of course what else is new!
This pond is a combination of freshwater and salt water and those weeds in
the pond are pieces of pale-green filamentous seaweed, Sour weed Desmaresta viridis, which can grow in
shallow brackish water. Then I began to also
realize that this boggy pond is being nicely heated up by the bright sun all
day long which explains why it is warm, actually ominously warm – not
good! Well, so much for fresh water
there! Not wanting to believe that
there was no fresh water I looked farther along the beach to find a brook
that fed down from above with usable fresh water. |
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Oh you are going to like
this story. Here is what I did about
dealing with my kayak since I have now adopted the strategy those of us aged
ones are inclined to resort to of using experimentation rather than just
plain brute strength. Now you can just visualize
this strategy, rather than going through the ordeal of dragging my boat up
the sand beach I pulled it halfway out of the water and tied it to some rocks
on each side. I tried the trick of tying
next I found that my great trick was a disaster waiting to happen because now
my faithful kayak is floating with the lines to the rocks on each side were
dangerously taught. All I was doing was risking rolling my kayak over as one
of the rocks would have been heavier and the rock on the opposite side would
have lifted or dragged in the wind. The heavier rock could be
just heavy enough to pull the kayak over.
Oh boy! My great experiment was just not a good idea,
as a matter of fact it was simply awful!
Really I thought to myself
as I recalled that I should have used the outhaul trick. Ho hum, I forgot to bring a
mesh bag. It would have been so easy
to just put some rocks into a strong mesh bag. I could have chosen a spot
off the beach to plop the bag filled with rocks into the water where the
bottom had few rocks. How nice that would have
been to create a pulley by just running that 50 foot throw line from my stern
through the loop on the bag and then back to the top of the beach. Then have another line on
the bow brought to the top of the beach tied off on some stout rock. Oh how perfect it would
have been because I would have been able after unloading my kayak to just
slack off the bow line to pull on the stern line to back the kayak back out
into the water. The kayak would ride
perpendicular to the beach. Even though this time I
used the tide to bring the kayak to the top of the beach still I had the
miserable ordeal of hauling the kayak down over the rocks to the water. This is very stressful for the kayak. Usually in other areas I
was able to find rock ramps which I used foam rollers to roll the kayak on up
the ramp. |
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Paddling is tiring me; it
might be the light, my face was burning after being on the beach without all
my protection. I went in the tent and
slept I suspect that this is fatigue. Now it was dead calm with
just air moving through the fjords. What nerve those mosquitoes
are already showing up here on Amarqua at the beginning of this passage. Just think I am not alone! Oh how lovely! Nothing
like being part of the food chain. Everyone says it is much
hotter up in this part of Below is a photo of my tent
in Laksefjord where the mosquitoes were so dense I up and left in a huge
hurry it was just too much. Later in 2003 I put my
mosquito hat in my paddling jacket pocket so I had some sanity and everyone
else there either wore a net or stood downwind of the smoky fire. Tide is dropping at |
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Thursday July 30th
I received a strong shortwave radio signal at On the next morning,
Friday, July 31st, I for some strange reason I became mixed up
about whether to head across to Nutarmiut island or to continue along the
coastline. I started paddling along
the shore instead of crossing over to the opposite side because it looked at
first as though I ought to go that way. I had trouble gauging
distances because everything looked equal the colors that I usually use to
gauge distances all looked like the same brown. I think it was due to the opposite shore
being where I should have been going being back lit by the morning light. Both sides had this same
dark brown appearance making them look all the same distance from me no
matter if they were over to the east or south and nearer bye. As I started heading more
toward the island south I realized that I had to paddle east across to the
bird cliffs. Really from where I was
they were just across the way but from what it looked like all was
interconnected completely around as if I needed to paddle farther to the east
where I would see the opening to Ammaqqua.
I was confused by appearances all was dark brown. I knew that those bird
cliffs had to be stained white with bird excrement but from where I was
sitting the white did not show up. I
should have checked with my binoculars because they would have picked up the
white on those cliff faces. I was hoping to find once
again some razorbills and awks nesting on the cliffs I saw in 1993. |
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#038 |
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I saw a few razorbills and
some awks but not nearly as many as when I was paddling by in 1993 along the
cliffs of Nutarmiut Ø. Below is a view of coming
past the cliffs. I did not take any
suitable photos of the birds but I used a photo from a previous year. |
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#039 |
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Below is one of those
photos from my kayak showing the birds the island called Quamvik,
the end of the peninsula on Singuaranaq island and
across the way those mighty cliffs on Kangeq which
are just near the opening to Eqaluarsit or Laksefjord. |
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#040 |
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Below is a photo from the
airplane of that same shoreline. My paddle starts at the left side bird cliff
area and goes to the right past the island and dwelling area. As a matter of fact Qamavik is well known to people in this area as a special
site. My first time paddling
through this opening in 1993 was just such a special moment |
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#041 |
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Even in this photo below
you cannot see the opening between Nutarmiut and Sagdlingualua
or |
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#042 |
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Then I came inside the tiny
passage this time I was even more excited because I had been told that people
had definitely lived here. Here I saw
the bright green grass that was evidence of dwellings in this passage. I thought people might live here because it
was a good vantage point for hunting and fishing with a good view of the area. |
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In the photo below I could
not resist showing you just what it looks like as I am just approaching the
hidden opening between Nutarmiut and Sagdlingualua
/ Qamavik island.
It is one of those - who would believe this deal - situations. The photo below my kayak
bow is pointing at the rocks behind the dark island in the foreground. This is the distinctive rocks in the
background unique to the entrance of Laksefjorden. Next is the opening and
there on the left is the grassy area where people once lived in sod houses. |
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#043 |
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Out at the point now I was
on Angmarqua passage and across the way is the east
side of Akuliaruseq island, part of Laksefjord entrance. It doesn’t look like much in this picture
but a few days later wow! was I glad that I could recognize this landmark on
Akuliaruseq island. |
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Looking at the picture you
would never guess that once I rounded the point eastward to the left that the
wind would have come up behind me. Actually it goes with the
territory; wind goes up and down the fjords.
How fast it goes depends on the time of day, temperature and sunlight
intensity. I was coming from a
protected area and the day was progressing so I should have expected this
just because of the physics of the situation. Paddling a kayak gives me
first hand direct experience of any wind tide or current but for me figuring
what are the dominant factors takes practice and thought. |
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So there I found my
unsuspecting self experiencing following seas with two foot breaking waves
behind me that kept with me for the next few miles. Following seas are always
disconcerting, it is as if somebody is throwing you around and you don’t know
when and how strongly it will be. |
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After awhile I just become
synchronized with the motion of the water and relax but be
at the ready for a nasty moment. Sort
of that tense awareness that you just never know be ready to handle it, let
your hips relax and swivel with the waves and keep your shoulders level. Kind
of like doing some exotic hip gyrations! |
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There were another few
miles to where I found a pocket beach with water running – whew. This was a site named
Nutarmiut. It is well known to
everyone because I was a recent dwelling site. |
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In the photo below is what
I saw from my beach campsite of the opening to Laksefjorden. This like Sortehul has unique rocks that I
know all too well from past visits. At the bottom of this photo
is the sandy shallow beach in this sheltered area. I put my tent at the top of
the beach in the loose sand. You might
wonder why I would sleep on this loose sand because what is not good about
sand is that it has a way of getting into everything. It is better to sleep on earth. For staking my tent down I resorted
used a combination of a small but preferably rock tied onto each stake line. To secure the line and tent what I would do
would be choose a large boulder which most conveniently happened to be along
the top of this beach that I could carry. What I did with the boulder
was to place it on top of the tie down line and in between the tent and the
small rock tied at the end of the line.
I would try to tie the small rock on the end of the line so that there
would be just enough space to place a large boulder heavy and large enough to
keep the tent stretched taught and the smaller rock fitting snugly against
the boulder keep the tent tie down line taught. This is an old trick I
learned that it is easy to tie the stake lines to a small rock and to keep it
wedged in place by weighting the stake line between with a boulder. If I don’t have any
boulders around such as in Barrow Alaska then I have to resort to using bags
loaded with equipment on each of the four corners and the snow flaps
converted to sand pockets filled with sand.
It is one of those what do you do with your tent when you are
wind-bound. I have seen this in
Barrow. |
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#044 |
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Now see that water on the
sandy beach, well at the time I took the photo from my tent door the tide was
coming in. So there I was, la de dah,
wondering - will I have to move my tent or am I just high enough that it will
stop before my tent? Ah! Such a nice
thought just before retiring at night, really! All I could tell myself was
that I hope the tide will stop before it gets to my tent. Then again guess what!
There is no place higher on this beach to put my tent. I am up against the bank and from there I
get to climb up above. I really didn’t want to go
through the ordeal of getting everything up the complicated trek between
boulders up the brook to dry ground somewhere up there that might be
level. From what I saw there was where
there were no flat areas, just lumpy bumpy ground with a smorgasbord of rocks
here and there, – beat that. Actually this area
immediately above was an archeological site.
A view of this area above the beach is in the photo below the lumps
and bumps are hidden from view but believe me they are there just waiting for
some unsuspecting victim to set up their tent over them. What you are actually
seeing is some house and meat cache holes and walls along with willow bushes
across the brook on the other side. Looking at the waterline
you can see that there is nothing but cliffs, rocks and a bird colony where
the rocks are stained white from the bird occupation. I was also worried how
strong the wind was going to be over night because I hate slatting tent
fabric. The wind calmed down as the
evening progressed. I saw some clouds high over
the east. The birds were very noisy
until the about 9 or 10 at night they were Glaucous gulls no razorbills or
awks in this colony to my surprise. I have found that razorbill
and auk colonies are very uncommon.
This was something I had not thought about because I had just come
from an auk and razorbill colony a few miles away. Shags / cormorants are very
common but the most common bird colony is of gulls. Greenlanders used to eat
gulls, which specific types I do not know but I was told that it is part of |
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#045 |
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I found a house with elaborate
stone walls and other houses and I took photos of them. This must have been a very
desirable place to live, judging by the nature of the walls of these houses. |
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#046 |
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Here is a photo of these
intricate stone house walls how complex and well built they are. In among the
stones and along the ground nowhere have I seen such a proliferation of
brilliant green clumps of Mountain Sorrel or Scurvy-grass, Oxyria digyna.
This salad is a delight to eat.
It is loaded with vitamin C and A making its juicy leaves very tasty,
like eating both spinach and watercress together. |
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#047 |
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On the west side of the
brook I found eight collapsed sod structures with assorted stones strewn on
the surface and the smaller stone lined holes for meat caches. |
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#048 |
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On the west side of the
brook I found eight collapsed sod structures with assorted stones strewn on
the surface and the smaller stone lined holes for meat caches. |
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Along the stream which is
an exit from a series of bogs and lakes I found huge quantities of duck feathers
and duck manure with heavily trodden paths up along the brook to the lake. I would say that ducks come
here to feed on the rich supply of submerged vegetation and have their annual
remigial molt. This molt renders them
flightless for some time in the summer. |
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The plants along the brook
are much larger than what I usually find due to the robust nitrogen
enrichment from the ducks. Below is Campanula and
Stellaria in unusually large size and density, usually these plants are much
smaller and only occur at the base of steep rock faces were nutrients wash
down into the soil and rocks above. |
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#049 |
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The tide peaked at |
